Bonnie Jo Mount/WASHINGTON POST - Chris Stegherr served in the Marines and is now a security guard.
“It’s nice sometimes to actually have to do something,” he says, “because then you can put your knowledge to use.”
Falken has trained him to react to nearly every possibility. He went through firearm classes, shotgun training, an executive protection course, hands-on combat practice. On the golf course, he hasn’t had to use any of those skills — yet.
He knows the golf course as though it were his own back yard: public parkland at one edge, townhouses on another, the road up to the clubhouse. There’s an abandoned building down by the river where gang members and immigrants sometimes go to drink and party. He has learned to smooth over the dirt at the doorway so he can tell quickly whether strangers have come and gone.
At night, under a field of stars, with not a person in sight, Stegherr stays alert, helped by an occasional swig of Mountain Dew.
“Three,” he says. “And four.” He flicks on his flashlight and there they are, green eyes staring back.
At one bend, he sees a light, hears a rumble. A vehicle? On the course? At this hour?
He floors the accelerator. The cart hums along, edging closer to the possible trouble.
He pulls up alongside the cart and finds a prosperous-looking father, two young sons and a few fishing rods.
“We’ve been fishing this pond for 20 years and there’s never been an issue,” says the trespasser, a golf club member who immediately invokes the name of its general manager. “There’s a difference between young families and terrorists.”
Calmly, Stegherr says his orders are to ensure that no one is on the course after 9 p.m. “I’m just doing what I’m told until they tell me not to,” he says.
The member is hot and gunning for an argument. Stegherr tells him about the abandoned shed and how his job is to stay alert to intruders.
The member retorts, “There’s a difference between families who pay $75,000 a year to be here and guys out there drinking.”
After a few tense minutes, Stegherr bids the man good-night, and their golf carts part ways, threat averted.
“Five,” Stegherr says. It’s deer numbers five, six and seven, really — two fawns with their mother.
His life back in the States has a certain order to it. He sleeps a few hours in the morning after work; runs errands; maybe has dinner with his wife, Laura, a Navy lieutenant. Some days, he works afternoons at a jewelry store at Tysons Corner. He might grab a nap before heading to the golf club in the evening.
Once, he planned to stay in the Marines, but after he married into the military, coordinating careers became too complicated.
Now, at 26, he thinks about police work. He’s prepared, ready for action, hoping that he’ll eventually find the same sense of purpose that led him to the Marines in those frightening months.
But for now, the golf course gives him a small slice of America to watch over.
His cart slips behind a sand trap, then up past a water hazard. There’s a splash in the distance — a frog taking a midnight swim.
“Eight,” Stegherr says under his breath, as he looks into the darkness. The bushes rustle, and an animal scurries away.
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