My wife’s
military ID card has to be renewed every four years, and we not only regularly
renew the card at MacDill Air Force Base, but we drive over there several times
a year to buy groceries at the expansive commissary. (It goes without saying
that I am a military retiree; having accumulated 35+ years of active and
reserve service).
And did I
happen to mention I served as a separations, retirement, and reenlistment clerk
at MacDill Air Force Base almost (drum roll) fifty years ago? (Well, I did).
The last
time my wife’s ID card was due to expire, we drove through the main gate, and
proceeded another mile to the Consolidated Base Personnel Building (CBPO);
which just happened to be located in the very same structure in which I had
performed my military duties such a long ago.
We were talking about that particular
visit as my wife and I drove to the base today, and I was absolutely mystified
(and mortified) that four years had come and gone since we last renewed her
card. (Speaking of the all too swift passage of time, I tell people I’m
thirty... as long as I stay away from mirrors).
As we stepped up to the customer
service desk on the first floor of the CBPO, I made an unusual request of the
airman (well, air lady) at the workstation.
“Airman Rodriguez, I served in this
building a very long time ago; on the second floor. Would you mind if I walk up
the stairs, and take a look at my old office?”
To which the young lady responded,
“Well sir. I can’t give you permission
to do that. You understand this is an active duty facility.”
And while I didn’t respond in the
exact manner in which my thoughts transported me, my unspoken impression was,
“Well, duh!”
If
you know me, and I see a valid reason to take a particular action, I don’t
generally take ‘No’ for an answer. And thus, I thanked the young woman, turned
on my heels, rounded the corner, and began to climb up that all too familiar
staircase.
One
short flight. Turn. A second short flight. Open door. Right turn. Five feet. And
I found myself staring into an unfamiliar room. The office in which I had
worked for three years had been converted into a rather non-descript conference
room. A flat screen monitor hung on the south wall. The only thing about the
place which I recognized was its approximate twenty by twenty foot dimensions,
and a row of four over-sized windows which faced the street, (and which I, from
time to time, glanced down at my waiting car).
I
later wished I had taken my wife’s cell phone up that double flight of stairs,
as it would have been wonderful to have gotten a photograph of that memorable
room.
But
as I implied earlier, today was the day to once again renew Jean’s military ID
card, and having negotiated the front gate, I once again aimed my Nissan Altima
towards the Consolidated Base Personnel Building. However, when we arrived in
the parking lot of the once familiar three story edifice, I noticed that the
building was “under attack” by a myriad of construction workers. A large, brown
opaque window had been installed above the entranceway, and stretched upwards
from the ground floor to the rooftop. And I paused to admire its
attractiveness.
At
this point, one of the construction workers stepped up, and after I explained
why we were there, he directed us to the temporary personnel office building
across the street.
Walking
into the foyer of the CBPO, we strode up to the customer service desk, gave a
civilian clerk our names, and stated the nature of our business. And with this,
she invited us to take a seat.
Pt.
3
As I write these words, it occurs to me that
the last time we renewed my wife’s ID card, we were forced to wait an amazing
four hours before being served. This time around, the process was expedited.
For just an hour after we entered the building, a young male sergeant walked up
from a nearby hallway, and in a loud voice shouted, “Now serving Staff Sergeant
McDonald.” (That was my cue).
Jean and I stood up, greeted Airman Furman,
and followed him down the hall from whence he had made his sudden appearance.
As we approached the fourth office on the right, he made an immediate right, we
followed him through the door, and sat down by his desk.
While I am by demeanor and habit a slight
introvert, I could not help but make the twenty something airman aware of my
military lineage.
“You know I served on this base almost half a
century ago, and I worked in that building across the street.” Of course, the
good sergeant had recently fulfilled his duties in that building; ‘til it was
‘let out’ for remodeling. And I continued to provide the young man more
information than he’d ever hoped for. “Matter of fact, I worked on the second
floor in the Separations and Reenlistments office. A few years ago I noticed
they’d turned it into a conference room.”
Sergeant Furman humored me with a smile, and
as he completed my wife’s ID card, I told him that in ‘my day and time’ we
typed all our military documents on electric typewriters, and rather than a
computer monitor, and keyboard on every desk, a designated airman input
pertinent information on a desk-sized mainframe computer; the only computer in
the entire building.
And to his credit, the young military
whippersnapper feigned interest in my protracted story.
The young man completed Jean’s ID card in a
matter of five minutes, and as he stood up to bid us ‘adieu,’ I spoke.
“Sergeant Furman, would you mind if I sat down
at your desk, and my wife snaps a picture of me? You know, for old times sake.”
Unlike the customer service representative of
four years ago, and her unwillingness to cooperate with my simple request, the
young sergeant was totally conducive, and moved out of the way for me to assume
his coveted seat. (Well, maybe not all that coveted). I realized that while I
might never get a photograph of yours truly seated in the approximate place
across the street where I once performed my duties, this was the closest thing
to it. One of numerous offices, one of numerous desks, in the temporary
personnel building, a hundred feet from the site in which I had once so
faithfully executed my role on this very military base.
As I dropped my derriere into the warm typing
chair, I directed my eyes at the clerk’s monitor, and rested my fingers on the
keyboard. And click, click my wife popped off a couple of pictures. With this,
I almost regretfully rose from the chair, thanked the airman, shook his hand,
and we stepped out the office door, down the hallway, out the front portal, and
strode to our car.
It was only after we arrived home, and I ‘took
a gander’ at the photos that I realized how very old I looked! That thin,
fresh-faced airman of the Vietnam War era had metamorphosed, and a noticeably
heavier, balding sexagenarian had assumed his place.
They say you can’t go home again. Well, I
don’t know about that, but I’m glad I had the opportunity to ‘do it just one
more time.’
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