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Military Brat Life
Home?
by Cheryl
Like everyone else, I have a long history of places that I have lived. My dad
was in the Air Force for 20 years and retired as a Lt. Col. He now works at Lockheed
Martin. In 22 years, I have gone from Vietnam, to Whitman AFB, Missour, to Shaw AFB,
SC to Mildenhall, England, to Langley AFB, VA to Arlington, Texas to Waco, Texas
(Baylor University) and now to Greenville, SC. Next is to Fort Benning, Georgia, probably
where my finance will be located. He is presently in Korea for another 9 months.
My parents still go to the commissary and BX to get things and my sister and
brother are still apart of the Air Force family. My sister is married to an
Air Force man in Germany with her daughter and my brother is in the Air Force
Band in Hanscom AFB, Mass. My 9 year old niece has been a Air Force Brat all
of her life too and goes to a Dod in Spangdalhem, Germany.
Now on to the reason I am writing. If you live a life like the rest of the military brats
out there, where is home? Home is where your family is, home is where your friends are,
home is where your heart is. It can be in one place for most people but for us brats,
it is in many places. It is where we left our friends, it is where we left our grand-
parents, aunts, uncles, counsins. I have been in this new state for 3 months now, and
it is home because that is where my parents are. It will be home as long as they are
here. In this life style, you have to have an open mind and heart but be strong in your
fountatin morally and ethically. It will hold you up in the hard times.
It is not easy when your dad or mom leaves; it is not easy when your spouse or lover leaves;
it is not easy when your siblings leaves. All of these men and women are serving their
country and that is certainly something to be proud of.
Look in your heart, and you will find where you call home.
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Operation Footlocker
by Vann Baker
What is green, covered with stickers and filled with memories and icons which only a Military Brat can understand? Operation Footlocker.

We've all grown up with footlockers, but Operation Footlocker doesn't travel with one person from destination to anotherit travels to brat reunions, events and military bases as a mobile memory project.
Operation Footlocker is a grassroots effort to celebrate the shared cultural identity of Military Brats and grew out a discussion in the spring of 1996 on the Military Veterans of America site within America Online.
Mary Edwards Wertsch, author of the book Military Brats: Legacies of Childhood Inside the Fortress, and one of the participants in the discussion, first conceived the idea of taking a real footlocker and sending it around the country as a way of gathering
memorabilia and bringing brats together. Reta Jones Nicholson provided the first footlocker and was the catalyst who brought Operation Footlocker from discussion to realty.
Operation Footlocker is a volunteer effort and requests can be made to have the footlocker shipped to for brat events or sharing brat history with the general public.
For more information on appearances or to bring the Footlocker to your event, visit the Operation Footlocker web site.
This article first appeared in On The Move, Volume 1, Number 1.
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Did You Know . . .
. . . Pat Conroy is a Military Brat?
Have you heard of the book and movie "The Great Santini?" Or "Prince of Tides", "Lords of Discipline"? Pat Conroy's father was a career Marine Corps Aviator.
For a more complete list, be sure to take a look at Glenn Greenwood's Famous Overseas Alumni & Military Brats list, located on the American Overseas School Historical Society web site.
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