Part Four

1
Beer Hall

I had gone to the beer hall this first Saturday evening after returning to Basic Training Camp, from Christmas leave. The Captain was there, I had heard he showed up now and then, but not often, and this was perhaps my third time in the beer hall myself, I preferred the EM Club to the hall, more sedate.
For me it was really the first time I saw him here, a sharp consciousness of being stared at absorbed me, made me look the other way. He was still gazing at me when I turned around, thus, it was me he was curious about—so I validated, some kind of strained expectancy, I expect, like a month ago when he stared at me in his office, like a rat in a cage, or maze. More like a psychological pondering, trying to figure me out for the butchering that was going to take place. I paid little heed thought, at first, just curious also to his inquisitive mannerisms.
After about ten-minutes of this, I asked myself, ‘What is he waiting for?’ I was becoming irritably, adding, ‘what does he expect of me now: to sing the National Anthem for him personally?’ I stood silently, a tinge guarded now, as if this was an entirely obvious reaction, as he approached me.

“We’ve both been away for a while, Christmas vacation, I’ve wanted to talk to you before you left, but…well it just didn’t work out, I’m a bit surprised you’re back, and so glad I found you here this evening, Private Siluk.” He said in a seriously low and cordial tone, almost a mumble.

At about this time, I was waiting for the punch, the Sunday punch that normally comes with such surprises; you know, someone says a few good words, to get you off guard, off balance, and than bang.


2
The Captain


(I gazed mutely at him.) The Captain stood now alongside of me, as I leaned back, somewhat comfortable against a pillar in the old WWII, beer hall. He said, sincerely, yet kind of in an official manner, something I never expected, never even saw it coming:

“You make me look like the worst Company Commander in the whole Basic Training Camp, Private Siluk. My comrades laugh and make jokes about how you belittle the Army, and its training and our Sergeants… (then he grabbed two beers on the counter, laid down thirty cents, and brought them back to me, one for him, the other for me, then continued:) as I was saying, about to say, you do not make me look good in front of my peers. To the contrary, and I’ve thought about his a while, what to do with you, you are always borderline, actually you would make a good soldier, if you wanted to, it seems you do not want to though. (he looked at me deeply and sincerely into my eyes) what did I ever do to you?” He asked.

“Nothing,” I said.

“Well then, unintentionally, you are making me look like the worse commander at Fort Bragg for nothing? I never drafted you, the Government did, yet it seems you are taking your anger out on me, my Company!”

(I felt awkward, not sure what to say)) He did not say it loud, but said it firmly, with almost hurt in his face. I knew I was taking it out on the platoon, but there are four platoons to a company, and I didn’t feel I was taking it out on them, but he assured me I was, because they rated all four platoons, to see which one was the worst and best, and then rated the companies, which were four also, to a Battalion, and I was in the 10th Battalion, 1st BDE (Brigade) this I knew already, and I knew we were the worse of the worse. But I never put two and two together it was me making the platoon look back, I passed all the physical and written tests, but it was based on more I guess than that.))

“I never said it was your fault, Captain,” I responded; as we both walked easily and leisurely a few steps, both thinking. He perhaps had it all figured out, how he would present this to me, it was too cleaver to have had it just pop out of his head at the moment it did, for he added this, “I’ll make you a deal, you have got two years of this life to deal with, it’s going to be a rough road for everyone involved, even you, everyone you meet. (Smiley walks by, I smile, let him know all is well; the Captain becomes silent until he passed, then continues), as I was saying, you have a lot of time to fight with everyone, and that is not a good way to live. Here is what I will do for you. At midnight, I will have two MPs pick you up at the barracks, everyone will be sleeping, and they will take you to the bus station, and not report you’re missing for twenty-four hours, enough time to get to Canada, if that is where you wish to go. You can be out of the country before the AWOL notice goes into effect. Or you can stay here, and please stop making trouble for me (he made this personal)?”

He was I think waiting for an answer, one I never gave him, couldn’t give him, at the moment, so I simply walked away, as he said, “They’ll be out by your barracks at midnight.” (Meaning the MPs.)

Well, I was there in the morning, as if nothing had been said, standing in formation, as always, reveille (my wake up call), and I’m not sure if the Captain saw me or not, but that was the last time I had saw him, face to face; off in the distance, I saw him here and there. He did one thing if anything, he threw it back on me, I had to make the decision, not him, thus, his conscious was free, and back in those days, it wasn’t hard for an officer to get revenge if he indeed wanted to, and it wasn’t hard for a trouble maker like me I suppose to cause friction for the Army on a continues us scale, so perhaps he gave both us, the Army and me, an once of respect, to straighten things out, or let time do it the hard way, for both of us. For the most part, I behaved myself, for the most part I say, but not completely. And in time I would turn out to be a good soldier, and awarded a number of medals to prove it. Yes, this was really just the beginning.


Written 4-2-2007

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(January, 1970; Week Six in Basic Training)

Part Five


In the days and weeks to follow—every muscle throughout my body was aching, head spinning; yet I was not worn down like most of the troops, perhaps I had a lot of training in San Francisco, and back in St Paul, Minnesota in karate, and my body was somewhat ready for this kind of training. Face to face with the Drill Sergeants, I half straightened my attitude out, somewhat came to an understanding, willingly obedient, yet at night I still came in soggy drunk, hanging onto whatever I could.

On the top bunk, of the bunk bed I was on (in the large room we lived in, the bunk beds of us 44-soldiers were in two rows, 11-to each side, one soldier on top, one on the bottom, old WWII, wooden framed, square frame, slanted roofed barracks, and going toward the double doors, to the right, it lead out into the courtyard, just beyond the doors, straight ahead, was the latrine. The windows in the building were wide, on both sides of the wooden structure, several to each side; the outside painted white, the inside pale white, and green.), as I was about to say, a southern boy slept on the top bunk, he didn’t seem to like me, or get along with me all that well, just gave me sneers like the Sergeants often did, not like Smiley and I, and he didn’t like me coming into the barracks drunk and coming in so late, I felt it was none of his business. He was a strict soldier, and our attitudes conflicted, ferocity of rectangular emotion around him, I called it now, then it was just bitterness, and he decided to confront me on this drinking issue one evening, just before lights out.

I came in, it was perhaps a few minutes before ´Light’s out!’ and he grabbed me by my shirt (about my height, and weight), said: “It’s two minutes to lights out, and here you are walking in half drunk.” He was correct in his observation.

“Oh,” I said, adding “…is that so…!” and broke his arm from my shirt, downward, and a second later, took my palm and pushed him against the wall. He was stunned I had broken his arm hold so easily, and without had him almost pinned against the wall. Then I grabbed his shaving cream and squirted it all over him, not sure why, but it was the closest thing to my free hands now, but perhaps to shame him or belittle him in front of the onlookers, whom were the soldiers in their bunks now. Then stepped back into a fighting stance, and egged him on. I did not want to beat him without him having another chance to strike me, it didn’t seem right. I mean I could have killed him right there, had I wanted to, his open posture was almost an invitation for a slaughter, but only a professional fighter could have seen that. I had just come from San Francisco and Studied Karate under the guidance of the greatest Karate instructor of its day (1968-69), Gosei Yamaguchi, thus, having two years in warlike arts in fighting; I was ready.

His instinct was good, he backed down, and I never pushed anyone beyond that point, the point of no return, never put anyone in a corner I always told myself, give him a little room to get out, it could save you a lot of trouble. That was always inbreed in me, not sure of the why or how it.

My thoughts at the time were: why does this wooden man, one I can break so easily confront me like this. The following morning he was standing outside, with two friends, and I came up to him and said, “Do you want to finish it…?” and added, let me show you this: and before he could say a word I had thrown several punches and a back kick (not to show off but to show him I no longer was going to play with him), and I pulled my punches lest I break his nose or jaw or something. After the demonstration, his eyes bulged out, and he just said, “You’re a trained fighter, it would be crazy to fight with you,” and walked away.

4-2-2007

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(January, 1970; Week Seven in Basic Training)

1
KP

KP, or call it Kitchen Police, Kitchen Duty, or whatever, but back in my day, ever soldier did it. I was woken up this one morning of my seventh week in training, it was a Sunday, and someone wanted to go to church, so guess who they picked for kitchen duty, me. I wasn’t supposed to have it, I had had it three times before, and was suppose to have been done with it. But the Army never works that way, they just keep putting straws on the camels back until he drops, or says something to stop it, and I was not everyone’s favorite soldier, so I just accepted it, I was close to going on to the next stage, advance training in Alabama so I figured another day on KP would not hurt. Yet at the time I didn’t know my next duty station. I didn’t even know if they were going to pass me, I mean, they could have fixed it for me to stay around a while if they hated me so much, you know, torment me with another eight weeks of this boy scout training as I had felt it was. They had done it I heard, but they would not do it to me. Although I’m getting ahead of myself, it is of no consequence to the story here and beyond.

“Soldier, get up, you got KP!” said the young sergeant, my drill sergeant, at 4:00 AM, with a smirk on his face. He was a vulture, “I already had it three times before!” I said.

“You got ten minutes…no more!” he added to his unsightly face. The Buck Sergeant stood outside, waited to see if I was coming, and I was, I rushed to and fro…and was on my way in ten minutes flat.

It was as if by me staying in the platoon touched off a high explosive inside the sergeant’s head, I think he would have liked me to have gone AWOL, run to Canada for his amusement. As I walked outside, onto the dirt road in front of the barracks, and then on down the dirt road, and across the black asphalt road—that went the opposite way, to the Mess Hall, he looked a bit gloomy, I was turning out to be a soldier indeed, and he wasn’t sure if he liked that.

It was a long day, or would be. First came the dishes, then the pots and pans, and then the potatoes, yes, I hated doing the potatoes, not because it was hard, nothing in the Army is that hard, it was boring, and they had an automatic potato peeler right behind me, staring at my back side, as I sat on the steps in back of the mess hall, peeling potatoes the old fashion way, with a knife, slowly, and a big pot for the skins of the potatoes and one for the potatoes. I think it was based on not wanting us to have something to do, rather than nothing to do and the automatic peeler would only do the job quicker and allow us to have free time. Oh well, it was all part of the show I told myself. And it gave me time to think of many things.

(I thought about Maria Garcia, a young woman I was seeing and had met while on Christmas leave, back in St. Paul (the past December). She had a kid, and we’d drink a lot together, and she always seemed to be having family, friends, people in general over to her house, a Mexican thing I think, or Spanish thing, more the company the better; where as for me being the gringo, I was not used to this, and had I suppose less of a family life in that I didn’t have so many people around, more of a loner. But it was nice meeting everyone. She was cute, short, black thick hair, a nice shape on her, and somewhat of a decent lover. And I never told her I was in the Army, and on my last day of leave, I simply left, that was it, I got up one morning, had my orders to go, and left, never even made a phone call, had I, I would not have known what to say anyhow. I would see her some two years later; she’d spot me in St. Paul, in a grocery story, and ask, “Whatever happened to you?” She wasn’t even mad, just concerned. I replied: “I’m really sorry, I was on my way to Vietnam, to war, and I thought, had I told you, it would just get in the way.” Well there was some truth to that, I had went from Fort Bragg, to advance training in Alabama, and onto West Germany, before I went to Vietnam, I kind of let all that stuff out of the picture, deleted it you could say, and just added Vietnam, and war.

“Oh my gosh,” she said, with a serious look.

“How are you doing now?” I asked. And she assured me she was doing fine. Evidently, living with someone, and thus, we parted good friends.

On my three hundred and forty-forth potato, I got thinking about Sergeant Wolf, a black sergeant, drill sergeant that is. How he’d smoke, solemnly smoke them cigarettes, right to its end. He was there among the other Drill Sergeants often, talking, he was from ‘C’ platoon, I think he liked me, because I made him look good, and our sergeants bad; they always had bets, betting on this and that: saying there platoon was better, and I think my drill sergeants lost many bets. He had a fleshless neck, all most none at all, and a head of an absurd largeness; a stooping body like an ape, and hands that almost touching the ground when he walked. He was the Judo and Karate instructor; I could have taught the men better, but for what time we had, it was good enough. I think at times his prerogative was to out show me, but whatever he showed, or demonstrated, I could do better, he had a horrible agility, dull small eyes, clean-shaven. He darted here and there it seemed, like a spider, stupidly I often found myself looking at him. I wouldn’t miss him, I told myself.

Yes indeed many thoughts were going through my mind this day, this twelve hour day: I remembered the three Generals, the second or third day I had been in boot camp, Smiley, I and Bruce were sitting down in the clothing supply area waiting to get sized up for our dress greens, and here comes three generals, I didn’t really know a general from a captain, but one had three stars on his shoulders. “How they treating you soldier?” he asked me, I didn’t get up, and simply said, “So, so, I guess,” he smiled, and said something else, and I never saluted him, nor stood at attention, that was a peeve with my young drill sergeant, but he got over it, after warning me, should it happen again, I’d be severely reprimanded; the General saw the sergeant was upset, and told him in so many wards: give him a break.

The other thing that came to mind in my daydreaming was the old sergeants appearance, my drill sergeant, when I say old, I do not really mean, old, old, but for a drill sergeant, old: he had a square jaw, like me, but was a few inches taller, not much, a rough looking face, as if he had been around a bit, small eyes, half closed all the time, or seemingly so. At times he was vigorous and at times a cold pathetic look gravitated all over his face to his forehead. He was what many called, a Red Neck, perhaps thirty-seven years old, but he was a vulture nonetheless.)


2
Army Life

I felt at times I was the side focus of the group of drill sergeants, they had beat the hell out of one of the soldiers for not adjusting and getting smart with them, which I really never did, I mean I never disrespected them verbally, I was simply not afraid of them, and they knew it. Moreover I was guarded I suppose, waiting for them to do it to me, or try. And they knew I was waiting, and I think my eyes warned them, be careful, you are treading on unknown ground, and somebody besides me will get hurt also. What I took to be men of honor, among our leaders, disappointment me somewhat, most were fine, but some were not. They had a job to do I know, and this is of course how I was feeling at the time: everyone with gaunt and hard eyes, with gloomy jobs, and often drunk before lights went out for us. The older drill sergeant, my drill sergeant couldn’t talk for two weeks, laryngitis (inflammation of the larynx). Not sure why I thought this was funny, but he couldn’t holler like he’d have liked to.

At the end of the day, I had a few aches and some numbness, my muscles danced, and my nerves wiggled. Smiley came by once, said: “See yaw at the beer hall tonight…!” And Bruce and Allen would be with him. Both good old southern boys, as they called themselves. Allen was a large figure of a man, glasses and smart. I nodded my head ‘yes’ and kept on peeling those potatoes, and cutting them up.

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Part Six

We marched back and forth like children walking in formation to school, not half miles though, but four and five miles a day. No one had the right to resort to tears nor calmly and flatly refuse, a few I think wanted to, we had a fat boy in the group, and the sergeants run him ragged (by the time he left, he must had lost forty pounds, he was most grateful to his oppressors) didn’t even fight back, emotionally or physically. Most of the trainees just did what they were told, had to do, thought they had to do. I learned later on in time, one can hate the Army and love it at the same time. And then one becomes codependent on it, with it. This never took place at this stage of the game, but down the road of life it would.

Most of the recruits just did what they were told, not creating any static, or disruptions. The first day they had asked if any of the soldiers were lawyers, or studying law in college, and a few raised their hands, and I never saw them again. Not sure if they got special treatment, or a special platoon, but I knew that if you were in college, the chances were you’d not be drafted until after you got out, or if you were married prior to 1965. I guess I felt, they felt, the rule makers of the country felt we (the others) were dispensable in comparison. Anyhow, as I was saying the men were almost on automatic control for the drill sergeants at this time, acting without thinking, like robots, what they wanted I suppose.

They seemed to have immune perversity while I often emanated an inner outrageousness for such control. I suppose that is why a nation selects our youth, they are so vulnerable, gullible, and patriotism is high, and not reviewed for wrongness. When I select a church (or any organization) to belong to, I review its doctrine, its code, no matter what, listen to the preachers, if they preach the gospel fine, if they preach something that sounds like it, I need to do some thinking, more thinking, and deep thinking—do I want to belong to this or not, kind of thinking; it is a decision with me and myself, my life, the only thing I got here on earth.

People are deceiving; self-interest is stronger than going to Hell. A nation run by a lunatic is not wise to follow. And it is obvious from history: it is easier to enmesh the masses with a big lie, than the few with a small lie. Hitler, and all his kind in history have done so, and continue to do so, and have proven me right, and the blind follow the blind.

On the other hand, it was good for me I suppose, I had a judge that said in so many words: go in the Army, or face the consequences, it was on some minor charges, but I am sure he would have made them look big had I not done my duty (I think it was traffic tickets, 21-of them, way overdue, and I didn’t have the money to pay for them and correct the situation, or problems that would have come from it, perhaps a year in the workhouse is what I might have been facing.) Oh, well, it kept my record clean, they wash the tickets away, the Army was dealing with me, and in time the Army would be like the World’s Fair for me, I got to travel, which I loved, and got paid for working out, which I loved, but orders, they were the quencher, I had to adjust to that, control, that I didn’t love.
And so the battle between me and the Army was half over, nothing was hard for me in the Basic Training world, wasteful perhaps, but not difficult. I was throwing time away, and they were throwing dollars my way, and travel, and training, and so we both got something out of it, the tax payers I’m not sure. And if I was going to save the world, this was a good place to start. It was now 1970, a new decade for me, an ultimatum had been settled, I accepted, this was better than the old stalemate I had back home, and found myself again in, while in the Army, and so I had to learn to bark like a dog to my masters, somewhat, and I would get my biscuit, and I did.

As time would prove, the Army became an intricate part of my life; it provided a roof over my head, a job, or employment, and college down the road.

4-3-2007

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Part Seven


I had learned, a Soldier’s first day in basic training, is like every other day, one very long day. For me it was thirteen weeks long. Dlsiluk

I was motionless, it was Saturday, and we were all standing about in the bus station on base at Fort Bragg, checking out the billboard for our assignments. It was the end of the eighth week of training, and we had but a few days left, going into the ninth week, actually, my 13th week (counting the four weeks I had for Christmas leave) belonging to this Platoon of sorts. We all were checking to see where our orders were going to send us, for our new assignment. The Drill Sergeants were sitting in the smoking room, drinking and so forth, having a bash, training was over for the most part, but we had two days left, we had to use them to clear the base, sign papers, bring back our linen, and so forth and then we’d meet back here and take our buses to wherever.

Sergeant Wolf was collecting money, “How about you Private Siluk?” he asked (a little kinder than usual), as I’m reading my assignment to ‘Red Stone Arsenal,’ Alabama, for munitions training; Smiley by my side, reading his, to Fort Hood, Texas, for Infantry Training.

“Well,” said the sergeant with his hat out.

“Collecting money for what?” I said, adding “is this another requirement?”

“So we can get drunk and forget all your faces, and all the work we had to do to get you recruits to be real soldiers.”
I just stared at him, and he walked away, went into the backroom with the door opened, and took a drink of his booze. Somehow I felt sorry for the men the Drill Sergeants, they really thought they were doing a good deed, they felt they deserved it, the change they were collecting, they all surely had some kind of vision, one I did not pick up on. I was in-between, the eclipse I suppose. So I walked into the backroom, “Want a drink…?” Staff Sergeant Wolf asked.
“I’m a beer drinker, not whiskey…” I said, and dropped fifty cents into his hat, and walked away. I had come to the conclusion, I was not there to change people, but changing me was not so bad, it was for the better, and I only changed what I wanted to change. We saw things a little differently I suppose, but that is the way life is, even in the Army, and they needed some kind of uniformity and it was over.

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