From Halloween...'til April Fool's Day...

I was drafted into the United States Army on Halloween, 1966, and was discharged, honorably I might add, on April Fools Day, 1970.

If that bit of history doesn't get your attention, nothing will.  But I thought a short intro into my time as a soldier way back when might prove entertaining in light of the events of the day.  It sure was to me.  

Sort of...

The Continental Trailways bus transporting me and a dozen or so other new recruits to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, that cold, COLD* late October evening, arrived just before dusk.  We departed with our carry stuff in our hands and a short little guy wearing a smoky-the-bear hat began immediately screaming at us.  At the top of his lungs.

In some sort of language approximating English, with a heavy tinge of what sounded like Tagalog, just for seasoning.

As it happens I was at the very end of the line of guys this scary little fellow was ordering around.  And, because I was the tallest, I think, he happened to pick on me to establish his authority.  He stepped in front of me, poking his little Filipino nose directly into my sternum.  His smoky hat was bumping into my chest as he screamed.  And I was looking directly down to the top of it.  The spittle from his drill sergeant mouth was flitting all about as he cursed at us.  (Short Note:  This was back in the Viet Nam Unpleasantness days so treating new recruits with dignity was, ummm, apparently unnecessary.)  

Now, I didn't know about those other guys, but I had no Earthly idea what this guy was saying.  Or, attempting to say.  As he was screaming at my breastbone.  Fortunately, there was another guy there whose job I guess was to translate for his tiny superior.  He told us to grab our s**t and follow him.  We did.  With a case of universally tight butt cheeks, I might add.

We were assigned a bunk that night, and a bed roll, given a baloney sandwich, and told to get some sleep, as the next day would be the beginning of "Hell Week."  He said that with a chuckle.  That's the period, we were soon to learn, during which they issue you your clothing and gear and prepare you for your (potentially) short life as a soldier.  And that was to include...horror of horrors...

                      "Shot Day."      

The inoculations which were to be "given" this day was truly something to behold.  I was a ballet in green.  A symphony during which they were to vaccinate more than 200 recruits in less than 30 minutes.  They had emptied out a barracks where a company of 50 or so normally slept and equipped it with medics to inoculate their new conscripts against any and every imaginable ailment they might contract.  Oh yeah, you couldn't refuse them.  I don't think anyone even considered trying.  Or even raising an objection at the time.  

Just like I can't believe it now.  

When you're in the military, you do as the military tells you.  For the military owns your butt from the time you hold up your right hand and get sworn, until you receive your final discharge.  Or, like the very balmy Lt. Col. Schiller recently found out when he decided to go very, VERY public (social media) with his refusal to accede to shot mandates from above, you get tossed in the brig, and then bounced out of the Marine Corps, without your pension.

It's a good idea in the military...and in life...to pick which hill to die on.  This wasn't his...

Anyway, the next morning arrived overcast and dark.  And very cold.  And the medics were ready for us with their saddlebags of medicine hanging over their shoulders, with long rubber tubes attached to guns, GUNS, that shot drugs into your skin, using high velocity air instead of needles!  

So you can imagine the bruising that occurs when you get high velocity shots between the pores of your skin with a paint ball gun.  And in our case, at least, there were about 27 of them in total.  27 different shots!  We were then protected against any and every damn thing!  

Except "lead poisoning" from the Viet Cong, of course, but that's another story.

Glory of glories!  We were given the next day off!  And we soon found out why.  Waking up the next morning was pure agony!  We were so sick by the time we were all shot up that most of us just laid down on the bare metal springs of an empty bunk and prayed the ache would soon subside.  But every single fiber of my being throbbed in pain that next morning!  Every muscle!  Every sinew!  Every nerve and vein and hair on my head hurt like I'd been run over by a Mack truck!  I felt like I'd been dragged through a knothole!

I needed to pee so bad I had to get up, I recall, but was forced to crawl to the latrine 'cause I could not walk.  I guess this was one of those, "You had to be there moments..."

We soldiers all lived through "Shot Day," back then, and all the other indecencies they threw at us.  Because we were men.  Men with a job to do.  You do what you have to do to get to where you need to be.  For that's the American way.  And because that's what men do.  

Then, at least.

A short note to those who have blanched at getting the vaccine for any of a number of reasons:  Even though it's being mandated by a silly old puke who I'm confident has no idea which direction is up, the vaccine is good for you.  Take it.  I suggest those of you who have yet to avail yourself of the vaccine because you fear its side effects (almost infinitesimally small), or you hate Joe O'Biden (who doesn't?), or you think Fauci is a major-league prick (but what would Sunday morning be without him?), go ahead and do it anyway.  It could be a matter of life and death.

Yours...

* There is no cold like Fort Leonard Wood cold.  I recall many winter days there praying for the thermometer to reach zero.  It basically sucked.  "Basically," get it?  Ft. Wood was one of the Army's three main training centers back then (the others were Ft. Dix, NJ and Ft. Lewis, WA).  I have low-crawled over every single inch of Ft. Wood's forlorn, rock-strewn landscape, approximating that of the moon, and I do not recommend it to others.  No way, no how...