Has It Really Been Three Years?

Found this in my "archives" and can't believe it's really been three years. When I look back on that time of our lives, it all seems like a blur...


This Knight Looked Like He Was Wearing Shining Armor

COMMENTARY By BILL MOOR South Bend Tribune Columnist

U.S. Marine Bobby Knight of South Bend has plenty of support just from his family. In front are Kelli and Kevin. From the left on the couch are Katie, Carrie (Urbanski) holding Nolan, Patty, Bob and Colleen. Another sister, Chrissie, is away at college. Tribune Photo/DAVE WITHAM

Yellow ribbons are tied around the flowering plum tree in Bob and Patty Knight's front yard ... an American flag hangs from their garage ... and a care package already is assembled atop the kitchen counter in the Knights' South Bend home.Their pride swells; their hearts hurt."How can something that makes you feel so proud also make you feel so bad," Patty asks.She is the mother of seven Knights, including one in shining armor. Or at least that is how her son Bobby looked to her last week when he bid his family farewell in his United States Marine uniform."All we know at this point is that he is at Camp Pendleton in California and that his unit will soon be heading to somewhere in the Middle East," Patty says.

Bobby Knight -- yes, he heard all the "General" jokes about his name back in boot camp -- is a member of the Marine Corps Reserves Engineer Company B of the 6th Engineer Support Battalion. The South Bend-based unit was activated for up to a year a few weeks ago as part of Operation Enduring Freedom.Bobby, 25, is a graduate of LaSalle High School, a delivery truck driver for Bonnie Doon Ice Cream and a former volunteer basketball coach at Corpus Christi, his old grade school in South Bend.He could be the kid next door to any of us. Yet he may soon be up on the front line -- or clearing the way for the front line -- in our next war.

His five sisters -- 27-year-old Carrie Urbanski, 23-year-old twins Katie and Colleen, 19-year-old Chrissie and 10-year-old Kelli -- along with kid brother Kevin, 15, all keep him in their prayers."He told me I shouldn't be scared for him," says little Kelli, a fifth-grader at Corpus Christi. "I am trying not to be.""If the others in the military are like Bobby, then we are in very good hands," says Carrie, a fourth-grade teacher at Monroe Elementary School.

Bobby Knight loves being a Marine, while serving as a heavy-equipment operator for his engineering unit. "They kiddingly call themselves 'Uncle Sam's Construction Company,''' his mother says.During past summer camps, he and his comrades have been to El Salvador to build a medical facility, to Honduras to build a school and to South Korea last summer to build roads and get their taste of combat training."I think the Marines have given Bobby a new direction in life," his father says."It definitely has changed him," Patty adds. "He has gone to these countries and has seen people with nothing but still be as happy as can be. So when he goes back to his own house and sees all the things he has, I think it makes him appreciate it even more."And want to help more, too.Even on the homefront.

When his sisters need a hand, he becomes the go-to guy after they call. And now he is answering his country's call."They actually told him back in July not to make plans for the holidays," Patty says. "So we were very grateful to have him through Christmas and New Year's."I do know he is ready," she continues. "Four years ago, when he went off to boot camp, he admitted he was scared to death. But not now. He says he knows that he and his unit can do the job."His family is in awe of his resolve and how the Marines have helped mold him into a man.A few weeks before Christmas, Bobby and two other Marines came to his sister Carrie's classroom at Monroe to pick up presents that her students had brought in for the Toys for Tots campaign. She could hardly believe that this was the kid brother who used to pull her hair.

In 10-year-old Kelli Knight's fifth-grade class at Corpus Christi, they already have written letters to Bobby."What makes that even more special is that the teacher, Mrs. (Janet) Pethick, also was Bobby's fifth-grade teacher," Patty says.Like many other young men and women in the military, Bobby Knight has his support group back on the home front.Godspeed to all of them.Bobby left South Bend last week with homemade blueberry muffins in one hand and a rosary from his youngest sister in his other.His mother nods. "Family and faith -- that's how we will get though this next year."