ProetryPlace Blog 28 Soldiering and Such
Part 2
(At the end of Part 1, Blog 27, our hero, i.e. me, is left on a bus headed for Fort Sheridan, Illinois after being inducted into the United States Army.)
Hours later, the gates of Fort Sheridan admitted us. Weary passengers disgorged from our bus and merged with other young men milling about along the side of the road. Streetlights tinted everyone ghostly yellow under the cold night sky. Confused Second Lieutenants regrouped us into smaller units, a mysterious military mix and match, and we were led to the mess hall nearby. My stomach ached from hunger.
Inside, I cast a suspicion eye at the strange meat, camouflaged in thick, dark gravy that was spooned onto my tray. I hoped for the best, some kind of beef maybe, or it could be pork . . . turkey? With my first hungry bite, I knew its true identify—liver! I gagged, and spent my first night in an Army barracks with an empty stomach. Emotionally and physically depleted, I slept finally without pretense.
A shrieking whistle woke me at 6 o’clock. “Gentlemen arise.” The sergeant’s magnificent baritone echoed through the cavernous room. “A new day has dawned.” Any hint of daylight was over an hour away. “Drop your cocks and grab your socks.” He advanced stiffly between the rows of double bunks lining the barracks walls, eyes ahead, seeing no one. “’cruits, listen up!” At the far wall, he wheeled and reversed direction. “Relieve yourselves, wash up, brush your teeth and make up those bunks, in that order! Fall out on the street at oh-six-thirty. Prompt.”
He was gone, leaving the disheveled, half-awake “cruits” blinking and stumbling about under the harsh glare of bare-bulb ceiling lights. I complied with all except the first command, which modesty and empty bowels prevented. Ten shiny commodes stood side by side along the latrine wall, facing an equal number of urinals on the opposite wall. No chance for privacy. I might never have a BM for the next two years!
Marching to the morning mess, no one spoke while a short, skinny corporal walked alongside droning an occasional “hup, hup.” The dismal realization that I was no longer free to go my own way whenever I chose was becoming ever more clear, like the dawning of the gray winter sky. Strangers would control when and where I slept, when and what I ate, how and where I moved, even my allowed responses. This was just day two, with a promise of 728 more to come, and already I didn’t like any part of it.
After breakfast, we marched, as well as civilians playing soldier can, to the barber. I stood in a long line, waiting again and watching all manners of male coiffures yield to the barbers’ shears, buzzed efficiently to stubble with just eight or ten sweeps of the droning clippers, front to back, front to back, zip it’s gone.
“Next.”
So this is how Sampson felt. My vainly treasured waves were shorn, and I became a skinhead, distinguishable from the other skinheads only on close observation.
“Move out to the next station.”
I moved to the next station.
“Waste?” the uniform behind the counter asked.
“Huh?”
Exasperation: “What’s your waist size?”
“Oh. Uh . . . 32.”
“Take these. Move on.”
I gathered up all the clothing foisted on me as I moved from one quartermaster clerk to the next along the line—one wool, khaki dress-uniform with pants, shirt, tie, cap and Eisenhower jacket, two cotton, olive drab fatigue sets, underwear, socks, boots, a fatigue jacket, a heavy, wool-lined trenchcoat and a duffle bag big enough to hold it all.
“Move along,” a uniform with one stripe on his sleeve commanded and pointed. “In there.”
I staggered with my load of hideous haberdashery into a large room with high tables, low benches and young men in various stages of undress.
“Everything off,” another uniform commanded. “Put on your army underwear and Class A uniform. Make sure everything fits, including the cap, especially the boots. You’ll be wearing it all for quite a while.”
I followed orders and crammed everything I was not wearing into the duffle bag. Leaving the room, I confronted a full-length mirror. At first, I thought I’d met someone entering the doorway and took a step back. Then I realized, that’s me. My god. That’s me. I stood at attention for a second, awestruck at the transformation the Army had wrought. Yeah, that’s me. It’s really me. GI Dick. I damn near saluted!
The tag and stencil station was the last stop, critical to completing my identity metamorphosis. A quarter master corporal stenciled white paint on the outside of the heavy, canvas duffle. It labeled me as US55355951.
“Make sure that matches your dog tags and hang ‘em around your neck.”
I had become an eight-digit serial number. The “US” showed that I was a draftee, not Regular Army, or “RA,” the designation some received. I thought, RA. . .hmm . . . but that’s me, R. A. Anderson. Yeah, Anderson, Richard Allen Anderson, yeah.
(to be continued)
Richard, Lovely! Now were is the "follow me" button? ;-)
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