The Times They Are A-Changing

I will remember July 20, 1969 until my last breath.  Of course, Artur was at the command center at Marshall Space Flight Center.  The rest of the family was gathered in the den.  The image was grainy on the 19-inch black and white TV.  But we knew history was being made.  First, when the Apollo 11 lunar module touched down on the surface of the moon.  Then, six hours later, when Neil Armstrong made his first small step.  The space race was over.  America had won.

No one realized it at the time, but that was the beginning of the end for the German scientists.  There were more missions to the moon, and Skylab, but America’s interest in the space program peaked that day.  It was all downhill after that.

At the same time Huntsville was focused on going to the moon, the nation was experiencing multiple challenges.  All around us, in the southern United States, the Civil Rights movement had caused a cultural storm.  The Vietnam war had divided the population and large protests were rocking the nation.  The space program had been very expensive and the nation was piling up serious debt.

In early 1972, von Braun moved from Huntsville to Washington.  In June, he announced his retirement from NASA.  In Huntsville, the team could taste it.  The ride was coming to an end.  

Artur called a family meeting a few weeks after von Braun retired.  He told us, he had resigned from his job at NASA.  He had accomplished everything he could there.  He said, “It is time for phase two of my professional life.”  

He’d done well investing his money, and had no need to work.  Had he wanted another job, his reputation would open doors for him anywhere he went.  Instead, Artur went in another direction.

In the fall of 1972, I started my first year of high school, at the most prestigious private school in town.  I was now a Randolph Raider.  My goals were to study as little as possible, get a girlfriend, and make the golf team.

A week later, at the age of 52, Artur became an “irregular undergraduate” at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.  His goals were to obtain a PhD in History, become a professor, and teach history and mathematics.  

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I have no explanation for why I was a complete idiot growing up.  My parents had endured the absurdities of war and communism, and had overcome.  I was born on third base and couldn’t be bothered with the short trot to home plate.

I stumbled through the first three and a half years of high school.  In that time, Artur had completed his bachelors degree in History, had taken many of the graduate classes, and was already working on his PhD thesis.  “The History of Rocket Science, from pre-war Germany to the Moon.”

My stupidity peaked during spring break my senior year.  Everyone knew about college students spending the week at Panama City, down in Florida.  On the spur of the moment, I decided I didn’t need to wait for college.  I stole $200 from my mother’s rainy day emergency jar, got in the Shelby, and headed south.  Eight hours later, I was cruising down Front Beach Road.

I was too young to buy beer, but I had cash and a big mouth.  It didn’t take long to hook up with some college students.  I don’t remember much of what happened after that.

I do remember waking up the next morning.  A policeman was prodding me with his billy stick.  “You alive, son?  You’re in a heap of trouble.”

While he was putting the handcuffs on me, I looked around.  According to the flag, I was on the 14th green of a golf course.  The Shelby was wrecked, up against the lip of a sand trap.  When the DA showed the pictures to the judge, it was apparent I’d gone on a drunken joy ride through the golf course.  I’d done enough damage for it to be classified as felony vandalism.

Even Dad’s influence couldn’t get me out of that one.  I spent 6 months in juvenile detention in Florida.  I got out just in time to start my senior year over again.

And that is how Dad was able to earn a bachelors, masters, and PhD in history, in the same amount of time it took me to get through high school.

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Artur was offered a job at the University of Maryland when he graduated.  The family received a shock when Ekaterina announced she was not going with him.  She liked Huntsville, and did not want to leave.  I was too self absorbed to see it, but for the past few years, my parents had been growing apart from each other.

My father shook my hand and said, “Serge, you’re the man of the house now.  Take good care of your mother.”

As he backed out of the driveway, I had no idea of the twists and turns our lives would take.  Artur would not set foot in Huntsville again for almost 20 years.

At least I was smart enough to realize I was not college material.  I got a job running the cash register at the neighborhood 7-11.  The first in a string of dead end jobs that I couldn’t keep for long.  Without my mother looking after me, I would have been homeless.

The years came and went.  Artur made a name for himself in his new career.  I visited him several times.  Once, we were walking across the university campus and ran into some of his students.  A guy with a long ponytail told me, “Dude, you’ve got the coolest dad on the planet!”

And possibly the craziest dad on the planet.  It was 1991 when the phone rang.  Mom said, “Serge, your father wants to talk to you.”

By then, the world had changed.  The Cold War was over.  The USSR was dead.  Poland was finally free.  And I couldn’t have been more shocked when my father, now 71 years old, told me: “Son, I just got a teaching job at the University of Warsaw.  I’m moving back to Poland.  And I want you to come with me.”