My dad was in the Army, and I grew up on military bases all over the U.S. and in Germany. In my experience, military communities, even in peacetime, pull together and provide a good, steady environment for raising children. At the age of ten (1981) I lived in Fort Bragg, NC, in a housing area set aside for officers who had families. It was a five minute bike ride from a similar area for NCO families, and it all pretty much blended into a single community without much consideration for rank.
As soon as we moved in, our family name went up on a sign outside the house, and we started getting a flood of neighbors coming over with casseroles, offers of assistance, and invitations to come by and meet the kids. Every other house likewise had the family name posted in plain view, so it was a simple matter to learn who lived where, and which families had kids your own age. Families with “problem children” were identified quickly and the entire community parental network kept their collective eyes on them. Race, creed, and color were never issues that kept kids apart. I had best friends who were Black, Latino, Korean, and God-knows-what-else, and nobody ever made a big deal of it. A family’s non-European or non-Christian heritage was more of an interesting quirk than anything to get worked up about.
During summers and on Saturdays I was free to wander through the nearby forest, ride my bike miles away from home, visit other kids’ houses at will – and all without asking my parents. Since Saturday cartoons were over at noon, and most people believed that Atari would ruin your TV, couch potato kids were unheard of. We had basketball and tennis courts nearby, swimming pools, an ice rink, horse stables, a bowling alley, summer camps, and an activity center to keep us busy. If my parents were ever concerned about my wanderings around the neighborhood, they kept it pretty well hidden.
A fairly typical scene from my boyhood was something that happened now and then around 5:00 on warm weekday evenings. Since most everybody’s dad got home from work around the same time, it would be normal to see five or six or them standing in the street (we lived on a cul-de-sac) in their camo fatigues and combat boots, shooting the breeze and kicking a soccer ball around while trying not to spill their beer. It was not at all unusual to have paratroopers landing in the field behind our house, or to have the 82nd Airborne Choir performing at our school and singing an only slightly edited version of Blood on the Risers to the giggling mirth of the third graders. Your average army brat was quite accustomed to going by military time (13:00 hours for 1:00 pm) and could convert to and from “civilian time” without thinking twice. Most of my friends couldn’t name more than a few pro football teams, but they could tell you about most of the major engagements of World War II.
During times of crisis, everyone pulled together even more. I recall when a massive training jump out in the California desert went horribly wrong and a number of soldiers were dragged to their deaths by high surface winds. My cub scout troop’s scoutmaster was among the dead. I remember clearly the way everyone went out of their way to provide every kind of support to the families who had lost a loved one. During the Iran hostage crisis, there was hardly a house in the entire area that did not have a red, white and blue flag emblazoned with the number 52 hanging on the front door to represent the Americans held in captivity.
Displays of patriotism were pure, unashamed, and unstained by partisan animosity. When the main post flag was lowered at 17:00, everyone within hearing range of the bugle stopped what they were doing, faced the flag, and saluted during the short ceremony. The Forth of July was a huge holiday that everyone looked forward to. Crowds would pack the parade field to witness the 50-gun Salute to the Nation. We kids especially enjoyed the Army band’s annual performance of The 1812 Overture, complete with howitzers. Uncle Sam was not just the provider of Daddy’s paycheck – he was the symbol of our homes, our schools, our lives. There were the unavoidable complaints about bureaucracy and base politics, but the idea of the federal government as an evil, insidious entity was as foreign to us as spoken Sanskrit.
Another thing that made this idyllic boyhood so incongruous was the fact that we lived a few scant miles from Fayetteville, a town that was plagued by violent crime, poverty, and racial intolerance. Fort Bragg was at the time (don’t know if this has changed) an open post. No guards or even gates at the borders. There was no physical boundary to keep the criminal elements out. Yet, to the best of my recollection, they stayed away in droves.
Many years (and several changes of station) later, my father retired from the Army and we moved off-base for the first time I could clearly remember. The difference was startling. Even after 15 years in the same house, I have yet to meet more than a handful of neighbors. Nobody knows anybody else or shows the least inclination to do so. Kids rarely play in the front yards, and the parks remain empty most of the day. My parents, convinced that the neighborhood was gang-ridden, virtually forbid my younger brother from venturing out of the house unchaperoned. Not only do people lock their doors and windows at night, but they install heavy wrought-iron grills with deadbolts over them as well. Although my daughter is only five, I cannot imagine granting her as a ten-year old even a fraction of the freedom I had at that age.
I understand that a lot of what I treasure from my boyhood are products of a world viewed through childish obliviousness to the ugliness of reality, and of my own highly selective memory. I understand that violent crime has steadily decreased over the past twenty years, and that my daughter is probably safer now than I ever was at her age. I understand that Uncle Sam does not always act in ways that are right and just, that America is not universally acclaimed as a bastion of freedom, and that many of our own citizens would rather swallow broken glass than salute the flag. I understand that a multicultural community living in harmony is the exception rather than the rule, and always has been. And yet, even so, I prefer to cling to the belief that it is the world that has changed, and not a change in myself, that makes me see bygone days so rosily-tinted. I was raised with the belief that America was a shining beacon to all the world, just as sure as the sky is blue and that fire is hot. And I would rather hold on to this with every last fiber of my being, and see my childhood as “normal” than give in to the cynicism, fear-mongering, and national self-loathing that so predominates our media.
So at the ripe old age of 33 I very definitely look back at my childhood as “the good old days”. Who could blame me?
