Hi. I loved your story and one that I can relate to. As a sixteen year old in California, I too wanted the jeans and the "look". Instead I spent all my after-school and vacations working in a CIA office under-cover with a Top Secret clearance. It was located at Moffitt Field in Mountain View. My youth was gobbled up with administrative tasks like typing and filing. This was my father's office,. My few friends thought I had committed a major crime, because the FBI came to their homes to ask about me and my bahavior. This was standard for the background investigation to get a Top Secret Clearance - but was not "standard procedures" for families of 16 year old high school friends. Little did I know at that point in time, that I would spend a lifetime doing Top Secret work, become a spy, lived in Russia for twenty years, and raised my own children in a communist country.
Wow. Thank you so much for sharing this. The contrast here is staggering: while most of us were trying to decipher the unwritten rules of high school social systems, you were being initiated into a literal state apparatus. It is wild to think that while your peers were being monitored by the 'hallway,' you were being vetted by the FBI. To look back now and see that your entire trajectory: Russia, the Cold War, raising children in a communist country, started at sixteen at Moffitt Field, is a feeling of awe. It sounds like you spent a lifetime navigating the ultimate high-stakes system. I am deeply honored that my essay opened a door for you to share a piece of that journey. I am absolutely floored by your story. I'm so curious, how did you maintain your sense of self across those twenty years in Russia?
Hi. I loved your story and one that I can relate to. As a sixteen year old in California, I too wanted the jeans and the "look". Instead I spent all my after-school and vacations working in a CIA office under-cover with a Top Secret clearance. It was located at Moffitt Field in Mountain View. My youth was gobbled up with administrative tasks like typing and filing. This was my father's office,. My few friends thought I had committed a major crime, because the FBI came to their homes to ask about me and my bahavior. This was standard for the background investigation to get a Top Secret Clearance - but was not "standard procedures" for families of 16 year old high school friends. Little did I know at that point in time, that I would spend a lifetime doing Top Secret work, become a spy, lived in Russia for twenty years, and raised my own children in a communist country.
Wow. Thank you so much for sharing this. The contrast here is staggering: while most of us were trying to decipher the unwritten rules of high school social systems, you were being initiated into a literal state apparatus. It is wild to think that while your peers were being monitored by the 'hallway,' you were being vetted by the FBI. To look back now and see that your entire trajectory: Russia, the Cold War, raising children in a communist country, started at sixteen at Moffitt Field, is a feeling of awe. It sounds like you spent a lifetime navigating the ultimate high-stakes system. I am deeply honored that my essay opened a door for you to share a piece of that journey. I am absolutely floored by your story. I'm so curious, how did you maintain your sense of self across those twenty years in Russia?
The ink trap set for you? I was thinking palm strike. Your response was better
Much better.
Tim Long, Just Up the Hill from Lock 15