by Dwain Hebda

Even though his seaworthy days are behind him, Mike Mason, U.S. Navy, never stopped serving alongside his brothers in arms. 

Seated at a table in one corner of Julie’s Sweet Shoppe in Conway, he chats and laughs with a group of vets who, like himself, were inspired to answer their country’s call to arms. It’s what’s jokingly referred to here as the young guys’ table, made up of Vietnam veterans. The grown-up table, with its collection of soldiers, sailors and airmen from the Korean conflict, have their own table yonder.

Mason, 70, is proud to be included among these men of honor. But he’s equally cognizant of the ones who aren’t here, who didn’t make it back from foreign shores or who vanished and whose families wait for them still. So, when he got the running bug a few years back, he thought of a way to honor the memory of these fallen heroes. 

“About four years ago, I got to thinking, ‘There’s a lot of my brothers and sisters from Vietnam that didn’t make it back. They can’t run or anything,’” he said. “I guess it’s been about two years now I had this T-shirt here made. My running shirt.”

Mason’s olive drab T-shirt, which he wears in local 5Ks, bears the Vietnam service medal ribbon imprinted on the front. On the back it reads, “Running for the 53,307 that are not here to run.” To top things off, he carries a full-sized American flag as he runs, in honor of his comrades.

“I’m not out there running for speed, especially when you’re carrying a flag,” he said. “If there’s any kind of wind at all, it’s tough.

“I just think people need to realize that the people who are in the service put their lives on the line for this country every day. They signed a contract for that when they joined, up to and including their life. I just hope people realize that.”

Mason’s own love affair with the military endured for more than 20 years in some capacity or another, both overseas and in his hometown of Conway. 

“I dropped out of UCA (University of Central Arkansas), well, back then it was SCA (State College of Arkansas), and joined the Navy,” he said. “I did four years in the Navy, and while I was in there, I was very fortunate. I got to make a Caribbean cruise, a Mediterranean cruise and my ship got decommissioned. I actually volunteered for Vietnam.”

Landing in southeast Asia in the spring of 1970, he served aboard a small boat that helped execute ambushes on the inland waterways south of Saigon. Later, he was transferred to Cam Ranh Bay at an armory where he finished his yearlong tour. From there, he landed on an aircraft carrier that sailed off the Vietnamese coast, a cruise that closed out his service in 1972. 

“The people (in Vietnam) were really, really friendly towards us,” he said. “Especially up around Cam Ranh Bay, they had beaches and it was a real pretty white sandy beach. I enjoyed the whole country and the people up there. Someday I would love to go back just to see if I could find some of the people that I served with.”

Mason came home to a reserved reception (“I had a lot of bad looks and everything, but as far as someone spitting on me, it didn’t happen,” he said.) and set to work with local companies. But he hadn’t quite got the military bug out of his system. On the advice of a relative, he joined the Army National Guard’s 489th Combat Engineers for six years, then completed the trifecta by joining the Air National Guard, a hitch that lasted 11 years. 

“So I ended up with almost 21 years of military service. I don’t know if I ever met another (vet) that was in all three branches,” he said with a grin.

That alone would have been impressive enough, but Mason wasn’t done serving others. He joined Team Rubicon, a local group that pitches in during the aftermath of natural disasters. He and his group worked the 2014 Mayflower and Vilonia tornadoes and have gone as far as Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas to lend a hand. He sees it as living out the life of service he started with Uncle Sam.

“In the military, it’s all about my service to my country, that’s what I’m most proud of,” he said. “There are people that for whatever reason can’t or won’t serve, but I’m still out there. Just like I read one time, my time in uniform is up, but my service never ends.”