U.S. Navy Cmdr. Joseph B. (Joe) Hornbuckle 3rd is feeling deeply thankful this week. Mr. Hornbuckle, 38, who earlier this year returned from spending six months in Southern Afghanistan, shared his stories of travel with Chilmark schoolchildren on Tuesday. It was also a time for him to say hello and thanks to all his Island friends.

Around Christmastime, a year ago, Mr. Hornbuckle received a big package from the Chilmark School. At the time he was working at the NATO headquarters in a plywood office in Kandahar. The package contained colorful gifts from the children. “I was one of maybe a half dozen Americans there,” he said. The temperature outside was around 25 degrees. “It gets really cold in the desert,” Mr. Hornbuckle said. There was no mystery about the package, he remembered. Outside there was a picture postcard of the Chilmark School.

The package contained personal handwritten letters, many of them from fifth graders. “Each one of the students wrote a several-page note. There were drawings. They told me who they were. They asked questions. There were flags drawn on the letters. They spoke of life on the Vineyard. It reminded me so much of the Vineyard. I sat for hours reading them,” Mr. Hornbuckle said. “The letters were thoughtful, touching.”

Mr. Hornbuckle is an avid recreational fisherman who has been in the Navy since he was 17. His wife is the former Jackie Jardin of Chilmark.

“There are so many people on the Island who were particularly thoughtful,” Mr. Hornbuckle said this week. He said many of the gifts he received in Afghanistan were shared with colleagues or passed on to an orphanage nearby.

Mr. Hornbuckle, his wife and their two daughters, Ruth, 11, and Isobel, 7, live in Maryland. The Vineyard has always been an important part of their lives.

“This is a special trip. It is the first time I’ve been back since the deployment. I was here for the July Fourth parade in 2007. I marched in that parade with the veterans. I was treated warmly. Normally we get back to the Vineyard a couple times a year,” he said.

His trip to Afghanistan put the schedule off a bit.

Last year he began a nine-month deployment, which included six months in Afghanistan. The deployment ended last March.

This is a big weekend in other ways — Mrs. Hornbuckle has a 25th high school graduation reunion.

“This trip has been a focus of Thanksgiving for me,” Mr. Hornbuckle said. “There is a message here that we want to send to the kids. We have so much to be thankful for. Even though the economy seems poor and there is negativity in the air, the message to share with the children is that we have a lot to be thankful for.”