Chapter 1
The James family was an Army
family. Frank and Lacy had met and
married while attending Kansas State University, and Frank had been
commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant shortly after graduation. He had earned his “butterbar” and entered as
an officer because he had been a ROTC student in engineering. The Army loves engineers; not as much as
Infantry or Armor, but it always has something to build or destroy, and
engineers are experts at both. Lacy was pregnant when they graduated, and the
last three months of her college career had been challenging. The coursework in Economics was difficult
enough, but vomiting every morning and feeling nauseous whenever she thought
about food was not what she had expected. Expectations aside though, she and
Frank were ecstatic and anxious at the same time about the radical change of
direction their lives would take.
The Army does not let grass grow
under a soldier‘s feet once he is in its loving care, and Frank was to report
for duty at the US Army Engineer School at Ft. Leonard Wood, Missouri less than
a week after graduation. He had attended
college on a ROTC scholarship and the Army exerted its hold on him during the
summers with assignments in active Army units.
He had even gone to jump school at Ft. Benning and become
“airborne”. While Frank was attending
his basic branch orientation, Lacy did the lion’s share of preparation for
their move from Manhattan, Kansas to Ft. Richardson, Alaska.
Lacy had never dealt with movers
before and it was different from all previous experience. Their moving had been done in pickups and
horse trailers to that point, but packers showed up two days after graduation
and in a flurry of disassembling and boxing their meager possessions, she was
left talking to herself in an empty house.
She was starry-eyed in love with Frank, but she wasn’t sure she was in
love with the Army and she was beginning to understand that her needs were
always secondary to the “needs of the service”.
She packed her suitcase with whatever was left in the house, and headed
to the airport; destination: San Antonio.
She was born and raised there and would visit her parents for a month
before she and Frank planned to rendezvous in Anchorage after his orientation.
The month crawled by. She was happy to see her family, tired of
puking every morning, and missed her husband, so when July 23 arrived, she was
more than ready to get on an airplane and fly north. She said her goodbyes to her Mom and Dad, and
8 long hours later, she arrived at the Ted Stevens International Airport in
Anchorage. Frank’s flight landed at
almost the same time, and they were met by their “sponsor” family from Ft.
Richardson. They stayed in a hotel
facility on Ft. Richardson for another month waiting for their quarters to open
up and for their shipment to arrive. When
they finally moved in, met their neighbors, learned how to live with the
military, and explored the area, the blur was beginning to abate.
Lacy’s morning sickness had finally
gone away and Frank was learning what it was like to be a 2nd.
Lieutenant. It was better than being a
Private. Sort of. The months flew by, winter showed up in late
September, and in November, Lacy gave birth to a beautiful baby boy, John.
The next 14 years were like a cd
player in repeat mode. Every three years
they would receive orders which would transfer them somewhere else in the
world, Frank would receive promotions and responsibility he dealt with well,
and Lacy would deliver three more beautiful babies from whom she learned what real responsibility was all about. Meanwhile, as their family grew up, so did
the world. IPods and cellphones became
ubiquitous and peace in the world was elusive.
Frank had served a 1 year tour in Iraq helping with reconstruction after
the overthrow of Sadaam Hussein, but this time their assignment was to
Germany.
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