National Guard soldier turned his life around

ABOUT THIS SERIES

For the next year, the Dayton Daily News will follow the lives of a number of local soldiers from the Ohio National Guard’s Columbus-based Task Force 1-134 Field Artillery Regiment, sharing their daily struggles and triumphs as they readjust to life back home. We’ll follow them as they are reunited with their families, but also as they cope with employment issues, and the challenges of obtaining benefits.

At the age of 14, Seth Parker was reporting to a Montgomery County Juvenile Court probation officer.

Eight years later, he reports to officers with the Ohio Army National Guard. Just returned from Afghanistan, Parker is enjoying the fruits of his hard work and sacrifice — buying a used Lexus SUV, a 47-inch flat-screen TV and hanging out with a close-knit group of friends. He plans to go back to college on the GI bill and study to become a psychologist. “I like to understand what makes people tick,” Parker explained.

It is a remarkable transformation that shows what’s possible when someone “believes in somebody who doesn’t believe in himself,” according to Parker’s former probation officer, Marty Caffrey.

Most importantly, Caffrey said, Parker came to believe in himself: “He did a lot of work to better himself, and I was privileged to be a small part of it.”

Parker and his mother, Pamela Brown-Parker of Trotwood, would not erase the difficulties of the past. “I wouldn’t be who I am without it,” he said simply.

His mother admits there were times when she was ready to give up. “I didn’t know him,” she said.

This alienated, aloof teenager, who had been caught stealing, bore so little resemblance to the child who had devoured books and excelled in soccer and the martial arts.

“I just felt anger, a sense of powerlessness, and a sense that nobody was in my corner,” Parker recalled. “My faith in people was gone, and I was turning into someone who only depended on myself.”

Caffrey noticed that the angry teen was also extremely intelligent: “He was one of those kids who was bright enough to be really great or really bad,” he said. “Seth was very closed off. He was a 14-year-old kid who knew all the answers.”

Parker said he had become a skilled liar, but “Marty didn’t fall for it. He told me that I had to get it together. And he was there to nurture me and help me along.”

Caffrey, who now works as an employment services manager for Goodwill Industries, said it is important not to sugarcoat things with kids. “We forget how smart they are,” he said. “It’s important to meet them where they are, not where we think they should be.”

The breakthrough came, Caffrey said, when Parker developed empathy for others and started working on his relationships with others, particularly his mother. “He really worked hard to do that at a time when he was not trusting people,” Caffrey recalled.

Parker earned his GED at 16, not wanting to go back to high school. “I was tired of it; I was ready to move on,” he explained. He studied culinary arts at Sinclair Community College and landed a job in food prep at the now-defunct Pacchia restaurant in the Oregon district. He wanted to finish a four-year degree but could not imagine how he would pay for it, when his mother introduced the idea of the Ohio Army National Guard.

“My knowledge of war was confined to ‘Call of Duty’ and ‘Saving Private Ryan,’” Parker recalled.

‘Fear was palpable’

His mother envisioned a desk job, but Parker opted for the infantry. “That sounded like more of a challenge,” he said.

One night, heading home after work at Pacchia, Parker wondered, “What did I do? I’m an only child, and I’m going to go over there and get blown up. This is it.”

Despite that momentary panic, and the challenges of a year-long deployment, Parker now feels he is exactly where he needs to be. Through his military service, he has discovered things about himself that he had never known. He had never fired a weapon, other than on video games, but “it turns out I’m a good marksman. I’m physically in shape, and I’m on a good path. I have good people to take me to the next level.”

Parker served as a gunner with the Columbus-based Task Force 1-134 Field Artillery Regiment based out of Columbus. He is one of a half-dozen soldiers the Dayton Daily News will be following over the coming year in an ongoing series, “Home from War.” Stationed in Kundzu, Afghanistan, Parker made frequent trips “outside the wire” — away from his own base — as members of his battalion escorted military VIPS to other bases. He felt relatively safe, riding in heavy-duty armored vehicles and wearing body armor, until the day in April when three members of his brigade were killed by a suicide bomber.

“The sense of fear was palpable,” Parker recalled. “We hadn’t taken any casualties until then.”

Now that he is home, Parker is not taking anything for granted. Not the peach cobbler his mother had waiting for him. Not the ability to order a double steak fajita burrito at Chipotle’s. “I’m eating up everything I can,” Parker said. During this brief honeymoon period, newly returned from war, his biggest decision is whether to go to Rooster’s or Applebee’s for lunch.

Learned ‘to forgive myself’

He does not miss sleeping in a tent with a dozen other men on sparse beds made only slightly bearable by memory foam. But he misses the camaraderie of the Army and the way his fellow soldiers understand his rough-and-tumble language. “My patience is not the greatest because of what I’ve been through,” he admitted. “I’m worried that I’ll run roughshod with people instead of being polite.”

His relationship has remained strong with his girlfriend, Amanda Vaughn, who is studying biology at Miles College in Birmingham, Ala. Never a clingy couple, they have learned they can survive for a week without being able to talk to one another.

Since coming home, he has enjoyed chilling out in his “man cave,” as he jokingly calls his bedroom, watching Netflix and playing video games. He cannot wait to start classes again at Sinclair, and likes to picture himself, one day working in a psychologist’s office. “I’m fascinated by the mind and why people do what they do,” he said.

During his teen years, Parker said, “I didn’t listen to anybody.” Now, he and his mother talk to each other about everything. He wants to make a career out of listening to the problems of others.

His former probation officer, he said, taught him “to forgive myself, and that was very powerful.”

Caffrey was thrilled when he learned what Parker is doing today. “I’m humbled that he feels I had any part in turning him around,” said Caffrey, a Washington Twp. father or four boys. “I got goosebumps just hearing Seth sounding proud of himself, and committed to helping his family. As my mother used to say, ‘The road to maturity is paved with immaturity.’”