WASHINGTON — Bob's Pizzeria in upstate New York was still wobbling in its second year when owner Robert Francis Banas abruptly shut it down and marched off to the war on terrorism.
A National Guardsman for six years, Banas was called to duty Sept. 11, the day the terrorists struck. After a few days in New York City, he spent a month guarding the Lewiston-Queenston Bridge on the U.S.-Canada border.
"Everyone was expecting another attack," the soft-spoken Buffalo Bills fan said from his North Tonawanda pizza shop. "We were right near the power plant that provides the power supply for a lot of the state."
Nearly seven months after the terror attacks — six months since the Afghan war started Oct. 7 — more than 83,000 reservists and guardsmen are on active duty for the federal government. That's the most since the Gulf War a decade ago.
An additional 7,000 guardsmen have been called up by governors to provide airport security.
As they went off to fight, protect bases, fly refueling missions or perform myriad other suddenly crucial tasks, many left jobs that pay far more than they now earn on duty. Those duties are creating some precarious family financial situations and endangering the existence of some small businesses.
Banas padlocked his fledgling enterprise on Sept. 11. He ended up serving for about a month after the attacks.
"We weren't sure how long we were going to be gone, and no one else was really capable of keeping the place open. I didn't reopen until Nov. 9," Banas said, apologizing for frequent interruptions as he took some of the 40 to 50 pizza orders he gets on an average night.
A $10,000 Small Business Administration loan, designed especially for his situation, enabled him to reopen the shop and rehire the part-timers he laid off while he was gone.
Despite the title "reserves," such forces are far from the last resort, mobilized only when the entire active duty military is at war.
In the post-Cold War era, the military has shrunk to 1.4 million troops from a high of 2 million during the mid-1980s. As a result, the Pentagon must turn to its 1.3 million reservists to shoulder part of any military campaign.
By law, companies must let reservists and guardsmen go on duty, and rehire them to equivalent jobs on their return — including raises and other benefits they would have earned had they stayed at work all along.
For most reservists and guardsmen, the part-time military duty is a source of extra cash in peacetime. But when mobilized, they earn only what active duty service members get, and that often is much less.
No law requires compensation for money they lose while serving.
"If you're serving in Afghanistan or you've been called to duty at an airport, you still have to pay your mortgage," said Army Maj. Hunt Kerrigan. "If your salary has been cut in half, how do you deal with that?"
Some employers are voluntarily paying on-duty employees at least part of the difference between their military pay and on-the-job earnings.
The $4,200 a month Senior Master Sgt. Fritz Vogel is earning at McGuire Air Force Base in New Jersey is about half his normal income, he says.
To his 13-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son, that means the twice-a-week karate classes are history, movie trips are a rarity and bowling is out.
"You have to re-examine where every penny goes," said Vogel, 48, who closed his construction business — Fritz's Welding Co., in Birdsboro, Pa., near Reading — when he was called up Oct. 22 for a year.
The youngsters have "gotten the brunt of it," he said. While they understand why their father is away — a reality that hit home when he told them about updating his will — they still are youngsters who make demands on their parents.
"We get hammered every weekend," he said. "They want to do this, want to do that. We've got to say, 'No, no, no.' "
Also sacrificing are their two older sons, 26 and 25. Vogel laid them off because he is the one who writes the bids, gets the jobs and oversees the work, primarily the steel end of construction.
Despite the hardships, Vogel was eager to serve after Sept. 11. The man who has been on active or reserve military status for 27 years volunteered the next day.
"We went up to New York, putting up a triage unit at 120 Broadway, right at ground zero," Vogel said. "We took it apart because there was nobody coming in" except firefighters with eye and respiratory problems from the blinding dust.
After a month at home, Vogel was called for the year and is thrilled to be doing construction projects on the base. "I have my expertise that I'm putting to use on the military side," while learning some new tricks from the military.
Delta Air Lines pilot Walter Mood was not elated about being called up Oct. 15.
"It wasn't exactly on my list of things to do that day," said Mood, an Air Force major now flying huge C-5 transport planes out of Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, carrying massive amounts of materiel around the world. "But part of the contract is that if the country needs me, I will go."
His $7,500 monthly military pay falls $5,000 short of his former earnings, in part because as a civilian he had two jobs — flying 737s for Delta and spending about 80 days a year on reserve duty.
But Mood, 37, and his wife Laura, who have no children, "always planned to live fairly simply." He's been on active or reserve Air Force status since they married 15 years ago. "We can still live on a major's salary."
Yet even they have cut back: "We're definitely not saving as much, and we're eating out less."
Mood is hoping his yearlong stint is not extended because other C-5 units have not been mobilized. "I'll be pretty unhappy if they don't activate the other units and let us off."
On the other hand, Banas, single and in his 20s, said he will serve again, no matter the cost.
"God forbid anything like that happened again, I would go in a second," he said.
Vogel, too.
"There's no doubt," he said. "I wouldn't even think twice about it. No question."