Basic Training and Me

In the past I have seen movies such as "In the Army Now" with Pauly Shore and "Renaissance Man" with Danny Devito. They where fun movies when they came out in the mid 90's. Ten years later I have re-watched these moves and they are still just as fun. However, there was something eerie about them. As I was watching "In the Army Now' I saw the characters in the processing area and thought to myself now that looks familiar. WAIT a minute, I have sat in those benches, I have looked at those walls, and I have walked on those grounds. Some of the scenes from "In the Army Now" were filmed at Fort Sill Oklahoma the same place I completed basic training. Even though the movie was filmed a few years before I was there, everything was just as I remembered.

Basic training was a very interesting experience for me. It started out at the MEPS (Military Entrance Processing Station) in Albuquerque, NM. That is the place where the new recruits get sworn into duty and all the paperwork is checked for dots above the I's and crosses on all the T's. My adventure started as a security holdover, which means there was something in my record that made me a security risk. I was held over for two days because of an "unlawful" swimming charge that was dropped over six years prior. So, I was twenty years old when I enlisted and that made me fourteen and a minor when the charge was dropped. Talk about military efficiency, maybe a bit too efficient in the wrong areas? From there, I flew out to Fort Sill, Oklahoma, which was going to be my new home for a minimum of two and one half months.

There are two areas at Fort Sill for new recruits, one was the staging area where we partially learned to march, issued basic gear and uniforms, hair cuts, eye checks and physical strength and health examinations to include all vaccinations are up to-date. The other area was "across the tracks".

"Across the tracks" was both literal and figurative in its meaning. While in the staging when people would talk about being "across the tracks" we all just assumed it meant the training area. Some kind of strange lingo that described how hard training would be. Everyday, we saw cattle cars load with new recruits and head for "across the tracks". The new recruits would be laughing and caring on like kids on the way to an amusement park. It was the beginning of a very surreal experience.

When my day came to load into a cattle car, I had two huge military bags of gear and my own personal bag, (which I was smart enough to only have a very small one). There were some recruits with huge suitcases plus their military gear, they looked like a packed mule as they sauntered over to the cattle cars. Let me tell you, when I say cattle cars, they are literally real cattle cars and they packed us in like sardines. It didn't matter much, everyone was hooting and hollering as the car pulled away from the staging area.

In one half of a split second everything changed. You see we road that cattle car for a few minutes, I from my position was able to see a couple of the Drill Sergeants, they where smiling deviously and I knew things where about to change. Even though I was near one of the small windows, I never saw them coming, the familiar brrump brump of a vehicle going over train tracks and the air around us changed. The Drill Sergeants started screaming at everyone, and ordered us to pick all of our junk up off the floor of "THEIR" cattle cars. Also everyone was ordered to put their faces against the walls and no one was allowed to speak or look up or move let alone breathe to loud. Once we went "across the tracks" our military training had begun.

Once at our destination we where forcefully thrown out of the cattle car and put into lines and ranks which made up our company. My full destination was Charlie Company 1/40th Field Artillery. I also ended up as first squad leader. As first squad leader you have a very important job, when the drill calls for formation, you mark where the formation starts. There is an exact location away from the drill, to find this location you have to run up next to the drill, mark off X number of steps perform a left face and mark off another X number of steps, than left face and everyone falls in on you. There were a couple things which made this seemingly simple task more difficult, one you have less than a second to mark distance and two I was out of shape and weighing in over 280lbs. It was a high profile position and I didn't need any help to stand out. With a 52" chest and 40"waist I stood out plenty enough. I remember one of the first days; we were standing in the chow line just outside the main doors waiting for our turn. A drill walked by me, stopped turned around then looked me up and down and stared at my chest. He asked, "˜Is that all Muscle Private?" I looked up at him, straight in the eye and stated, "˜No Drill Sergeant not all of it." He got this funny look on his face then walked away. You see, in basic training they will drop you, (physical training) anytime for any reason. I figured if I said yes, he would drop me to prove it, and if I said no he would drop me to make it. I split the difference and the gambled worked.

One of the things I disliked while in basic training surprisingly wasn't the Drill Sergeants or the constant yelling and physical training and stuff; those things I expected. What I didn't like, was the 'fellow soldiers' who where in training with me. It seems, they immediately made their own clicks or groups and I never have been one for clicks so I ended up the loner. You see, these clicks are not that big of deal, what was was the mentality of these people whereas they did not care or want to care about anyone other then themselves. Some of the recruits had special "back to school" training, whereas they took a summer for basic training then when back to civilization to finish their senior year of high school. Their attitude literally was "I don't care about anyone here, because after this is over I go back to the real world and never see any of you again.' I heard that sentiment more than once. There were also some people who were bitter because of personal issues; however, it was everyone else's fault. On such person, from what I gather was a hot shot football player, complete with some fancy ring. However, he could not ever play pro-ball because he had a heart murmur. I don't know how it became my problem, but it did. He also happened to be the PG (Platoon Guide), kind of peer leader. One such day it was my problem, he stepped up to me, pressed his chest against mine trying to push me back and stated, "Why is it every time I hear jacking around I look up and See you.' Not giving him any ground I replied, "Because I am the BIGEST one here!' He looked at me for a minute than walked away with his head down because he couldn't better me.

Regardless of the lack of friendships in basic training I did enjoy myself. I remember one night whereas I was dead asleep and woke up to the drill yelling to "toe to line'. Toe to line meant for everyone to line up at the foot of their bunks facing out with our toes on the imaginary line the bunks created. So there it was pitch dark, middle of the night and I hop out of the bunk and stand at attention on the line. A couple minutes went by and a fireguard walked by. He stopped and asked, "Gett, what are you doing?" I looked around saw everyone still sleeping, so thinking on my feet said, "I'm headed to the head.' And that was that. Oh, I didn't stay squad leader for to long, I like to think, because I rocked and the drill couldn't make fun of me so he gave someone else that position, which was fine by me I already stood out enough. Another funny situation that happened was within the first couple weeks of training. Now, think of this, June and July in Oklahoma, it was wicked hot to start with, now you add uniforms with sleeves and lots of physical training you have some stinking sweaty smelly troops on your hands. After a half day of training we ended up at a photography studio to have our pictures taken. We looking tore up from the ground up had to put on some "fake" class A uniforms for these pictures. Basically a half shirt and full jacket, which was easy enough to do; yet, did I tell you how big I was? They did not have a "fake" uniform to fit me, and so, I ended up having my photo taken in my dirty sticking smelly BDU's, only one in the company.

I could most likely write a book on the good the bad and the ugly of my basic training experiences, yet, one of the better ones, was the fact that I drew the design that was used to make company t-shirts. There was a front and back design, the front featured a large skull with flaming eyes under a round brown (drills hat), and the back was a much smaller version with a BDU cap on with all of our names listed. The design was liked so much I was allowed to paint the Drill Skull on the wall next to first bunk. This stood over 7' tall from the top of the hat to the point of the chin. By the end of basic training, I weighed in at 135lbs and a 36" waist. All in all I had fun, and if I was able too, I would do it again minus the rotten recruits. Yet, this is getting mighty long for now, and so I will leave you with a quote from one of my drills.

"A Word from the Wise is Sufficient. It's a Fact Private, it's a Fact."