For Those Who've Never Had the Pleasure...

I share this wonderful Country with 1,700,000 other Veterans of military service.  Who I think of often.  Especially those Vets who are sleeping on our sidewalks tonight.  We do so much for economic refugees (i.e., Illegal Aliens) from 156 countries, so far, but nada, zip nothing for our own Veterans.  Do they get a free cell phone?  Do they get a bus or train or plane ticket to anywhere, paid for by you and me?  Do they get free legal services?  Free rent, food and clothing?  Nooooooooo!

I think it's shameful.  I also think that my time in the military helped make me into who I finally turned out to be.  And here's a little tale about how all that journey started...

It was late in the afternoon of October 31st, 1966.  That would be Halloween.

And I was being formally inducted into the United States Army that very same day.  Trick or Treat!

I rolled into Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri just before sundown.  My life as a pool hustling, car racing, girl chasing, poker playing and beer drinking scofflaw was over.  My life as cannon fodder in our "Police Action" against some poor folks 8,000 miles away was just beginning.  

And I was scared sh*tless.

I sold my 1966 Chevrolet Corvette.  It was a sweet 427 cube, 425 hp., 4-speed with side pipes.  And all my guns.  52 of them.  Gave away all my hunting and fishing stuff, too.  I fully expected to be sent to Viet Nam.  I fully expected to have to get off the plane running, with some assassin taking pot shots at me.  I'd lived my life like the moth next to a flame.  I didn't expect to live to see 40.  Pool hustlers are like that.  I spent most of my evenings and weekends in dirty, dark biker bars with names like "Dew Drop Inn."  Places where you can get beat to death by a guy named "Bunny" and be buried near the tracks.  

So I wasn't quite sure how my new life would unfold.  But I knew it would be rough.  And here's how it all began...  

The Continental Trailways bus I was riding in arrived at the front of the Fort Leonard Wood U. S. Army Induction Center right at 5:00 p.m.  I was ushered off the bus along with 23 other young guys by an Army sergeant with the loudest voice I've ever heard.  Made even louder as it reverberated around the inside of the bus like a BB in a boxcar.  

I remembered I'd forgotten my earplugs.

We were herded, not usered.  Screamed at!  Cursed!  Belittled!  Intimidated!  Intentionally, I later learned.  This was the beginning.  They were stripping us of our identity.  To take us apart and then hopefully put us back together over the coming weeks in the mold of the U. S. Army.  To build us into soldiers.  Who would follow orders as given.  Without hesitation.  As a hesitation might cause death.  Yours and a lot of somebody elses.

Individualism is not appreciated in the Army. 

And as we were in the build-up stage of that Viet Nam Unpleasantness, following orders to a "T" might be our only chance of survival...

We scurried off the bus.  We were ordered to line up, side-by-side.  With me, being the tallest of the 23, all the way at the right end of the line.  It was a cold, wet, misty, dank, late October evening.  And it was near freezing.  That kind of bone-chilling, late Fall cold Missouri is so famous for.  

It was uncomfortable, as Missouri weather can often be.  I tried to explain Missouri weather one time.  There are four distinct seasons.  Winter, almost Summer, Summer, and almost Winter.  And each of those "almosts" lasts about two weeks...   

We were shaking like dogs sh*tting razor blades.  Out of fear and from the cold.  And then this little bitty guy with a Smokey the Bear hat came strutting his way out of the front gate and up to me.  He was a Filipino drill sergeant, and he came so close to me that the brim of his hat was banging onto my sternum.  Over and over.  As he screamed at me.  I was looking down on the top of that hat.  That was the only thing I could see of this guy who I'd never met but clearly did not like me.

A lot.

This guy was no more than 5' 5", proof that the Army is a good career option for those with no other options.  Or, if you're dumber than a bag of rocks, and can learn to scream gibberish at total strangers...

BTW, they were orders.  I think.  Or very loud requests, at least.  

This little dude was screaming in some language approximating English.  It was Tagalog, I later learned.  That's the national language of the Filipines.  And English.  Which they have to learn in order to become nurses at the Lost Angeles County USC Medical Center (inside joke).  I only understood about every third word.  I think he thought by screaming down the tallest guy there, he could intimidate all the other poor losers.  Instead, my chuckling at the hilarity of it all, laughing out loud, actually, so incensed this little drill sergeant that he ordered me to stand at attention, in the cold, for the next hour and a half.    

And the "Army" hadn't even really gotten started yet!

BTW, I got pneumonia and spent my first week in the Army in the hospital.  And the little Filipino guy probably got a promotion.

And when it did get started, boy, did it ever!  It would take nearly the 4 years to tell you about my 4 years of the Army.  Via the Army I was able to visit more than 20 countries.  It sent me to Germany to work in Army Intelligence.  An oxymoron, I'm aware.  I'd love to tell you how I saved everybody's butt from communism, but nearly everything I did is still classified.  So there's that... 

I was a loudmouth pool hustler who thought everyone wore a moneybelt and carried a gun before I went in.  By the time I came out I was seasoned, hardened, tough, resilient, well educated and wise.  I signed up to be an Army sniper.  I was able to make a far greater contribution than shooting one Bad Guy at a time.

Maybe one day I'll write about it.  The stuff I'm able to, that is...

The Army made me one very grown-up gentleman.  And Patriot.  One well prepared to take my place in society.  If you've got a son or daughter who could use some growing up and a free college education (and take the burden to pay for that education off of  you), call your Congressman.  He'll help get the paperwork to Anapolis, or West Point, or Colorado Springs started.  It just might be the second best decision you'll ever make.  Marrying your wife or husband being the first, of course...