Parent Conversation

50 years ago this week I sat down at the kitchen table with my mother and father and explained to them my intent to enlist in the Navy right after my upcoming 18th birthday. There was a nasty war going on and they were worried but they gave me their fearful blessing with the promise that I would go back and finish college on the GI Bill when I completed my four year service. I did.

There were a lot of similar conversations at kitchen tables all over America during that month of December in 1969. It was the first draft lottery on December 1st and suddenly young men knew more about their chances of getting drafted into the Army to fight the war in Viet Nam. There were many draft parties on college campuses that night where guys sat around and listened for their birth date to be read with the knowledge that there futures and possibly their lives were in the balance. A low number meant you were likely to get drafted and a high number meant you were safe.

My number was 10. I joked that it was the first time I was in the top ten of anything. I enlisted in the Navy a few days later following that conversation at the kitchen table with my parents. 

Following my four years in the Navy I did go to college for four years and I was fortunate that the state of Pennsylvania had a financial program for resident veterans where if you attended a state college or university then you had free tuition from the state. I went to Temple University and it did not cost me any tuition. On top of that I got the federal money from the GI Bill which I could that monthly check to pay for books, fees and living expenses. 

This turned out to be a blessing because a few months after I enlisted my father passed away suddenly from a ruptured brain aneurysm. My family would never have been able to pay for my college tuition after that and the veterans benefits got me my college education.

Fifty years later I still vividly remember that conversation at the kitchen table with my parents. It was actually probably the last time I had a serious talk with my father before he died.