John Richard Haddick------------Since Then
Since non-graduating with the PBHS Class of `56 [thank you Mrs. Grace Norton, it WAS the best thing that could have happened] I found myself in a bit of a quandary as the four years of high school, and the eight prior had been sort of pointing to some training in music somewhere during which I�d either evolve into a studio musician or become a broker of recreational substances, or both. Therefore finding myself �out da door� with no diploma and with marketable skills limited to bagging groceries, pumping gasoline, and learning how to stay awake during drive-in theater second features I was easily on the fast track to perdition. About then my parents opined that the room and board rate was about to escalate and queried how I intended to meet these economic realities.
Having done really good in Mr. Harding�s Business Math class and knowing from Shop that I couldn�t hold two pieces of wood together, much less make anything from dead forest material and the closest I�d come to appreciating the FFA was during the stocking and displaying of produce at Food Fair, I determined that I�d best find something that would provide shelter and clothing, reasonably fresh food, and a bit of �chance� funds*. [* You�ll have a better chance to score if you have money in your pocket, not tied up in promises.] Being a cabana boy at the Boca Raton Club or a numbers runner intern on Miami Beach both seemed less then splendid prep for the future, especially as the Cuban connection was beginning to utter sounds of discontent from a lad named Castro.
This left expanding on the awareness gained during almost two years with the Florida National Guard out of the armory in Fort Lauderdale. Crawling around in the dirt and mud or holding still while any number of creatures [identities completely unknown as Biology had been scheduled during my �rest� period] noshed upon me were not events that caused tremendous positive adrenal response so the Army and Marines were moved to the bottom of the pile. At that time the Air Force manned scores of bases in areas that hardly ever saw the light of day, much less the warmth of the sun�s rays, so that narrowed the field to the Navy. Well, also the Coast Guard but then I�d probably be assigned to the Hillsborough Light House and still get in trouble with the life forms adorning the beaches or else I�d be driving one of those little boats around and checking to see how drunk the yacht owners were and their barely clothed wives, daughters, girl friends might need the �Hugger Knees In� resuscitation technique [this was even before mouth to mouth!] in order to stay well over the upcoming six or so hours, and gee, that, too, might be problematic.
So Navy it was and by late July 1956 I was learning seafaring lore at Great Lakes Recruit Training Command outside Chicago, Illinois. While there I obtained a high school GED, two year college equivalency, joined the First Methodist Church (only church off base that did not lock its doors at night) and somehow went through a battery of tests that indicated possible understanding of electronics and technical systems [sorry Mr. Barton, it seems ergs and ohms and F=MA just needed another way of presentation besides tossing chalk at closed eyes in the back row.] It seems I could also do investigative research [good on you Mrs. Payne] and had some gift for creating word pictures [yeah, Mr. Hagman] and was both a good listener [who---aah Mr. Ousley] and knew the future was based on understanding the past [yes, Ms�s Rundell and Murphy] though I could never diagram a sentence and usually made three mistakes when spelling �cat� [sorry Ms�s Creech/Johnson, Southern, you gave it your best shot but Marlene Lenz said that typing was a skill I could use even if the words were not correctly spelled, and she, well, she just presented in a different way].
By October 1956 I was stationed on the Navy Base at Key West learning how to operate anti-submarine search equipment and was getting some social awareness training at Arthur Murray�s Dance Studio in town and picking up a bit of Spanish during some liberty calls in Havana. Every couple of weekends I�d hitch-hike up Route 1 to get a hair cut in Pompano and get to visit places along Old Dixie that I�d been thrown out of a year earlier. Began to focus in on an individual who was still a�Bean-picken and who�s dad had been a close friend of my father�s for twenty or so years but her step-Mom made the determination that a non-Catholic sailor was probably the tool of the Devil and blocked cultivating that garden.
In mid-`57 someone on base suggested I take a test for the Naval Academy Preparatory School, whatever that was, and I did just to take another test�see, the psychological burden of missing so many tests in high school due to suspensions and the like [thanks Mr. Carlisle, it did prepare me better then staying in school]. I somehow scored high enough to get orders to Naval Station Bainbridge, Maryland where I learned what real night life was in Lancaster, PA and what life on the docks meant in ole Balamore (Baltimore for the non-Marylander�s amongst ya.)
Five years [and what could be 580 pages of foolscap] later, 1962, I had a degree in Engineering from the Naval Academy, a wife from Chicago and child (not necessarily in that order) and was a shiny gold barred new Ensign in the US Navy sailing off the coast of Cuba with a battalion of Marines getting ready to invade and smash those nasty missiles that the Ruskies had sold to Fidel so he could blow something other than cigar smoke in the Brother�s Kennedy�s faces. During my third month at sea I was informed by my wife that she was two months pregnant. Again, not being a great biology student I just presumed I was pressing too hard when I stamped my letters home.
Shortly afterward I left the ship and reported to Pensacola, Florida for flight training, which was completed eighteen months later, May 1964, at Corpus Christi, Texas. I was ordered to a patrol squadron at Jacksonville, Florida and over the next four years spent nearly three and one-half years deployed to bases around the world, including a de-vine time shuttling between the Philippines and Vietnam. During this period my wife had the unusual experience of delivering a number of nine and ten pound pre-mature children�must have been to account for my times at home. Her family did have an inherited respiratory defect that resulted in breathing problems that took a couple of the children, but it seemed those �family secrets� couldn�t be shared so medical pre-planning could be initiated. By early 1968 refined skills with biology and mathematics resulted in my acquiring a first ex-wife who stayed in Jacksonville while I went to Pensacola as a flight instructor.
In mid-`69 I married a U of Alabama grad, Sharon Ann Sullivan, from Montgomery, who, a year later delivered a very sweet daughter, Elizabeth Ashley. In mid-`70 I also resigned from the active duty Navy as the goals for staying in combat with the Vietnamese were getting a bit obscured and if you can�t cheerfully follow the orders then you step aside, which I did. We moved from Pensacola to New Orleans, LA and I went to work assembling benefit packages for large and small companies. Fat City was just starting to compete with the French Quarter and night rolled into day and business and pleasure sort of fused and the candle began to smolder at both ends and the middle. When you�re young that�s called �living� now I see it as quick stepping to an early grave.
Early in 1972 an accident at home claimed Ashley, not to final rest, but to a limbo state of equipment and no brain wave activity. On the same day Sharon�s mother died unexpectedly and during the next six months we spiraled out of control, with Sharon eventually running away. Ashley was turned over to the state of Louisiana where she existed at Hammond State School for nearly four years before God finally granted her admission for eternal rest.
I had departed New Orleans for St. Louis in late `74 in the company of an Atlanta lady (Constance) who�d graduated from Georgia and was flying for then Southern Airways, and who, with the accompaniment of a `65 PBHS graduate had both plucked me from a very bad scene after Ashley�s accident and Sharon�s departure. I began a remedial program in (life) Psychology and acquired a couple of advanced degrees in Human Relations (Webster College, St Louis), Organization Psychology (Southern Ill U at Edwardsville), and Abnormal Psychology (U of Missouri at St Louis).
Sharon had resurfaced when Ashley was laid to rest and, though we�d only shared a few moments at graveside, we only divorced in late `78. Shortly thereafter she met a lawyer from around the Ocala area, they married and subsequently moved to Kentucky where they raised horses and sold hand crafted jewelry. She had found a terrific life and they both were doing quite well till she was murdered and he seriously injured during a home invasion in April 1996.
In February 1979 after school and some free lance consulting I went to work for the Defense Mapping Agency in St. Louis. I�d remained flying in the Naval Reserve after I left active duty and moving into the manufacture of military maps was a reasonable segue for that moment in my life. In 1981 I married a St Louis native, Suzanne, a mother of two (Scott and Amy), and who, herself, was attending SIUE for a degree in business accounting. Being a step parent was fun and different. Camping, ball games, kid�s parties and �house stuff� replaced the military career deployments or urban nightlife freak shows that had used up a number of my years.
By early 1988 the agency determined that I needed to see other work campus sites and gave me orders to the D.C. area. Suzanne said no, she did not travel, and we tried long distance for a year. It failed, we divorced, and she married a retired engineer from McDonnell Douglas who still consulted at the St Louis HQ so she never had to leave her home.
From 1989 I become a very frequent flyer with the opportunity to see many great tourist areas; Panama in `89 as �Just Cause� removed Manuel Antonio Noriega from controlling the drug trade, Desert Storm/Desert Shield for the opening dance of Gulf War I in `90/91. Off shore the horn of Africa as Mogadishu played out in `93 [ah thank you so much Prez Bill]. Then lots of planning support for Bosnia, Kosovo, Serbia, followed by global rethinking after the World Trade Center I and II, along with Northern and Southern Watch or extended Gulf War I, followed by the Afghanistan exercise in preparation of Gulf War II, or remove Saddam. Thank goodness the Berlin War came down so that we could enjoy the Peace Dividend from the late `80�s on.
In mid-`93 I met and in late `94 married a northern Virginia native, Terri Emma Oddo Syrdek Plaugher (divorcee, widow), who, as a government employee with another intelligence agency, the Chef�s International Alliance (that�s CIA cover) is able to speak my language and, as I, a domestic retread, can read my mind. In 2002 a small series of back discomforts realigned my view of what is important for the future. We�ve each lost both parents and each have one sibling raising children, she a brother with two boys in California and I a sister with one boy in Maryland. We have an indoor feline family and support neighborhood feline ferals outside our home in Vienna, Virginia, a continuation of the urban sprawl from D.C./Baltimore/Philly/and Manhattan