THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, November 12, 1995 TAG: 9511080630
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SERIES: Holly and Bobby\ Chapter 1, Saying Goodbye
In a Navy family, it's a deployment that hurts the most. Holly and
Bobby White know. For six months, they opened up their home, their
letters and their thoughts as the carrier Theodore Roosevelt sailed an
ocean away. This is their story.
SOURCE: BY KERRY DEROCHI, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 141 lines
I swore I'd never do this again. Never say never. I don't know what I'm feeling right now. So many different thoughts and emotions are running through me. There's so much I wanted to do, say and see. It's really hard to believe that it's time for all of this again. . . . The ship seemed so huge today. I never have seen it this big. Seems like a big cavern. I feel it, bad today. Please God watch over me and mine.
- B.W., aboard the Roosevelt
For his last dinner at home, Bobby White ate macaroni and cheese on a plastic picnic table in his back yard, his two sons at his side.
In the dim porch light, Bobby struggled to memorize their small, round faces. Robby's freckles. Cody's bright blond hair.
He needed to remember.
``You know I'm fixin' to be leaving,'' Bobby said.
``Yeah,'' said Robby, his brown eyes fixed on the plate of noodles.
``Yeah.''
There were no tears, no emotional scenes. It was a simple family dinner on a cool spring night.
Across the patio, Holly White stood quietly watching her family. She didn't want to interrupt, she didn't need to share the spotlight. Not on this night. She leaned against the glass door and wondered where the days had gone.
They had made such plans, she and Bobby. They were going to spend more time together these last few weeks, just the two of them. Quality time. They were going to have nice, romantic dinners, the kind they had when they were first married.
Instead, here it was the final night, and Holly felt like an outsider, watching her husband and sons, feeling as if Bobby's ship had already pulled out to sea.
``You just get to the point where it's, `just go, I'm tired of this,' '' Holly, 25, said. ``You keep building yourself up that you're going to have all these special moments. You don't. You can't find the time.''
It's like that before a deployment.
Fear of separation creates a distance, not one that you measure, but one that you feel. In the silences that fall so frequently. In the fights that crop up, stupidly, even angrily, during the last few days together.
``You cut the person off, so it's easier to leave,'' said Bobby, 24, a second class petty officer.
In the Navy, they say a marriage that survives a six-month deployment is a marriage that can survive anything.
Holly and Bobby White are survivors.
Their two-story apartment at the Norfolk Naval Air Station is testament to their five years together. In the clutter of model race cars, rubber dinosaurs and stacks of Disney videos, stands a wooden bear in a sailor suit.
A color photograph of the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt, Daddy's ship, hangs on the boys' bedroom wall. Each night, Robby and Cody kiss it in a solemn ceremony.
For weeks, Holly and Bobby have tried to prepare the boys for the separation, the second in two years.
How do you tell a 3 and 4-year-old that Daddy won't be home for dinner? How do you convince them that he hasn't left for good?
``There's a part of you that says `No,' '' said Holly. ``There's a part of you that says, ` I just want to stop it all now. ' ''
But you don't. You can't.
In early March, a few weeks before he left, Bobby bought a pear tree and planted it in the back yard. He told the boys it was their job to water it while he was away.
Holly cut out a life-size drawing of a sailor and posted it on the pantry door. She wrapped a chain made out of yellow construction paper around the sailor's neck. Each link represented a week that Bobby would be gone.
There were 25 of them. The chain touched the floor.
Six months.
On the kitchen calendar, it stretches forever - 185 blank spaces. Three birthdays, Easter and the Fourth of July. The military has a saying for every day that passes on a deployment. It's a countdown.
184 days and a wake-up.
184 days until home.
In the end, it's what the deployment is all about. The leaving is about coming home.
On March 21, the day before the Roosevelt would pull away from the pier, Holly and Bobby drove the boys to Virginia Beach to go horseback riding.
The boys, giggling in their new cowboy boots and jeans, sat on skinny ponies named Scruffy and Cocoa while their parents led them slowly around the ring.
Later, the family went to the Navy exchange, where the boys helped Bobby stock up on shampoo, soap and razors.
After dinner, Bobby and Holly gave the boys a bath and got them ready for bed. They didn't speak.
Holly worried about how she would manage the family, the apartment, the bills. Bobby thought of what he would miss.
Already, they were far apart.
At 10, Robby and Cody got into bed, with Bobby between them and Holly lying across the other end.
It was time for a story.
In a halting voice, Bobby read to the boys from their favorite book, ``Sleepytime Ship.'' This time, he couldn't finish the story. Tears blurred the words.
Hush little sailor
as you float away
on a sea of bright stars.
Yawn your last yawn
then drift . . . and drift
and drift . . . toward the dawn. MEMO: Tomorrow: The family begins to realize life without Dad.
ILLUSTRATION: Color photos by Gary C. Knapp
Six days before Petty Officer 2nd class Bobby White is scheduled to
leave on deployment, his family attends a briefing aboard the
aircraft carrier Roosevelt to help them deal with the separation.
But the Whites began doing little things long before this day. In
early March, Bobby bought a pear tree for the back yard and told his
boys they'd have to help water it until he got home in the fall.
Holly and Bobby White
Photos by Gary C. Knapp
How do you tell a 3- and 4-year-old that Daddy won't be home for
dinner? How do you convince them that he hasn't left for good?
Above: six days before the Roosevelt leaves, the Whites attend a
briefing aimed at helping families prepare for separation by
explaining what the crew will be doing in the Mediterranean and what
support services are available for families.
Above left: While Bobby and the boys are playing upstairs, Holly
talks to Bobby's mother about the upcoming deployment.
At left: Two hours before he is scheduled to leave, Bobby holds
close a sleepy Cody. The day and night before were spent making
memories: pony rides at Oceana, games and an extra-late bath and
bedtime.
KEYWORDS: NAVY FAMILY NAVY DEPENDENTS U.S. NAVY DEPLOYMENT by CNB