encore Center Stage
An Army offi cer takes his sons to watch a special forces unit demonstration jump at Fort Bragg, N.C., and they get an unexpected up close view of the show.
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In 1981, I had returned to the U.S. from a tour in Korea and had been as- signed to a unit at Fort Bragg, N.C., home of the 82nd Airborne Division. As I was a single parent with joint custody, my two sons had arrived to spend the summer with me. A special forces unit was doing a demonstration jump on a drop zone equipped for public viewing, and my children wanted to watch it. I had never visited any of the drop
zones, so I carefully reviewed a map and asked a sergeant how to take my sons to the place where they could sit in the bleachers and watch. (The sergeant ne- glected to tell me he had never been to that drop zone either.) We figured out a way to get there that included driving over a portion of an unpaved and lightly marked road, and my sons and I started out in my red 1981 Mercury Lynx. At what I thought to be the right
place, I turned off the paved road onto the unpaved portion. But soon I realized something was wrong. My oldest son noticed the wheels of my car were lug- ging down in the shifting sand. He sat in the seat asking, “Front-wheel drive will go anywhere, won’t it, Dad?” I knew if I stopped, I would be stuck in the middle of nowhere, so my only realistic choice was to continue forward. Finally, I saw ahead of me the bleachers with people sitting there waiting for the jump. As we approached the bleachers, I heard strange sounds around my car. I
92 MILITARY OFFICER JUNE 2015
turned and was looking right into the face of a special forces soldier who was landing very close to my moving car. More soldiers were coming down all around us. I was driving my car in the middle of a jump!
I could only imagine the scene 2,000 feet up in the air: The jumpmaster prob- ably was addressing the soldiers in the two flights saying, Some idiot is driving a red auto- mobile across the jump zone. We are going to give them a show, and you will jump any- way. We are special forces. Be alert, and do not land in front of that idiot. I reached the pavement
in front of the bleachers and hightailed it out of there. I knew someone must have gotten a description of my car and license plate num- ber, and I waited for my commander to address the issue with me and potential- ly bring my military service to an end. Fortunately, it never came. I remembered as I supervised soldiers in the future the grace that had been shown to me by a command that did not attempt to identify me.
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— Chaplain T. Gregory Matthews is a re- tired Army major. He lives in Longmont, Colo. For submission information, see page 6.
Tell Your Story Submit your humorous true stories (between 400 and 450 words) of ser- vice-related experiences by email to encore@moaa .org or by mail to Encore Editor, 201 N. Washington St., Alexandria, VA 22314. All submissions will be considered for publication.
ILLUSTRATION: WACSO
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