A Common Man's View: A Fresh Perspective from Middle-Class America

A Common

Man’s View

A Fresh Perspective from Middle-Class America

Chad Dupill

iUniverse, Inc.

Bloomington

A COMMON MAN’S VIEW

A Fresh Perspective from Middle-Class America

Copyright © 2012 by Chad Dupill.

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ISBN: 978-1-4697-5318-8 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4697-5319-5 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4697-5320-1 (ebk)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012901419

Printed in the United States of America

iUniverse rev. date: 02/25/2012

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Chapter 1

A Common-Man Beginning

Chapter 2

Heroes

Chapter 3

Political Correctness

Chapter 4

Hollywood

Chapter 5

The Now Generation

Chapter 6

The War on Terror

Chapter 7

Faith, Attitude, and a

Little Bit of Perspective

Chapter 8

A Word on Words

Chapter 9

The American Dream

Notes

Acknowledgments

To my wife, Katie, thank you for sticking by me throughout this process and for having patience through the ups and downs. I love you!

To my boys, Zachary and Travis, I love you guys more than anything in the world!

To my mother, Linda Dupill, for helping me with the editorial process and for just being you.

To my dad, Pete Dupill, for all the support and guidance you have given me throughout my life.

To all my brothers, Craig, Curt, Cliff, and Cornell, we have a bond that will never be broken.

To all my friends and family, thank you for always being there for me!

I also want to thank God that I live in America and that I have the opportunity to succeed!

God bless America!

Introduction

Many people reading this book are likely asking a few questions. First, why would a common man want to write a book, and what makes him common in the first place? I believe that my views on a number of different subjects are similar to yours, yet we never have our voices heard. All too often in the society we live in today, we hear from the likes of the Hollywood elites, such as the Paris Hiltons and Snookis, who in all practical reality never did anything worth mentioning, let alone worth listening to. Then we have the Michael Moores of the world who spin their nonsense, and people actually buy into their rhetoric. I’m not going to sit here and pick on the liberal left—well, not much anyway—but the main reason for writing this book is to give the common men and women in American society today a fresh perspective from someone who actually lives in the real world.

My goal is to have our voices heard no matter how faint they might be. I am more conservative than I am liberal. However, even the so-called mainstream right, the conservative side, offers a perspective so far removed from what I like to call the real world that we are being dictated to by people who don’t understand the struggles that middle America goes through on a day-to-day basis. That is why I felt driven to write this book for all of us common men and women who go through those day-to-day struggles. We do not have a nanny to watch over our children; we have to balance the budget. We have gone through the ups and downs of living in middle-class America, being responsible enough to keep on pushing no matter the odds. Why not present people with a book from someone who might actually have something worth saying, a book people can relate to, rather than a lecture by those on the left and right who at one point may have been common men but are now far removed from that life? I really felt compelled to write this book, as I am very concerned by the events that are currently taking place in our country and I legitimately fear for the future of our children and this great nation.

Chapter 1

A Common-Man Beginning

What makes me common? I was born the second of five boys in a middle-class family. I guess that would probably be enough, but in order to really understand my views and thought process throughout this book, you are going to need to know a little more about my background and what helped to form those opinions. I would like to take you through a short journey of my life and some of my experiences so that you may better understand that I am no different from most Americans. We have all made our mistakes and hopefully learned from them.

My father came from a large family, the second of seven children consisting of four boys and three girls. Although he initially moved quite a bit, he primarily grew up in New Milford, Connecticut. My dad’s father, whom I called Pepe, was a captain for Pan American Airlines. He was born in an abandoned railroad car in upper Maine during the Great Depression. My grandfather’s story is the story of the American dream. With only an eighth-grade formal education and the help of a priest and fellow Americans, he became an airline pilot. My dad’s mom, whom I knew as Meme, was one of many children who grew up in Jay, Maine. Meme raised the children and ran the household while Pepe provided the means for her to do so.

My mother was the second of three girls. She came from a dysfunctional home, and from what I understand, my mother’s childhood was anything but normal. My grandfather, whom I knew as Poppa, owned and operated a rest home for the elderly in Gaylordsville, Connecticut. My mother and sisters lived in the rest home along with Poppa and my grandmother, whom I knew as Grandma. They had their problems, as many couples do, and struggled to make ends meet, but what made things really difficult was that Grandma was mentally ill, diagnosed with a personality disorder of the paranoid type. My mother never knew what to expect from her mom but was blessed with the love, warmth, and support of their father. My mom and her eldest sister were the mother figures for their youngest sister, who was seven years younger than my mother. When my mother was an adult, her parents went through a very cruel and nasty divorce. Although I do have faint recollections of my grandmother, I never really knew her, as she died of cancer when I was quite young.

Each of my parents had very different childhoods, but each one’s family shared the common thread of a strong religious upbringing. My dad, for the most part, had a fairly traditional upbringing that was typical of the late ’50s and early ’60s with a hard-ass father, while my mom lived in a dysfunctional home without the love and guidance of a mother. Why is this significant? Because I believe that their experiences made them the parents they were, influenced what they did and said, and ultimately resulted in the adults my brothers and I are today.

It’s funny when we think about our own lives and how we came along the paths and directions we are currently at. My father was much like I was when he was younger; we had similar experiences like skipping school, testing our dads’ limits, etc. He went to Miami Dade Junior College out of high school and majored in aviation, for he, like his father, loved to fly. Like his son (and most boys), he wasn’t quite mature enough to be away from home, making all his own decisions. He loved to have a good time, party, and chase after the opposite sex rather than focusing on what was really important at that time: studying. After obtaining all his basic flight ratings (but not a degree), he went back home to live with Mom and Dad and to figure out what to do next. He drove a school bus and had enrolled part time at Western Connecticut State College. At this time, the Vietnam War was just picking up momentum, and unless a young man was enrolled in good standing in college, which my dad was not, he was eligible for the draft. When his number came up, he was called. The interesting thing is that his father had influential friends on the draft board. I have children myself and know that we all want to protect our kids, so if their numbers came up, especially with an unpopular war like Vietnam, we would probably want to just sweep it under the table. Not Pepe! Pepe believed that his son was no different from any other young man in America—if his country needed him and his number was called up, then it was his duty to go.

The next thing my dad knew, he was drafted into the United States Army with the next stop Vietnam. Understandably, my dad was trying to deal with this huge change and, needless to say, was pretty scared about going to war. In a moment of weakness, just prior to shipping out from California, Dad gave in to his fear and went AWOL (absent without leave) for three days. During that time, many draftees were running away to Canada in order to avoid going to war. My dad said he was scared shitless and stayed with Oscar, a close friend from home, who was with the air force and stationed in the area. After much discussion, he finally came to his senses and went back to base. Fearing the worst but ready to face the music, he reported back to his unit only to learn that they never noticed he had been gone in the first place. When I ask him to this day why he went back, he just looks at me, raises his brows, and says that he would never have been able to live with himself otherwise.

Dad went to Vietnam and served honorably for eighteen months, receiving several air medals and the Bronze Star. He returned to the United States safely but to a drastically different world from when he had left. The new world consisted of a generation known as the hippies who were for free love, anti-establishment, and hated the war and those who served. There are those who have written how the hippies have made huge advantages and set examples for the youth of today and years to come. Vietnam was a very unpopular war, particularly with the hippies, whose motto was Make love, not war. The spike in patriotism we see now was not present, and even today the American people, in my opinion, have a very short memory when it comes to patriotism. These poor excuses for Americans actually made the men and women who fought that war feel ashamed; and not only did they not set examples for our youth, but they also in fact committed treason. My dad arrived in San Francisco to be spat upon, called baby killer, and pushed. He had his camera stolen in a bathroom. He was quiet and confused and silently went on to JFK in New York, arriving late at night. A cab driver, a World War II vet, offered to drive him home to Connecticut for well under the normal fee. When he tells of this experience, it helps to counter the hatred he experienced in San Francisco.

So my father was reinserted into the civilian world and got back to the business of living. Many veterans, Vietnam veterans in particular, tried to forget everything they had experienced and leave it behind because they almost felt ashamed, based on the way they were treated upon their return. My dad never really talked much about the war until recently. Everything that is going on today seems to have resurfaced the anger he feels toward the American people and especially the hippies who treated these heroes so poorly.

My dad was getting back to the business of living and started courting my mother. My dad had dated my mother once prior to his going to ‘Nam. My mother graduated from college shortly after my dad came home. He had remembered her and called her house. Poppa, my mother’s father, thought the world of my dad, having displayed clippings of articles about him in the local papers. Poppa would tell my mother what a nice boy my dad was. Poppa, a World War II veteran, was the exact opposite of the hippies and respected those who served. My mother also supported the war and our soldiers (not a very popular opinion in the ’60s). My dad called my mom for a date, but she really didn’t want to go out with him, as she recalled the boy he was prior to Vietnam. After saying no two times, my dad finally asked my mom when she could go out. My mom never did like to lie or hurt anyone so she agreed on a date. My mom spent hours listening to my dad and what he felt about the war. From that first date on, they were inseparable. One month later, my dad asked her to marry him, and they were wed five months after that night. Poppa had a great respect for my father and hailed him as a hero. They remained the best of friends throughout Poppa’s life. Some would say that it was a very quick engagement, but forty-one years and five sons later, they are still happily married.

My dad and mom were full of dreams, just like most newlyweds. Mom taught school in Sharon, Connecticut, and Dad flight-instructed at Stormville Airport in New York to build up flight time. They saved all of my mom’s salary and lived off my dad’s. My dad was trying to build up his hours so that he could get a flying job, but the country was going through a recession. Oscar, Dad’s friend who had taken him in when he went AWOL before going to Vietnam, recommended that Dad go back to college and finish his degree. Many of his very good friends who had been in ‘Nam were doing that exact same thing.

Metropolitan State College in Colorado had an aviation program and accepted all of the credits from vets who returned from Vietnam. So off to Colorado they went. My mother got a job selling mobile homes (and they bought one to live in), then as a preschool teacher and assistant administrator, and supported her husband in every way possible as he utilized the GI Bill to complete his education. My dad worked part time at the clubhouse in the mobile home park where they lived. In 1972, while my dad was still in college, my mom unexpectedly became pregnant with my oldest brother. They had no medical insurance, so they made arrangements with a general practitioner to care for her during her pregnancy and paid for his services and delivery on time. My mom quit her job to care for her baby, and my dad went to school and worked more hours at the clubhouse. They found that it actually cost less to stay home,