We would dance
in our Class A uniforms, trousers to trousers, patent leather corfam
dress shoes to patent leather corfam dress shoes. Those of us who were
confident that we had few enough demerits or enough extra merits to pass
the Saturday morning inspection and get a pass to be able to go off
base from noon on Saturday until 4pm on Sunday were the happiest. If
not, we would at least be looking forward to some rest and peace.
Our squadron comrades would pull together to help those who were having trouble with the requirements of The United States Air Force Officer Training School (OTS) near Lackland Air Force Training Base, just outside of San Antonio Texas.
OTS was three months long if you graduated on the first try. Some officer candidates had to recycle and do however much was required over again. Some were cut from the program. Some even disqualified themselves. For the first half of the training we were not allowed to go off base at all.
For the second half the bar kept getting higher and higher in order to earn the privilege of spending the night and two half days or so either side of it. Some of us just stayed in Sam Antonio enjoying the River Walk. . . Spending time in Brackenridge Park riding on the little train of the kind you sometimes see at zoos or parks . . . Walking around the hanging gardens in the old stone quarry.
We were so used to marching everywhere with at least one other person, but usually with ten to twenty other officer candidates in our squadrons or with the whole group while practicing on the parade ground for our commissioning parade. The sun bore holes directly through the patent leather covers of our corfam shoes so that you could tel the sun's position overhead without looking up into the sky.
So we would be walking across the fields of the park or down trails and someone would have to say, "Break STEP," so we would be moving ahead perambulating using the opposite foot forward from whoever we walked alongside.
Then at the end of the day somewhere around 6-9 of us each would find a place to sleep on a bed or on the floor, still in our civvies, dead to the world because being exhausted was part and parcel of the training.
They told us they were trying to show us where our breaking points were and so we could learn how to push past through them . . . or sleep and understand that no one was indispensable, though all together as a team we were essential.
We were given tasks which taxed our personal capabilities and exercises the helped us learn how to lead a team or how to relinquish the leadership role in favor of aiding our suasion members to fulfill our assignments as a viable collective working unit.
An upper classmate named Tierney would stand across the hall from me during Saturday morning inspections, making faces at me when the inspectors were not looking, trying to get me to laugh and spoil my chances to go off base. The closer we got to the date of our commissioning . . . on Amelia Earhardt's birthday in 1980 . . . July 24th. . . the more second nature it became to be in inspection order all the time . . . even in the few hours of sleep we got every night if we were lucky.
Once when we were about halfway through I called home where I trusted that their dad was taking very good care of our daughter Krista, who was eight years old; and our son, Tom, who was a few months short of turning six. After catching up a bit, my husband said, "Kath! Your children are so wonderful!"
And I was confused and queried, "What are you taking about? Of course they are, but they are your kids, too."
"Yeah," he answered. "But I didn't know them at all."
We had a lot of joy when he brought them to our family picnic weekend. He and Krista drove down to the picnic pavilion in the car, but officer candidates were not allowed to be in a car on base unless we were leaving with a pass. So Tommy marched down the hill from my quarters with me. If a car with an officer sticker on the wind shield came toward us, we were required to salute because certainly the officer inside was above rank to us since we had no official rank -- only cadet ranks.
Tommy saluted when I did, and it turned out the commander of OTS, the highest ranking active duty officer we had was the driver of the car. As he returned our salutes he had a big smile on his face.
The hardest thing I ever did was that I left my kids for three months in order to do what I felt the Lord was calling me to do -- using my Russian language skills and other talents and experience to serve our country. Seeing the kids part way through was bittersweet because it was so difficult to let them go.
Tommy was sure he could get me to come home with them, and it broke my heart to break his heart and tell him that I couldn't. I told them that I was as close as a thought and that I would be with them in spirit.
Sometimes in the moments before falling asleep I would imagine what they had done that day and move into a dream of being with the them.
My kids' dad came in active duty as an Air Force officer ten months before I did, so he swore me in at the recruiting office in New Orleans the morning I left for Texas, and three months later, he required the commissioning oath from me the evening before our commissioning parade.
All that was very moving and meaningful, but in the three months of OTS and the four months of Air Intelligence Officer Training in Denver, I only saw them all four times. Although I didn't know the Lord very well in those days, I had an inkling of faith and a smidgen of hope that He would use everything for good.
* * * *
Twenty-six years ago I was preparing to leave our house on Keesler Air Force Base near Biloxi, Mississippi where my husband was in training as a communications officer. We had wonderful fellowship with the members of his class and their spouses and kids. Every Saturday we would put an un-stuffed turkey in the charcoal kettle grill. Four hours later, after a rollicking rough house of a touch football game on the gulf beach we would have a great party. We supplied the turkey and bread. Everyone else brought all sorts of delicious dishes and whatever they wanted to drink.
During the last game I attended a few days before leaving for OTS, we stayed up all night, taking, dancing, laughing, eating, and playing games. The kids all had a ball, too.
It was the best send-off I could possibly have had.
Today and always, Beloved, may the Lord continue to bless and keep you and yours.
Our squadron comrades would pull together to help those who were having trouble with the requirements of The United States Air Force Officer Training School (OTS) near Lackland Air Force Training Base, just outside of San Antonio Texas.
OTS was three months long if you graduated on the first try. Some officer candidates had to recycle and do however much was required over again. Some were cut from the program. Some even disqualified themselves. For the first half of the training we were not allowed to go off base at all.
For the second half the bar kept getting higher and higher in order to earn the privilege of spending the night and two half days or so either side of it. Some of us just stayed in Sam Antonio enjoying the River Walk. . . Spending time in Brackenridge Park riding on the little train of the kind you sometimes see at zoos or parks . . . Walking around the hanging gardens in the old stone quarry.
We were so used to marching everywhere with at least one other person, but usually with ten to twenty other officer candidates in our squadrons or with the whole group while practicing on the parade ground for our commissioning parade. The sun bore holes directly through the patent leather covers of our corfam shoes so that you could tel the sun's position overhead without looking up into the sky.
So we would be walking across the fields of the park or down trails and someone would have to say, "Break STEP," so we would be moving ahead perambulating using the opposite foot forward from whoever we walked alongside.
Then at the end of the day somewhere around 6-9 of us each would find a place to sleep on a bed or on the floor, still in our civvies, dead to the world because being exhausted was part and parcel of the training.
They told us they were trying to show us where our breaking points were and so we could learn how to push past through them . . . or sleep and understand that no one was indispensable, though all together as a team we were essential.
We were given tasks which taxed our personal capabilities and exercises the helped us learn how to lead a team or how to relinquish the leadership role in favor of aiding our suasion members to fulfill our assignments as a viable collective working unit.
An upper classmate named Tierney would stand across the hall from me during Saturday morning inspections, making faces at me when the inspectors were not looking, trying to get me to laugh and spoil my chances to go off base. The closer we got to the date of our commissioning . . . on Amelia Earhardt's birthday in 1980 . . . July 24th. . . the more second nature it became to be in inspection order all the time . . . even in the few hours of sleep we got every night if we were lucky.
Once when we were about halfway through I called home where I trusted that their dad was taking very good care of our daughter Krista, who was eight years old; and our son, Tom, who was a few months short of turning six. After catching up a bit, my husband said, "Kath! Your children are so wonderful!"
And I was confused and queried, "What are you taking about? Of course they are, but they are your kids, too."
"Yeah," he answered. "But I didn't know them at all."
We had a lot of joy when he brought them to our family picnic weekend. He and Krista drove down to the picnic pavilion in the car, but officer candidates were not allowed to be in a car on base unless we were leaving with a pass. So Tommy marched down the hill from my quarters with me. If a car with an officer sticker on the wind shield came toward us, we were required to salute because certainly the officer inside was above rank to us since we had no official rank -- only cadet ranks.
Tommy saluted when I did, and it turned out the commander of OTS, the highest ranking active duty officer we had was the driver of the car. As he returned our salutes he had a big smile on his face.
The hardest thing I ever did was that I left my kids for three months in order to do what I felt the Lord was calling me to do -- using my Russian language skills and other talents and experience to serve our country. Seeing the kids part way through was bittersweet because it was so difficult to let them go.
Tommy was sure he could get me to come home with them, and it broke my heart to break his heart and tell him that I couldn't. I told them that I was as close as a thought and that I would be with them in spirit.
Sometimes in the moments before falling asleep I would imagine what they had done that day and move into a dream of being with the them.
My kids' dad came in active duty as an Air Force officer ten months before I did, so he swore me in at the recruiting office in New Orleans the morning I left for Texas, and three months later, he required the commissioning oath from me the evening before our commissioning parade.
All that was very moving and meaningful, but in the three months of OTS and the four months of Air Intelligence Officer Training in Denver, I only saw them all four times. Although I didn't know the Lord very well in those days, I had an inkling of faith and a smidgen of hope that He would use everything for good.
* * * *
Twenty-six years ago I was preparing to leave our house on Keesler Air Force Base near Biloxi, Mississippi where my husband was in training as a communications officer. We had wonderful fellowship with the members of his class and their spouses and kids. Every Saturday we would put an un-stuffed turkey in the charcoal kettle grill. Four hours later, after a rollicking rough house of a touch football game on the gulf beach we would have a great party. We supplied the turkey and bread. Everyone else brought all sorts of delicious dishes and whatever they wanted to drink.
During the last game I attended a few days before leaving for OTS, we stayed up all night, taking, dancing, laughing, eating, and playing games. The kids all had a ball, too.
It was the best send-off I could possibly have had.
Today and always, Beloved, may the Lord continue to bless and keep you and yours.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.