Toby Meister mastered every mountain he tried to climb, from kickboxer to soldier to father.
JENKS -- Before a roadside
bomb in Afghanistan ended the
life of 1st Sgt. Tobias C. Meister this week, the Jenks soldier
had lived a life full of adventure
and inspiration in just 30 years,
his family said Friday.
A high school class president
and member of the National
Guard two years before graduation, Meister also was a Golden
Gloves boxing champion and an
undefeated kickboxer, along
with being Army Reserve Drill
Sergeant of the Year in 2002.
He married in 2003, witnessed the birth of his son in
2004 and became part of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan in 2005.
"He was just a mover," Judy
Meister said of her son, Toby.
"He enjoyed life to the fullest,
he enjoyed people, and he was
a wonderful son.
"And he was very patriotic.
He loved America, and Afghanistan just clarified that fact even
more."
He "would never ask any man
to do anything that he wasn't
willing to do himself," his mother said, so when his term as a
drill sergeant ended, he transferred to a unit of the U.S. Army Civil Affairs and Psychological Operations Command
(Airborne).
"He had trained so many soldiers to go over, he felt it was
his duty to do that also, to go
over and fight," Judy Meister
said.
Her son was as clear in his
mission as he was about the potential consequences, she said.
"He knew what to expect, and
he left a full set of instructions
for us, in case
something
should happen to him. He's taken care of his family, and he
told us how much he loved us
all the time, so even though
this is difficult, it makes it easier."
Meister was killed in Afghanistan on Wednesday when a
roadside bomb detonated near
the Humvee in which he was
traveling in Asadabad near the
Pakistan border, military officials said.
Previously employed by a Tulsa oil and gas firm, he had
gone to Afghanistan in June.
From his civil affairs post, he
was team leader of an 18-soldier
unit providing support for the
country's first free elections.
Judy Meister and her husband, Dave, had moved from
the family's native Iowa earlier
this year and moved into a
Jenks home, two blocks from
the house where their son lived
with his wife, Alicia, and 1-year-old son, William.
"We came specifically to help
out until Toby could get back
home . . . that's the kind of family that we are," she said. "We
said, 'Would you like us to do
this?' and he said yes. We were
wanting to do anything to get
him home safe."
Tim Meister said he was
looking forward to coming to
Oklahoma with his wife in February to see his older brother
during a two-week leave from
Afghanistan.
The little brother planned to
compare fatherhood notes with
Toby for the first time, as his
and his wife's adoption of a son
was official Dec. 9.
"Toby was most proud of being a wonderful husband and father in the short time that he
was one," Tim Meister said by
telephone from his Naples, Fla.,
home. "February was going to
be the first time he would have
met my son."
He recalled his brother joining the National Guard during
his junior year of high school in
Remsen, Iowa, where their
mother taught. Tim Meister
said his brother was also "always a good teacher, someone
who could get his point across
easier than most."
"He was a very motivated individual, and he loved to lead,
but he really loved to make
people better," Tim Meister
said. "He wasn't the typical drill
sergeant, not the yell-all-the-time
type. He'd get his point across
very easily."
After high school, Toby Meister left for college, then moved
to Dallas at 19 to teach karate.
He had an undefeated kickboxing career, and when he tried
boxing, he won the Golden
Gloves middleweight division at
the Cotton Bowl, his mother
said.
"He liked to parachute jump,
he liked to rock climb, he backpacked through Europe for
three weeks upon college graduation" from the University of
Texas at San Antonio, with a
degree in international business,
Judy Meister said.
"His philosophy was that if
there was something you really
wanted to do, and you set your
mind to it, there was nothing
you couldn't do," she said.
Fatherhood was a new mountain Toby Meister had climbed
and mastered, his mother said,
talking warmly about her grandson.
"Little Will reminds us a lot
of Toby. He looks like his dad,"
she said. "That's probably our
biggest disappointment, is that
Toby was a wonderful dad, and
that little boy isn't going to
know that. He's going to have
to be told that. He won't be
able to experience it."
The grandson was named after Judy Meister's father, an Army veteran of World War II.
Toby Meister was very close to
his grandfather, and that closeness led him into the Army instead of another branch of the
military, Judy Meister said.
"Toby was so supportive of
the war, and we just want to
make it clear to everyone that
his first concern was his fellow
soldiers, and that they're all
over there doing this for Americans," she said.
A memorial fund has been
set up to assist Meister's family.
Contributions may be made, in
person or by mail, to: 1st Sgt.
Tobias C. Meister Memorial
Fund, Grand Bank, 12345 S.
Memorial Drive, Suite 117, Bixby, OK 74008
Michael Smith 581-8381
michael.smith@tulsaworld.com
