Sailors drill at the Naval Station Great Lakes in Lake County, Ill., April 14, 2020.
Photo:
Stacey Wescott/Zuma Press
Chicago
They have no idea if they will be home with their families for Christmas.
They were a group of about 25 young men. On a recent frigid Saturday, I ran into them at Midway International Airport. They were sitting in a remote corner of the terminal, a few yards down the corridor from a compact, crowded United Service Organizations lounge.
All were in their dress blues. These were their first hours out of boot camp at Naval Station Great Lakes in Lake County, Ill.—their first hours as official sailors. They were bound for Pensacola, Fla., for their next round of training. Some appeared calm and confident, others a bit nervous.
A few were sleeping in the hard airport chairs out in the concourse. It was no wonder why. One of the sailors told me that at 11 p.m. the night before, they had been informed that they would be bused to the airport. They arrived at Midway around 2 a.m. Now it was late morning; they had been at the airport for more than nine hours. Their flight wasn’t until 5 p.m.
Fifteen hours is rather early to be showing up for a plane, but they seemed to discern that this was the military’s way: the time-honored “hurry up and wait.” One sailor, his round white cap (caps forever known in the Navy as “Dixie cups”) perched atop a duffel bag, said there were no officers with them at Midway or on the flight. The idea, as he understood it, was for them to get themselves down to Pensacola as a team, where processing awaited.
Christmas? No one had told them anything. They were holding out hope for a break during training so they could spend a few days with loved ones in their hometowns. But they also knew that their arrival in Pensacola was falling so close to the holiday that they might have to celebrate it there. And after that? Assignments to wherever in the world they might be deployed.
Around us in the…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at RSSOpinion…