That the sh!t hit the fleet.
After torturing the plebes one last time on Herndon, we’d had a week’s worth of fin de siecle parties on and around the campus – the “N” dance for varsity athletes over at Hubbard Hall, where the crew team tormented themselves for most of the year, was a highlight – it was the only affair in the Yard that served champagne, as I recall. Tropical whites and tiki torches reflected the Severn River. With all of the beautiful young men and women, it had the feeling of a movie set from the 1940′s, the “before” picture setting the left bookend to an unknowable “after” – an “after” whose ghostly contours are now, after 25 years, growing daily more distinct.
Finally the preparations were complete it was time to mill around smartly outside as the underclasses marched to the stadium to bid us farewell with ever-descending degrees of sincerity; the second class with whom we had become fast friends, the youngsters who still eyed us with all the caution that one uses around a biting dog that wags its tail, the plebes with a cordial loathing. A rustling in the seats as we sat down, an interminable speech or two – brave new world, sea lines of communication, the defense of the republic from the Soviet Menace, etc. Then, finally, graduation and commissioning of the top 10% in order of class rank, the rest of us alphabetically (your correspondent was solidly in the top 90% of his class). Hat’s up (and down, it turns out). The fat gold bar of an ensign replacing the thin one of a first class midshipman.
The smiles and handshakes after, the promises to keep in touch, that we’d see each other in the fleet. Promises we sometimes kept, but the tendency of things is always towards disorder, towards chaos. There would in any case be new loyalties to supercede that sacred word “classmate” – a word that had gotten us all through a difficult four years. There would be roommates, wingmen, squadron mates, messmates, shipmates, service buddies, Marines, dogs and finally, sojers.
Today we head down to the university campus to see our replacements join the line, NROTC midshipmen from the local universities: SDSU, UCSD, USD and Point Loma Nazarene. Three young people that we have fed and entertained for the last three years will be commissioned, two will change uniforms entirely. Our young man will lead the color guard, having exchanged the two diagonal stripes of a midshipman second class on his shoulder boards with the single, thin, horizontal stripe of a first class midshipman .
The cycle continues.
At some point, one of the young people you have fed, counseled and mentored all these years will step up and ask that you be the one to “swear them in” –read the commissioning Oath.
My dad did that for several of his Air Force Academy cadets. It was a signal honor for them, and a touching moment of deep pride and humility for him. Strangers when they first arrived at our home, they soon became and remain to this day family, my “grandbrothers and grandsisters”.
20 something years later, they are still trying to live up to the ‘special trust and confidence’ he resposed in them. He always felt that mentoring them in their careers was the greatest accomplishment of his service.
May you be so blessed.
Nice post. Almost forgot that this past Wednesday made it 10 years since my days of over the walls (behind the chapel, the wall was the lowest), wearing wool parade uniforms on Friday afternoons, IHTFP, chow calls, standing Mate of the Deck, smell of new whiteworks on a hot day…
God I miss Mother B. GO NAVY, BEAT ARMY! ’97 RULES!
Sir, your turn of phrase is really unrivaled. I read the archival post first, then this one. You are one consistently great writer.
And if I remember it correctly, you HAVE been asked to swear someone in…and you waxed eloquent there as well.
What vivid experiences you paint for us – with my gratitude for your service, for your son’s service, for the service of the pending graduates and for the commitment of all the families involved.
Have a great time Lex. Don’t forget to bring the hankies…
One year ago I watched SNO throw his hat. It is like a blur to me now.
4 Years?!?
Wow, only took 14 weeks to make an officer in Pensacola. Is Annapolis for the slower of the Officer wannabes? Hmmm.
Hey Bob, hows about a cost comparison?
Nose
i’m two days past my 23rd grad anniversary myself.
such memories.
Lex,
If I have the right of it, your eldest will receive his commission about the same time you retire, yes? “Chain unbroken,” indeed…
It’s been quite a day all around. I started at MCRD at 0900 going through the museum with visiting Marine compadres, then lunch pleasantly interrupted with a call from Anbar where the news is no news since the vbied three weeks ago. No news being good news, we moved on to the Midway, another local attraction I’ve never visited, satisfied the tourists, validated my judgment, and now rest my weary limbs with some Lex, Fox News, and Tanqueray. Life is good. I raise my glass to the young steely-eyed killers, and the Ensign too. May God bless them all.
Hey, Casca! Don’t diss the Midway! I’d be there everyday if I could…
Yeah, I’m a starry-eyed sap.
I’m not dissin’ it. I’ll go back one day when my low power light isn’t on. I’m just not romanticly involved with it. Going to sea for me was all barking shins, boredom, and waiting for the next landing/port call. You know the Marine plan of the Day… eat til you’re sleepy, sleep til you’re hungry.
Now if you want aviation romance, March is fabulous, also the aviation museum in Balboa Park. They even tell me that the wingnuts at Miramar have some painted old tarts up there.
Actually there was a highpoint. As I was leaving, I crossed paths with a fellow wearing a VMGR-352 hat. Since I’ve jumped out the door or off the ramp of every C-130 they own, my ears went up. Alas, we had no time to BS.
Thanks for the memories. It’s been eighteen years since I had the pleasure of administering the oath to SNO at VMI. He has gone on to become a squadron commander, now spending a great deal of time in the unfriendly skies somewhere “beyond the seas.”
Raising children is life’s greatest challenge, but nothing beats the validation of having a grizzeled old Master Chief come up to you to tell you that your son is “the finest officer I’ve ever served with.”
Since I know that no Master Chief would ever lie, or even tell sea stories, I must have done something right along the way. And that is reward enough.
Marine6 Sends
I was just teasin’, Casca. I figured your opinion was colored by those delightful days at sea in cramped quarters with nothing to do ’til you got to your destination.
I’m sure there’s more than a bit of romance to it in my mind, but thanks to Lex’s great story-telling ability, the hook has been set and I am now fascinated by anything related to naval aviation. So, a visit to the Midway is the closest I can get to doing what I’d be doing if I had it all to do over again… (Enough do-do in that sentence for you?)