Experience Hell
I was off to another adventure. It had seemed like the bus was going to stop at every small town through Indiana. It took a few hours to get to Indy. I spent a little while waiting at the AFES station for a few others to show up. Then a Sergeant drove us to the airport. We boarded to big jet for San Diego. The trip was going to take five hours. I had never been on a jet before. I had been on a plane though. Once when I was younger, my father took us all to a small airport in Ft. Wayne, called Smith Field. That day we got to fly for a penny for every pound we weighed. This flight was just like on the commercials on T.V. coffee, tea, or me. At least that was what I was thinking. The stewardess’ were very pretty. I leaned the seat back a little and lit up a smoke. I tried to act cool, and tried to talk to the stewardess’.
I was day dreaming for a while. Remembering back to when I went to Mississippi. I had seen the convoys and had told myself that I too was going to be a soldier. I must have fell off to sleep after a while. I dreamed of Darlene. I dreamed of taking her on a date and then going parking. Suddenly I heard the captain of the plane make an announcement that we would be landing soon. So much for the dream.
We all filed off the plane and was met by a couple of men in uniform. We grabbed our gear and was led to a plain gray bus. We were on our way to MCRD, that means Marine Corps Recruiting Depot. A lot of the fellows were joking around and seemed to be enjoying themselves. We turned off the freeway and came to a gate with a Marine in dress blues pants and caky shirt very neatly pressed, he had on white gloves came to attention and waved the bus thru the gates. It was about three in the morning when the bus came to a stop on the base.
Suddenly there was a uniformed man running up on the bus and he was yelling at the top of his lungs. “Everyone of you maggots of the bus!” Then another two uniforms joined him and started yelling at us to to line up on the yellow foot prints. There were these yellow foot prints painted on the pavement and when you stood on them, your feet were angled so as you were at attention. The yelling did not stop. Actually it did not stop for ten weeks. Thats how long this hell that I volunteered for was to last.
They were coming up to each of us yelling to keep our eyes forward and not to look around. To stand at attention with out moving. Not to speak unless one of them was speaking to you. You would answer by yelling back, “Sir Yes Sir!” “Sir No Sir!” and it seemed that they could only hear you if you yelled at the loudest that you could. To tell you the truth I was scared to death. What had I done?
We stood there for a long time. We were waiting to get our hair cuts. All the while we were waiting other buses were showing up with more recruits. We stood there so long that at least two men fainted. They were splashed with water and brought back around. All the while they were being yelled at that they were about to become the drill sergeants favorites.
When it became my turn to get my hair cut, and there were several of us getting it done at a time. The barbers made quick in shaving all of our hair off. Some of the other men looked like hippies and had been drafted, they were harassed the most. I was glad that I had shorter hair when I had arrived.
