Fort Huachuca Army Brat

My old friend Flavio Garcia died yesterday.

I met him at Fort Huachuca, Arizona, when we were both 8-year-old sons of sergeants in third grade at Colonel Johnston School. He was a cheerful student and an excellent athlete, despite having a heart with an enlarged aorta that occasionally made him pass out.

The summer before our fifth-grade year, Flavio was taken to Letterman Hospital in San Francisco for an operation to correct that heart problem. He came back fully recovered, and he caused a sensation when he took off his shirt on the playground to show off a 68-stitch scar.

As some of you know, I wrote “Tumbleweed Forts” about living on Fort Huachuca and, as my best friend, Flavio is featured prominently in the book, from the busy classrooms to the wide open desert to the cool mysteries of Huachuca Canyon. He even saved my life when I jumped in a deep lake at St. Davids before I knew how to swim.

Flavio played baseball in Fort Huachuca and, years after our families parted ways for other Army posts, he played football in high school. Later, he took up tennis and made many more friends in that pastime. Eventually, he got a job as a mailman. He met a wonderful woman, Cindy, and they married and settled down in Huntington Beach, California.

Last October, Flavio drove out to southern Arizona, and my brother George and I traveled there from our homes in Pennsylvania. We used that little reunion as a chance to look around the old fort again, and to visit Tombstone during Helldorado Days. We had a great time.

Thank goodness for that get-together. Flavio’s heart was still strong. But in the last few months, the heart troubles returned. He had surgery to implant new stents. He saw a doctor on Friday, and he was scheduled to see another doctor soon to get an internal defibrillator.

I chatted with him on the phone two nights ago. We talked about the NFL’s Sunday football games — especially his Chargers and my Eagles. He seemed weak, but he was as friendly as ever.

This morning his heart gave out.

Flavio Garcia was a good guy. He seemed to enjoy everything he did. As I said in the book, Flavio wouldn’t say “Do this” or “Do that.” He led by action. He seemed to have so much fun doing whatever he did, everyone else wanted to do it too.

When our fifth-grade music teacher, Mrs. Smith, showed us how to square dance, she taught Flavio first, because she knew that if Flavio figured out that do-si-do, everyone else would try it that much harder.

Godspeed, my old friend. You brightened so many lives. You showed all of us how to have fun.

Flavio was 73.