Stevie Szabad, Author

by Michele Sabad

     I grew up on military bases because my father was in the Army. I’d love to say that my father’s mother, the only grandmother I knew, was a “military” grandmother, but I cannot. I never thought of her as a “military grandmother”, and I doubt she would have described herself that way either. She was a thrice-widowed prairie farm wife and school teacher who, when I once asked, “Did my grandfather (who passed before I was born) fight in the war?” replied, “No, farmers grow food and are too important to go die in war.” I was shocked; I thought soldiers were the most important. But my father didn’t want the farm life. He wanted to join up, but he needed his mother’s permission being only 17. Reluctantly, my grandmother did sign the papers, and the stage was set for my own military path as…