As with some others, I did not know this thread existed…so Thank You Jerry for reviving it. I’ve read this entire thread, and it sure has brought back some GREAT memories to reminisce about regarding my Navy days. The reality of what many of you Marines and Army fellows did and went through during the Vietnam War, and the ME Campaigns,…well, my hat is off to each and every one of you. Thank You ALL who served, or were part of a serving family member.
Anyway…I’m going to present a bit of a different perspective of my beginning ‘veteran’ days. I’ll post more about my career in follow up posts.
My Naval career began pretty much out of high-school under the delayed entry & buddy program. Myself and two other high-school buds joined up together and shipped off to Boot Camp, San Diego, in August of 1970. At 19 years old, we ended up in the same Company throughout our 11 weeks of ‘indoctrination’. My first inclination and thought of “Oh, LJ…what in the world have you done?”
first came to me when we got off the bus at NTC San Diego at midnight, got into our barracks (open), finally got to sleep in a deathly quiet barracks…and then, at 0500, a 55 gallon metal trash can was thrown down the center of the barracks as our first ‘wake up call’ with about four instructors yelling and cursing at us…and for some reason, calling us “worms”. Here we were, with only about 3 hours of sleep, about 40 of us standing at, what was supposed to be, attention, in nothing but our skivvies and shaking like little girls who just had the boogie-man come out of the closet. Thus, started my career in the Navy.
To me, a naive` young man who didn’t have a clue one about what was going on, started his long and arduous path to becoming a man of discipline, albeit, with trepidation of the unknown. I can only assume, many others among me, and thousands of others in other branches of the military, felt the same exact thing during their first few days of basic. We were “broke down”, then built back up. Learning how to wash & fold our military clothes properly, learning what a ‘hospital corner’ was on a freshly made bed…every morning for 11 weeks. For the first two or three weeks, our standup lockers were torn apart and knocked over, wooden trunks at the end of our beds turned over, items strewn all over the place, clothes tossed to and fro over the floor, mattresses heaved completely off our bed frames…all because several other ‘worms’ just couldn’t get with the program. We learned real quick how NOT to disappoint our Company Commander. (Mine was a Submarine Chief Petty Officer, and we were his first Company…and he was trying to ‘make a name’ for himself. At that time, I didn’t have a clue what a narcissist was)
Eventually, we learned to work together as a “TEAM” and stopped thinking of just ourselves…a light bulb finally turned on inside our heads and we all realized that this was the only way we were going to make it through the intentional chaos of our chosen paths. We were called names, our mother’s were called names, we were degraded, slapped, kicked and yelled at by instructors two inches from our face and ears.
(I’m surprised I’m not deaf, even to this day) At night, we would hear some of the mentally weaker recruits sniffling, crying as silently as they could, so as not to bring attention to themselves. Many times, I asked myself again; “what have you done, LJ”. But we all learned, we all grew in stature, we all “became” the kind of men that was required of us. Not all of us made it through the 11 weeks. Some were sent home due to not being able to cope or be military bearing individuals. Some were set back two weeks to other Companies due to injuries, academic failures, etc. We learned how to break down, clean and reassemble our rifles (M-14’s). We learned the 9 and 16 count manual with our rifles. It was a proud day when we learned to work in unison, as a group, three to four feet apart and conduct those counts without hitting your fellow recruit or drop your rifle. (Oh…you DIDN’T want to drop your rifle…no, no, no. If you did, you slept with it.
) It was a beautiful sight to see us performing…and we learned to just “click” and do our part…as a group and individually. We learned how to march as a well executed group of men, making our 90 degree turns, conducting perfect left and right obliques, half-stepping, right & left faces and moving ‘about-faces’. We became a well oiled machine.
After five weeks of intense training, marching, cleaning, folding, looking out for one another, we ‘advanced’ to the other side of NTC…across the bridge to where we began to learn what shipboard life was going to be like, to some extent. We were no longer “worms”…we had become “squirrels”.
We learned how to put out fires, plug holes in a flooding compartment, phone talking procedures and etiquette, what the different alarms were and what they meant…such as the ‘collision alarm’, ‘General Quarters’, ‘flooding alarm’, etc. We learned what it meant to set conditions ‘alpha’, ‘x-ray’ and ‘Zebra’, and the importance of each one. The pride of our Company was becoming more apparent…we were going to make it!
After 11 weeks of drilling, learning, becoming young men who could be counted on, it came to Graduation Day. Dress whites, shined shoes, pure white covers, clean shaved, military haircuts and our immaculately cleaned rifles, it was time to march in front of a crowd of hundreds of people, loved ones, moms / dads / brothers & sisters. In front of Commanders, Chiefs, and the NTC Commanding Officer. We conducted formation drills for the crowd, doing our thing with the rifles (not one of us dropped it, thank goodness) and marching proudly in front of the stands and conducting an “eyes right” salute to the CO. What a proud day that was.
Some of you who read this may be thinking; ‘wow…how demeaning, abusive and downright intimidating for us and others to go through something like this. Well, yeah…it was to some extent, but we also knew WHY we were treated the way we were. Like I said…we got broke down, then built back up, physically, mentally and psychologically. We eventually understood. Other branches of the military had it worse than we ever did…and I can only imagine some of the stories that could be told. Nevertheless, my ‘personal’ experience of it all help to mold me into who I became…and to this day, I still uphold many of the things I learned about myself and what it took to understand and become a disciplined young man. Had I not experience what I did and adhered to my training throughout my career, I would have made many mistakes and decisions that would have altered my wellbeing as a United States Navy sailor. I have no regrets.
Of course, in this day and age, boot camp is not like this anymore. And throughout my Naval career, I began to witness the results of those who were treated with ‘kid gloves’ and only had to endure 8 weeks of basic. Not to disparage all of those who didn’t go through what I went through, for there are thousands of recruits who ‘got it’ and became great sailors. Others, not so much.
To be continued…