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mom prepares to deploy with Air Force Maj. Susan Crum takes her responsibilities as a mom very seriously. So when she gets on a plane in August to fly to an unknown destination for three months, she said, it’s going to be one of the hardest things she’s ever had to do. “There is just so much that could happen,” said Crum, the commander of the 301st security forces squadron for the Air Force Reserve. As defense force commander for a unit that will provide security for an overseas base, Crum said she is already preparing her personnel and equipment. But at home, Crum said she also faces the task of getting her 10-year-old daughter and 9-year-old son ready for her departure. “We just let them know a little bit at a time as to what is going on and try to prepare them as much as possible for their mom being gone for three months,” Crum said. Since mid-October, more than 300 reservists from the Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base, Fort Worth have left family and friends behind while they are deployed overseas, said Don Ray, public affairs officer. The number is about half of the 665 Marine, Air Force, Navy and Texas Air National Guard reservists from the base that have been activated, Ray said. Crum said that she and her husband, a commercial airline pilot, have talked to their children about the countries she might be sent to and the duties she will have. “I’ve told them all about al Qaeda and they know who Osama bin Laden is,” Crum said. “They have said they are a little worried and they ask me if those people have guns.” Treva Smutz, the mother of TCU student and Marine reservist Lane Smutz, said she is not as worried about her son as much as she was when he was first deployed overseas. His job keeps him primarily in very protected areas because he works as a structural mechanic on C-130s, a four engine, propeller driven transport plane, she said. “These are very expensive planes, so they do try to keep the planes as far away from the action as possible when they’re working on them,” Treva Smutz said. Lane Smutz was activated Jan. 26 and deployed overseas a month later, his mother said. She said that although she cannot reveal where her son is stationed overseas, he is still able to call and e-mail her. He is eager to come back to Fort Worth when his 90-day temporary assignment is over, she said. “He can’t talk to me about what he is doing, so I just tell him what’s going on here,” she said. Having to leave behind his studies at TCU was very disappointing for her son, Treva Smutz said. “He has a plan and friends, but he knew when he signed up that this was a possibility,” she said. “We were disappointed, but we’re glad he got to finish last semester.” Crum said that one of her biggest concerns is that because of her husband’s irregular schedule, she has to hire live-in help to look after her children when they are both gone. She said she is looking for a TCU student to move into their home in west Fort Worth and provide childcare. “We want a live-in student with us, somebody who can come into our family during the summer and the kids will get used to whoever is there in the house,” Crum said. “So when I leave, it’s not going to be a big turmoil.” Though she hopes the person that they find will far exceed their expectations and it will be a good experience, Crum said she will still worry about her children. “I am trusting somebody who I have known a very short time with that same responsibility that I have put upon myself,” Crum said. “I’ll probably worry more about the kids that they’re worried about me.” The
full meaning of her deployment doesn’t appear to be sinking
in yet with her children, Crum said. “I’m going to be gone through Thanksgiving and a couple of birthdays ,and other family events, so we’re trying to talk those through now.” Crum said. “When you’re 10 years old, if it’s not happening tomorrow or the next day, it really hasn’t come to full reality yet.” For now, Crum said she is concentrating on getting both her family and her military unit ready. “All I want is everybody who goes with me to come back with me and everybody who is deployed at that same base to come back in one piece,” Crum said. “Then I’ll consider it a success.” Laura
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