Yes, there were good times. A lot of them. The sun rose behind us one morning as we sat in bleachers listening to a military lecture that was not heard. The clouds above the man up front constantly changed colors. Brilliant pastels constantly changing clothes against the deepest of blue skies. No one but the instructor made a sound. We sat there staring and slack-jawed.
Poker on the weekends. Mostly stud and two card guts. Nickel games that never got out of hand but still paid a close to the vest gambler like me enough change to live off my earnings. Of course life was cheap in a trainee outfit. Didn't go anywhere or buy anything but a burger and a beer at the EM Club across the street. And, over the course of the nine weeks, a half dozen LPs.
But the games were fun, a lot of fun. We were makin' less than a hundred bucks a month, so a three dollar pot carried a lot of weight. Stimulatin'. Got my pulse movin' and my mind off what was down the road.
Six guys sittin' around a bunk, smokin' butts and shootin' the breeze. Seemed like none of the usuals ever lost much money. Profits were brought in by outsiders who didn't know what they were doing. Felt sorry for a man who lost ten bucks in as many minutes, but not sorry enough to return the man's money. But it was the freedom of a Saturday afternoon with a week's duty in the past and the next week too far away to care.
Earl's taste for poker was richer than mine. Usually he'd sit in with us. Once in a while he'd wander off to find a game with more meaning. His favorite was blackjack and he had a feel for it. Mid-cycle he found himself in a high stakes game and walked away with over three hundred dollars. That walk away took him straight to the post office where he sent home a money order for nearly all of his winnings. Smart man. Then bought a tiny stereo set with what remained. That's why I bought a half dozen albums.
Chili sauce in the mess hall. May not sound like much but it was a happy day when those red bottles were put out. Our cook, like our Drill Sergeants, lacked talent for his job. Boiled spuds at every meal and a whole lot of hot dogs or burned liver as ugly accompaniments. The chili sauce covered up a lot of sins.
Like in Basic Training and Vietnam later, Lois' letters kept me going. She wrote nearly every day and mail call was always worth waiting for. Knowing someone was there, back in the real world, waiting for me, made life worth living.
Then, every evening that I could, I would sit and write in return. Most of my letters were nothingness, small talk. But they were one sided conversations with her. In my mind Lois was always there.
Small talk. Constant banter among the men on the second floor of our barracks. There was always someone to talk with, argue with, solve problems with, two dozen men to be with every step of the way to the crap most of us were facing. Laughter in the face of ... wellll, all but the Reservists and National Guardsmen knew what that face was. All we had to do was let our guards down for a moment and we'd be staring at it. But we were together in our respect for that terrifying face. The best of bad times.
Don't know if the Army intended it that way but, for the most part, we were left alone. That was good. Our Platoon Sergeant was a shake 'n' bake fresh out of NCO School who'd gone through AIT six weeks earlier, name of Teeter. He was nothin' like the Drill Sergeants we'd had in Basic Training. Wasn't in our faces yelling all the time. Or doling out punishment out of sheer joy. No, Teeter was laid back and probably as clueless as we were as to what combat was like.
Our lot in training was learning how to use weapons and how to walk through the woods with loads on our backs. Boy Scout jamboree with real things that went boom and bang. Wasn't all that bad except for the not wantin' to be there part.
Seems like it's possible for people to have a good time anywhere. Just that in a war time army the good times come and go quickly. The bad time hangs around a long time. It's there, off in the background, bidin' its time, even when the good times are dancin' around up front by the fire. Our hope was that its good buddy Death wasn't there also.
The best of the times was the last one. Sittin' in the SEA-TAC airport bar waiting to go home. There were eight of us buyin' rounds and getting picked off one at a time as flights were called. Outside of Russ and Earl I was never to see any of them again. Don't remember a name. That's how life goes in the Amy. You see the same group of men twenty-four hours a day for nine weeks, then it's over. Why I never saw them again is another story. Probably the next entry.
That the group of us was havin' a good time just talking is the story of soldiers everywhere. Where we go, at least back then, there was no entertainment besides ourselves. No phones, no internet, no video games, no television, no radio to speak of. Just each other with our stories of the past, thoughts of the day, and hopes for the future. Talkin', it's what grunts do.
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