Chapter 21: An Army of One

June 2003 - September 2003

Kelly O’Connor was, without a doubt, the greatest girlfriend a guy could ever have! She was drop dead gorgeous, absolutely brilliant, had wealthy parents, and was - no ifs, ands, or buts - as horny as I was. What more could a guy ask for? We spent a lot of time in that little cabin that week. A couple of nights we just anchored the boat out on the lake and skinny-dipped in the moonlight. The weather mostly cooperated, too. It was in the seventies and low eighties almost the entire time, and we only had a couple of days of rain. Those days, well, if the boat is rocking, don’t bother knocking! By the time our week was up, I was in an acute state of carnal exhaustion. I needed to go into the Army, simply so I could get some rest!

That happened about a week after we got home. I was going to the MEPS on Monday, June 16, where I would get a final physical and be sworn in. After that, I was advised, give your soul to Jesus, Uncle Sam would take all the rest. I was to report to the recruiting center at 0800 that morning and was given a list of everything I was to take with me, and another list, even longer, of everything I wasn’t allowed to take. It was pretty basic. Pack a small gym bag with a one-day supply of comfortable clothing and some extra socks and underwear, and an extra pair of comfortable shoes. Bring a padlock or two, your birth certificate, driver’s license, and social security card, and any medication or eyeglasses you’ll need, and a small toilet kit. That was about it. The list of banned items was a whole lot longer. No family, no friends, no pets, no food, no drinks, no booze or drugs, no cigarettes, no money, no weapons, not even a pocketknife or nail file. Leave your cell phone and camera and games at home. No jewelry, no piercings, no hats, not even a t-shirt with any logos on it. You couldn’t even bring a book or newspapers, though they did make an exception for Bibles. If the Army wanted me to have it, they would see to it that I got it. If they didn’t give it to me, they must not want me to have it, so don’t try and be cute and get around it. From the MEPS I would be sorted out and then sent on to Fort Benning, either later that day or the next day.

Mom started crying the night before I was to leave, so that Monday morning I simply hugged her good-bye and Dad drove me over to the recruiting station. I left my jacket and ball cap in the truck, shook his hand, and went inside. I was off to join the Army.

I got there on the dot at 0800, which was going to take me some time to figure out. There were a couple of dozen people milling around, some of whom I knew and some of whom were total strangers. Almost immediately I learned the truth about what my grandfather had been saying. “I’m not saying the Army invented hurry-up-and-wait, but they sure managed to perfect it!” We were ushered into a small room with seats and told to sit down and be quiet. The bus would leave at 0900. We wouldn’t leave for another hour.

I looked around and saw Clyde Wilcox and Tony Vancuso. I knew there were a couple dozen of us from Matucket High going into the service, but some of them had selected later entry dates. The Military Enlistment Processing Station handled everybody, from all the services. We would travel there as a group, then be divvied up. I knew Clyde would be going to Fort Benning with me, but Tony would end up at Parris Island in South Carolina for Marine basic training. Clyde was going to go through Army Basic with me, but he was looking at a Military Occupational Specialty, or MOS, Twenty-One-Bravo, which was something in combat engineering. I was Eleven-Bravo, or infantryman. Even if we were together in Basic, when that finished, Clyde would be heading somewhere else for his Advanced training.

I sat down next to Tony and Clyde, and we talked in a low level while we were waiting. Tony and I were both in top shape from football season. Clyde still looked a little soft, but he had lost almost forty pounds and had been lifting weights and building his strength up. He actually looked human and had attended the school dances in the spring. His confidence had increased at about the same rate as his weight had decreased. That was a good thing, I figured.

We weren’t the only ones talking, so that must have been allowed. At 0845 we were ushered out to the green bus and ordered to sit down and shut up. Then we waited another fifteen minutes to leave, on the dot at 0900. It was about an hour’s drive to the MEPS. There were both guys and girls on the bus, but it was mostly guys. Regardless, it had been explicitly explained that once we got to the MEPS, we would be segregated, and there would be zero fraternization. That was an offense which would guarantee getting kicked out before you even got started.

All day long it was hurry-up-and-wait. Everybody got a physical, a few people had to take the ASVAB, and we all met with a detailer to review where we were going and what we would be doing. That was mostly stuff I had already done, but not everybody did it the same way. It took so long, in fact, that we were put up in a dorm-style barracks, two people to a room, to stay the night. Lunch, dinner, and breakfast would be the responsibility of the MEPS. We would be transported somewhere in the morning, after we were sworn in. I was assigned to a room with a Hispanic kid from Atlanta, Pedro Martinez, who was going into the Navy.

“I, Graham Wendell Reaper, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.”

I knew what the words meant, but when you say them for real, it seemed a whole lot more important. After that, it was off to Benning on another Army bus. I managed to wave to Tony, but that was about it. I couldn’t do much more than that with Clyde. We got split up on different buses, and when we unloaded at Fort Benning, we stayed split up.

I didn’t have a clue what I was going to be doing or where I was going to be going. Sergeant Donaldson had tried to explain what was about to happen, but it all looked like massive confusion to me. On the other hand, he had told me, as had Grandpa, to behave, keep my mouth shut, and obey the drill sergeants. Grandpa had put it succinctly. “There’s the right way, the wrong way, and the Army way. Don’t think about it. Just keep your mouth shut and do it the Army way.”

Sergeant Donaldson had told us all that the first thing that would happen was that we would go to the Reception Battalion to get sorted out. They would process us through, get us our uniforms, give us our haircuts, give us another physical and drug test, and run us through our physical assessment test. That meant we had to run a timed mile and do a bunch of pushups and stuff. Now, as I looked around me, I had to wonder about some of these guys. There were some of us who were in shape, like me, but a lot more were softer, like Clyde, and there were some who looked like Clyde pre-fat-camp. Some of those guys were going to have problems!

That became definite when we were welcomed by an officer in a giant reception hall. He explained the process and explained the penalties for screwing around. If you failed the physical assessment, you were held back, and had to enter the Fitness Training Company, otherwise known as Fat Camp. Your diet was monitored, and you did nothing but exercise. Twice a week you had the chance to test out and go to Basic Training. Flunk it eight times, four weeks, and they kicked you out and sent you home as a hopeless and pathetic reject, unfit to take a place among America’s mightiest warriors. No, he didn’t use those words, but you sort of got the idea. After that it was off to a massive round of hurry-up-and-wait.

I got a haircut. I didn’t normally let my hair get too long, maybe touching my ears and hitting the back of my collar, but this one left me almost bald! They used human barbers with electric trimmers that moved at lightning speed. I heard later that they were experimenting with a helmet that was filled with razors and would cut your hair automatically. They would plop it on a recruit’s head, hit a button, and his head would be bald and glistening seconds later. I could almost believe it.

I got another physical and another drug test. Since I didn’t use drugs, I wasn’t worried, but I had to wonder about some of these guys. A few looked like serious hard-core criminals and gangbangers. Maybe the Army had need for guys like that for a real-life Dirty Dozen or something. From there we went to another part of the medical area and started getting inoculations. I thought that was strange, since I already had a full record of vaccinations going back to when I was a baby. I even had to show proof of that to Sergeant Donaldson. It didn’t matter. I got everything all over again! Mumps, measles, tetanus, diphtheria, polio, flu - you name it, I got it!

From there we went to a warehouse sort of place where I was measured and given a mound of uniforms, underwear, socks, boots, and a duffel bag. I even got some towels to dry off with after showering. This we were ordered to stuff into the duffel bag. I managed to cram everything, including my gym bag with the crap I had brought, into the duffel bag. It was all very orderly and organized. Some people brought a small suitcase; how they expected to run around with that was beyond me.

That basically took up all our first day in the Army. We ate dinner in a D-FAC, a Dining Facility, and then were shown to a large barracks with bunk beds. That would be our home during our time at the Reception Battalion, so we were told to be neat and orderly. Everything was to be kept clean and neat. When we weren’t using something, we had to keep it in our bags. We were also warned that reveille was at 0430, and that we needed to shower, shave, and be dressed by 0500. The dress code called for us to be in Army t-shirt, Army PT shorts, white sport socks (no colors or logos), and running shoes or sneakers.

We were then turned loose, sort of. We couldn’t leave the barracks area. Some of the guys tried anyway and were sent back inside after getting chewed out. Everybody was talking and trying to find anybody they knew. The only guy I knew was Clyde Wilcox, and he wasn’t in this barracks, so I was out of luck. Still, I talked to a few guys and got to know them. About 2100 the lights were turned down and we were told it was lights out and time to go to bed.

We woke up to a recording of a bugle at an ungodly hour the next morning. I don’t know if it was 0430 or not since I had left my watch at home. Sergeant Donaldson assured me that if the Army wanted me to be somewhere, they would make sure I got there. I was in a top bunk and managed to make it to the floor without stepping on anybody. I had slept in my briefs, so I grabbed my toilet kit and a towel, and headed for the bathroom. It was weird, though, because while I had been around locker rooms and communal showers for years, it was a real new experience for some of these guys, and you could tell. I did my morning routine and got dressed in time for breakfast. Not everybody did, though, which caused all of us to get chewed out by the drill sergeants. We also got chewed out for leaving the barracks area a mess. Again, my bunk was okay, but some of these guys were real slobs. Even I got chewed because I didn’t make my bed properly. After that it was off to breakfast in the cafeteria.

After breakfast we did the physical assessments. We ran and we pulled up and we pushed up and we did every form of torture possible. Again, it was nothing I hadn’t done for years. For some of these guys it was a lost cause. This took us two days, since we did everything as a group. Part of the time we learned how to stand in line and stand at attention. Otherwise, it was back to the D-FAC or the barracks. I started making my bunk a lot neater. The guy below me saw what I was doing and asked me to help him, so I did. Since we all got yelled at if any of us fucked up, it paid off if none of us fucked up. You could see that playing out around the room, but not always. Some guys just wouldn’t or couldn’t learn. I predicted that Basic would be an unpleasant time for them.

Finally, on the fourth day, the final determinations were made. A string of green buses was waiting for us after breakfast. Some of us were called out by name and sent to Fitness Training, and the rest were ordered onto buses headed towards Basic Training. I was going to Basic. The first thing I learned was that the drill sergeant on my bus had a sense of humor. Unfortunately, it was not a sense of humor that I would enjoy. I mean, it really wasn’t my fault. I could really blame the guy sitting next to me on the bus. He was an average looking guy, but he had a big smile. He stuck out his hand and said, “Riley Fox!”

“Graham Reaper.”

“Where you from, Graham?”

“Matucket, Georgia.”

“Where’s that?”

“We’re about an hour west of Atlanta. You?”

“Knoxville, Tennessee. So, you’re a Georgia cracker,” he said.

I shrugged. It wasn’t like it was the first time I had heard the phrase. “And you’re a Tennessee hillbilly.”

The fellow in front, a Hispanic-looking guy, turned around and asked, “What’s the difference?”

I smiled and answered, “A Georgia cracker marries the prettiest girl in town, and a Tennessee hillbilly marries the prettiest girl at the family reunion.”

Riley laughed loudly at this, and the guy in front of me smiled and asked, “What about Alabama?”

“You from Alabama?” I asked.

“Yeah. Carlos Menendez.”

I looked at Riley, who promptly responded, “Alabama rednecks? Barnyard animals!” which got the redneck in front of us to laughing. In any case, most of us got to talking to each other, since it seemed like we would be spending the next few months together.

At the end of the short ride, we climbed off the bus and were moved into position like we had learned at the Reception Battalion. A drill sergeant in a Smokey Bear hat, who was as black as the ace of spades and looked as mean as a snake, greeted us warmly and welcomed us to the United States Army, the finest fighting force the world had ever seen. His name was Sergeant First Class Wallace, and he was the Senior Drill Sergeant for our Training Company. We were now Company A, First Battalion, 19^th Infantry Regiment, 198^th Infantry Brigade. He introduced us to the other drill sergeants who would be teaching us. He assured us that no expense would be spared to raise us to the level needed to join this elite institution.

And then the world became very strange. Our platoon drill sergeant was Staff Sergeant Dilbert Johnson, and he introduced himself with an interesting speech. “It has come to my attention that there is perhaps a misunderstanding as to what is involved in joining the United States Army, and that perhaps some of you who do not realize that every state in the nation, every territory in the commonwealth, and every city and district all contribute to the strength that you wish to join. This is obviously a defect in the poor educational systems that some of you experienced growing up. This pains me mightily, and it will be my personal goal to ensure that all of you benefit from the knowledge I gained in my time in the public school system of Mobile, Alabama. I promise you that this error will be rectified!”

Oh, shit! Sergeant Johnson, who had been riding at the front of the bus that Riley, Carlos, and I had been on, had heard the joking! All three of us were dead men!

The first thing we did was to get assigned to our barracks. Riley, Carlos, and I were all assigned to First Platoon. We were to be known in the future as ‘The Fighting First’ to differentiate us from all the other First Platoons around the place. There were about 200 guys in the company, split evenly into four platoons. We went inside and were assigned bunks and a locker. Sergeant Johnson, then ordered us all to bring our duffel bags to the open area in the center of the barracks. “Now, I want you all to open your bags and dump the contents into a pile here in the center.”

I had no idea what was up, but I had zero desire to cause myself any more pain. Somebody down the line hadn’t figured this out, though, because I heard, “Why? Everything will get mixed up!”

In seconds Johnson was in front of whoever that was and, in his face, so close he was almost chewing on his nose. “YOU DO NOT ASK WHY! YOU OBEY ORDERS AND DO AS YOU ARE TOLD! EMPTY YOUR BAG NOW!”

I didn’t need a second hint. I opened my bag and dumped everything on the floor of the barracks at my feet. Sergeant Johnson then began to walk among the piles, kicking them into the center, so that everything was mixed. “Now, you have five minutes to find all of your stuff and put it back in your bags!”

My eyes popped open at this, and I looked around wildly and saw the same looks elsewhere. Then I moved forward and grabbed the only thing I knew for sure was mine, the Matucket High gym bag I had my personal stuff in. After that everybody was in the pile, sorting things out and trying to find their stuff and stuff it in their bag. Since everything looked alike, it was simply hopeless. None of us accomplished anything, and Sergeant Johnson made us do it all over again twice more. I think that simply made it worse. We never did get it sorted out and ended up leaving everything in a big pile while we were ordered outside.

I hoped I’d see some of the stuff later. Once we were outside, Sergeant Johnson reported that all of us failed to assist each other, since soldiers assist their fellow soldiers and don’t worry about themselves. We would have a chance to rectify this later. This evening, after supper, we should find our equipment and mark it properly. We would be practicing this in the future. In the meantime, it was time to practice drilling. Then he asked us if anybody knew the state bird of Alabama.

A couple of hands came up, but that was it. “If you do not all know how to do something, then none of you know how to do something! The state bird of Alabama is the yellowhammer woodpecker, also known as the northern flicker. It is the only woodpecker which is a state bird anywhere in these United States!”

It went like this all week long! We had to do everything together, and if one of us failed, we all failed. Meanwhile Sergeant Johnson kept teaching us all about the wonders of Alabama. I never did learn if there was a state rodent of Alabama, but if there was, I suspect his name was Staff Sergeant Dilbert Johnson, and he was living in Georgia!

All week we learned to drill and march and salute and stand at attention. We were up at 0430 and went lights out at 2100. We did at least an hour every day of physical training, calisthenics and running mostly. We were issued fake rifles to do this with; they were called rubber ducks for some unknown reason. Even getting back to the barracks after dinner wasn’t the end of things, since that was the only time we had to clean the barracks, and Sergeant Johnson was a stickler for a clean barracks. Sleep was a blessing except we didn’t really get much sleep. Two of us were always awake, on fire guard for two hours at a time. Since there were theoretically eight hours of sleep every night that meant four shifts of two hours each. At least once a week you had to do fire guard and being woken at 0100 would ruin your whole day.

Our next week we began doing soldier stuff, as most of us thought of it. We started doing hand-to-hand combat, obstacle courses, and compass navigation. I was probably about average in some of that stuff. I’d never been a Boy Scout, so I had never learned anything about compasses or camping, but I had always been physical and had gotten knocked around in football. Getting knocked to the ground and knocking somebody else to the ground wasn’t all that hard to learn. At least I didn’t hurt myself and have to get sent back to Fat Camp to wait to heal up. A couple of guys busted themselves up on the obstacle course and had to go to the hospital. We never saw them again, but they were probably just held over.

When we weren’t outside doing something, we were in classes, getting taught how to do what we were supposed to be doing outside. How to read a map, how to work a compass, first aid - those were the sorts of practical classes we would get. We also got a lot of other stuff, like what the ranks were, who to salute and why, customs of the service, and a lot of military law. It wasn’t enough to know how to shoot people, you had to know when you were allowed to shoot people.

After that, we got into some more combat skills. I still don’t know what pugil sticks were training us for. Bayonet training, I guess, though nobody fought with bayonets anymore. We were also issued a real rifle, an M16A2, though nobody was crazy enough to issue us ammunition. We also got classroom lessons in them, and how to clean them and maintain them.

Morning to night it never ended. How any of us made time to make friends, I will never understand! I did, however, with both Carlos Menendez and Riley Fox. The three of us were quickly identified by our fellow recruits as the reason that we were all now learning about the wonders of Alabama. We were forced together out of self-preservation! (Did you know the state nut of Alabama is the pecan? No way did Staff Sergeant Johnson know all this crap. He must have been going home at night and reading the encyclopedia.)

After about a month into Basic, we all went out to a firing range and were instructed in loading and unloading the M16A2. First, we used empty magazines, and then we used full ones. Then we went to the firing line and were instructed in firing the M16A2. At that point I discovered something quite interesting. I was already doing well at the physical stuff, I mean, things like hand-to-hand and the obstacle course. That didn’t surprise me, though, since I was a big guy and had been pretty active my entire life. Still, I had never even held a gun before coming to Basic training, so how come I had the highest qualifying score with the M16A2 in the company, and practically from the first day? It just seemed incredibly easy to me. I had to work at not getting bull’s-eyes.