Published: Saturday, April 5, 2008
Kids experience deployment
Military children get a chance to explore their parents' absence
By Jim Haley
Herald WriterMARYSVILLE -- When most parents go off to work in the morning, they return home in the evening for dinner and some family time with their kids.
However, if one or more of a child's parents are in the military, long separations become part of family life.
About 40 grade-school children, most whose Snohomish County parents now are deployed abroad, participated in an exercise Friday to give them a little better understanding why their dad or mom is away.
Billed as a "deployment day camp for military kids," it was a day of activities, snapping to a military-style form of "attention," playing at visiting other "nations" and finally participating in a homecoming that featured cupcakes as a goal.
The kids were divided into groups or "commands," said farewell to their parents, engaged in games as a form of "training," worked at crafts and wrote a letter "home."
"We're trying to put them in the shoes of their parents just to give them a taste of what deployment may be like," said Stacy Bodenner of Naval Station Everett's Fleet and Family Support Center.
Some 3,600 Everett-area sailors and three naval station ships deployed in March to the Persian Gulf for seven months. Many of them left spouses and children behind. A fourth Everett ship also is deployed, but is expected to return to the naval station next month.
"I think this gives them a flavor of what their parents are going through," naval station executive officer Cmdr. Donald Leingang said. "They also are learning a little bit about what it means; kind of like when you learn what your mom or dad do at work."
The daylong program consisted of a simple, simulated deployment for children in first through sixth grades. It started with an opening ceremony, and the kids recited an "oath of the military child," which encourages them to do their school work and help out around the house.
Through the day, they were given a passport allowing them to visit different "countries." The countries, in this case, consisted of hands-on experience with a military working dog, fire department equipment, a mobile technology lab and a Vietnam-era patrol boat that was restored by local war veterans.
While examining the patrol boat restored by the Northwest chapter of Gamewardens of Vietnam, the youngsters got badges depicting a job on the boat. Plastic fire helmets were available as well.
At the end of the day, of course, the children were reunited with a parent.
Most of the children at the day camp were associated with Naval Station Everett. A handful came from Whidbey Island Naval Air Station parents, and there were a couple of children from U.S. Army families, Bodenner said.
The day camp also provided time for the children to talk among themselves about the family separation and their feelings.
That's a good thing, Leingang said.
"Now they will also know they aren't the only child with a mother or father who is deployed," he said.
The military kids were assembled at the Marysville's Navy Complex and the first order of business was induction. As always with the military that means a lot of paper work.
As soon as the Military kids had checked into the Deployment Command their parents left the area and the Color Guard entered. After the pledge to the flag and invocation the swearing in of the new recruits took place.
