Yes it is true, tonight is my 1500th blog post for “Tales of a Faithful Dragonslayer.” I have enjoyed sharing our lives with you, and even more than that, I have gotten a lot out of it. I have heard from people all across the globe, and have been blessed by your comments, criticisms, and insights. It has been a blast.
Tonight I want to share about our son Scotty who as regular readers know, wants to be a United States Marine……and no, because people have been asking, this story is not the genesis of my break…..so I will move on here.
To bring new readers up to speed, and to refresh others, Scotty graduated high school in 2011 and was scheduled to arrive at college in St. Louis later that year to study music. He is a talented musician, and was excited about the prospects of this opportunity. He however came to me just a couple of months before he was to leave and told me, thinking I would be mad, that he wanted to become a Marine.
It of course flashed me back to being 17 and sitting in a Marine recruiter’s office. I was a pretty undisciplined kid, okay VERY undisciplined, and I was also probably as they say in today’s language “at risk.” (You can fill in your own blanks if you want) At 17 I had no real supervision and had managed to screw up my life royally on a variety of fronts. I knew I needed to change, and considered nothing other the the Marines.
And like any kid like me, I had dreams of making a real life for myself. The Sargent had me already, I had just not signed my name. But when he asked me what I wanted to do when I got out of the Corps I shared that I thought I would like to go to college and maybe become a doctor. Sure, it was a lofty dream, but I was looking forward in hope. But he apparently did not believe he had me so he said, “You sign with the Marines young man and we will make you a doctor within 2 years.”
In retrospect I am surprised I survived that encounter in light of the things I said to him. They were vulgar and cutting, and the language of my youth, not the language of my life now. But I left and did not sign. I knew better, he was lying to me. And it was one of the biggest mistakes I made in my life.
Oddly enough at the end of seminary I had a chance to go in again…….as a chaplain. It was appealing to think I could fulfill a dream and call myself a Marine, but as I remember you had to go in through the Navy….but the big kicker was that chaplains did not carry guns. It just didn’t fit my MO.
So needless to say, I was deeply honored when Scotty shared his intentions with me. I will be the father of a US Marine, and to me that is a great honor. I will spare you the details, but the gist is that Scotty was scheduled to leave in December of this year for bootcamp and would be away about 9 months and return to serve in the Reserves while finishing college. This weekend however, that all changed.
On SEPTEMBER 24th, Scotty will be flown to San Diego, California where he will begin bootcamp. We will not hear from him for 13 weeks. He will graduate on December 21st becoming a US Marine during bootcamp. He will no longer be serving in the Reserves to finish college….he will have to do that wherever he is stationed. That’s right, Scott is now going active duty and will fulfill his dream AND serve his country. And in my mind, I cannot think of a better subject to post for my 1500th.
These next three weeks I am sure will be a blur, but we are thankful to have them. We are so very proud of him.
Goodnight my friends and God Bless!
Tommy+