His left hand was raised high in the air as he exited the building; a weary smile upon his face. I can still see him in black and white, flanked by men in suits, just before the shots rang out.
Those men surrounding him acted so fast! Within a second of the first shot being fired they had tackled the gunman and the President was whisked away in a black limousine.
I was 7 years old and I knew at that moment what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. I wanted to wear one of those suits and step in front of a bullet.
At that age I was fascinated by stories of heroism and valor. I read of the Knights of the Roundtable and the Samurai, and I watched as silver screen cowboys saved the day.
Chivalry, gallantry, sacrifice. These were the aspirations I had as a young boy from a trailer park who had absolutely no idea how to achieve them.
In order to be a Secret Service agent I knew that I’d have to be as clean as a whistle. I told myself that I wouldn’t need good grades or an impressive physique to step in front of bullet, I just needed to be unafraid and they had to trust me. It was the President of the United States that I wanted to sacrifice myself for after all.
As I grew older I stayed away from anything that would betray that trust. No drugs, no alcohol, no major crimes.
While my friends were getting drunk and high, I was concocting stories to dissuade the peer pressure. I most often used the story of a girl I had fallen in love with being killed by a drunk driver to immediately end any and all inquiries into the beer missing from my hand at parties. And there were a lot of parties.
Staying out of trouble for me was the easy part. I was clever and crafty and I’d get away with a lot more than my little brother did.
The hard part was the body I was given. I was a tiny kid. Larger than average at birth, but frail and lean as a young man. My first driver’s license listed me at 4’11” tall and weighing 90 pounds. I remained that size until well after high school.
But, what I lacked in size I made up for in courage...and stupidity. I mean, you have to be pretty dumb to aspire to leap in front of an assassin’s bullet.
And I was really dumb. I’d jump off of rooftops and parking garages. I would climb anything climbable and never think twice about falling. I’d pick fights with people who outweighed me by double, or triple, including my little brother, and I once hopped from the bed of a moving truck (I thought I could run as fast as it was moving....I couldn’t).
None of this was to impress anyone else, as is so often the case with little fellas. Instead I did everything to stop being afraid of that bullet that I was certain would one day take my life.
So I avoided trouble and built up courage, but I was an awful student and my family wasn’t connected to anyone that could grease wheels. It seemed to me that the tiny kid from the trailer park would be stuck having an average job and an average life, with no hope of ever being in the Secret Service.
It didn’t stop me from talking about it to anyone that would listen though. One man in particular listened to my dreams, encouraged them, and would eventually make a connection that started me on the path to fulfilling them.
He owned a jewelry store next to a video rental shop that I worked at in high school. I don’t know what prompted me to walk into his store in the first place, but I’d stop by often and talk to him about all the things I wanted to do with my life.
As time passed the video store closed and I went on to other jobs, bouncing from here to there with no real direction. My parents pushed me toward factory jobs and I attempted to join the Marine Corps (another story worth telling sometime), but nothing stuck.
I started working as undercover security at a department store in an attempt to get me one step closer to that date with destiny, but I ended up meeting a girl.
I can still remember what she was wearing the first time I saw her and despite the fact that it ended poorly, I do look upon that first moment fondly.
As is always the case with me and a girl, I wanted to impress her. We’d been on a few dates (really the first dates I had ever been on) and Christmas was approaching. She was obsessed with the color green and I wanted to give her something beautiful, so I ended up back at that man’s jewelry store.
We spent some time catching up and he asked what I was doing with my life. I gave him the less than exciting details and he offered me a job as an apprentice goldsmith.
I accepted his offer and very quickly learned that being a goldsmith was not going to be my calling. What the job did do though was introduce me to the jewelers brother.
He was managing one of the jewelers stores and the jeweler thought I’d be better at selling jewelry than I was at fixing it (or rather melting it) so he sent me to learn from his brother.
His brother, who is often mistaken for my own brother, happened to be the Captain of the Reserve Police Department in a small town next to the city where I lived. As he taught me about gemology and customer service he also told me all about the world of volunteer policing.
I was only 20, and too young to be a police officer, but the jeweler told him of my desire to be in the Secret Service and he insisted that I apply as a learning experience for my future endeavors. So, I did.
I don’t know how many people applied for that volunteer position with the small town police department, but I went through the process and came out on top. They offered me the job! It was contingent upon me turning 21, but they let me start hanging out and going on “ride-alongs” with their full-time officers.
I would remain with them for about 5 years before deciding that policing, not jewelry, was the career for me. I began applying to police departments across the nation (if my memory serves it was 16 in total). Oddly enough the last place I applied to was the first place to offer me a job, and it happened to be the city in which I lived.
In the late summer of that year I started the Police Academy and met some of the best friends a person could ever hope to make. It wasn’t easy, but we helped each other through it and on December 15, 1999, 25 of us graduated as the 52nd recruit class of the Fort Wayne Police Department at a ceremony filled with all of the pomp and circumstance befitting such an occasion.
I spent the next 17 years having a career that could be it’s own novel or movie, and although I left a bit earlier than I probably should have, I’m very proud to have served my community and our nation.
I never did make it to the Secret Service. I got so tied up in my police career that the years flew by and I grew too old to apply. I did spend a couple of years working as Task Force Agent for the DEA though, which may have actually been cooler than being a Secret Service agent anyway...and I didn’t die at the hands of a crazed assassin...yet.
To all of my friends and colleagues from the 52nd who are still serving us today, I salute you on our upcoming 25th anniversary. Congratulations!!!
