A Stupid Kid

As I look back at my early years I realize that I was a stupid kid. (I guess uneducated, shy and backward also come to mind.) I was horribly shy and really didn't have what one would call true friends. I barely made it through a Catholic Grade School. (We acutally have a first ever reunion of the school coming up.) I was made fun of, was a lousy student, terrible at baseball during recess, etc. I now know that I was terrible at baseball was due because of poor vision and not being able to judge distance. High School was even worse. It seemed the only thing that ever was good was working. Somehow that made up for everything else although it really kept me even more from school activities, etc. due to me working almost full time while going to high school. After High School I went to Des Moines and lived with a couple other guys and went to United Electronic Institute for six months. I was horrible at math, studying, etc. so I dropped out after about four months but lived and worked in Des Moines until my parents forced me to return to Omaha. I had made a friend, Steve from Wisconsin, and just starting to feel "normal" but that ended that. (I often think of Steve and where he ended up and wish we had had more time to get to know one another. We both shared some of the same circumstances in our past.)

I was working at a horse racing track and making some friends and started to feel normal when I was drafted and went to Ft. Lewis Washington. I was scared shitless. I was still very shy, not athletic, etc. and ready for failure. But a funny thing happened. I ended up feeling happy and normal. I made friends, laughed, told stories and we all did stupid things that we could laugh about. I guess we were all in the same boat. We were all away from home, out of our element, scared, etc. I never felt like this before and it was overwhelming. We were in the 4th Platoon which was considered the fuck ups. Every time our Company had to sit down the Drill Sargent's would say "Take Seats" to which we would reply:

"Rat Shit, Bat Shit, Suck your mothers tit. Cock suck, Mother Fuck, Eat a Bag of Shit. We're the mighty Penguins, all the other suck. We the might D12, rah, rah  fuck." And once when ROTC was there for training with us we added "ROTC Suck" to the end.

At the beginning of Basic I did what everyone told me not to do. I signed up for an extra year to get a school. Little did I know that I would be offered a duty station right a Ft. Lewis but once they found I signed up for a school I was told to forget that. Shit, I could have stayed there for my full two years. So, after the Basic Training Graduation Ceremony, me and 3 or so other guys grabbed a cab and he drove very fast to get us to the airport for our flight from Washington to Nebraska. We got there in a nick of time and they put us in First Class. We were offered this great meal, etc. but I turned it down even with the push for me to take it from Ed. Why? I was embarrassed. Why? Who the fuck knows. I was just overcome with being shy and embarrassed again. What the hell was wrong with me. Anyway, I had two weeks in Omaha before my tour at Ft. Gordon, GA. It was a strange two weeks. I had a girlfriend and I fucked that up royally and I don't even remember the circumstance other than I was a total ignorant prick. I also had an altercation when while driving my mom's car. Of course I had the buzzed hair down to my scalp. Some guy next to me at a red light started yelling stupid things at me and threw hamburgers all over my windshield and calling me names. I kinda was forcing them over into the wrong lane when the light turned green and the driver yelled "please" so I backed off.

I remember being glad that leave was over. I just didnt' seem to fit in and was ready to go. Scared shitless again, but ready. I flew off to Ft. Gordon GA via Chicago, Atlanta and finally Augusta. When I got there it was time to settle in for a day or so with all the new guys getting stationed there for inprocessing. It was a time also a for meeting up with some guys I had met in Basic and boy was it like old home week. One of the guys talked all the time in Basic about his car "The Judge" and what a car it was. He was more than happy to show it to us all since he drove it down to AIT.

Well, I got to get some ZZZZZs. It has been such a fucked up week so far and I have been so sad. Thinking back to a time, that those who never served would not understand, brings some peace to me tonight.

Goodnight Brothers.