Flags of Our Fathers

My father died last year.

He wasn’t a good father. See, he divorced my mother when I was a teenager. Then he divorced the rest of us a year later. He left the state and we never saw him again. I phoned him a few times over the years, but that’s not the same. Good dads don’t disappear. But I loved him nonetheless.

My sister called the sibs with the news of his death. She found out by doing an internet search. Yep, Google informed us that my father died somewhere in Oklahoma. She emailed us the obit. He got a military funeral.

Not a good dad, but he was a good soldier. He was a career soldier with 22 plus years in the US Army. A Master Sergeant. As long as I knew him, people called him “Sarge”.

We grew up on military bases in Japan, Texas, Missouri and Alaska. For a black family in the 1960’s, this gave us a life unreachable for most of the African-American community. We had all the creature comforts of middle-class American life - safe neighborhoods, good schools, social opportunities. Just as important, I think, my father was treated with respect in this world.

In the nineteen-sixties, there weren’t too many places a black (back then “negro”) man could succeed in mainstream (read white) America. Entertainment, sports, maybe. But in the military, he wasn’t judged by his color, he was respected for his rank and accomplishments. He was a Master Sergeant and Sergeants run the Army. They are treated with the highest respect, by grunts and officers alike. He earned their respect - he was a good soldier.

My father gave us a life that allowed all seven of us kids to have relatively safe childhoods, get good educations, and travel the world. Most blacks didn’t have these benefits back then. The Army gave us that. My dad gave us that. He was a good soldier.

If a father’s goal is to have his children do better than he did, I guess he achieved that. Us kids are mostly OK. Had he stuck around, I’m sure he would have been proud.

I went to a cemetery yesterday, Memorial Day, to honor my father. The soldier.

Goodbye, Sarge. Dad.

Faith of our fathers, we will love
Both friend and foe in all our strife;
And preach Thee, too, as love knows how
By kindly words and virtuous life.
~ Frederick William Faber