It all started at 5 a.m. when the recruiter picked me up at my parents’ house for the three-hour drive to the recruiting station in Syracuse, N.Y. Three other guys in the van were just as anxious and nervous as I was.
Forty of us awaited our physical exams, all just wearing underwear, trying to look nonchalant but freezing on a New York December day in a room where a window was open.
After exams, we dressed and recited the Oath of Enlistment. Then on to a bus, now just 38 of us as 2 had failed the physical.
My first-ever plane ride was then to San Antonio and yet another bus ride to Lackland Air Force Base.
At 5 a.m. the next morning, a mean-looking sergeant began banging a baton inside an empty trash can. We were to line up and place everything we had brought into a box for storage. The married guys were able to keep their wedding bands – that’s it. Everything we needed for the next 12 weeks would be provided, said the sergeant.
Next it was chow at the mess hall and on to the barber shop for a buzz haircut. Although we were a hodgepodge of guys, we soon began to look alike. New recruits were called “rainbows.” One thing we had in common was our similar thought: “My God, what did I get myself in for?!”
At the building called “the green monster,” we received a duffle bag, boots, hats, underwear, uniforms and toiletry kits.
Then it was time for shots and the dreaded “square” needle which we learned was just a myth.
Finally, we tagged our stuff and learned the proper way to fold, place and organize it all in our footlockers by our bunks.
Every day continued the same – 5 a.m. with the banging of the trash can, waiting for commode and sink, group shower, all the time with the Drill Sergeant screaming to hurry, hurry, hurry. Then it was run here, march there, classes, scrub, clean, calisthenics, and run some more.
On Sunday we were told to write letters home that we learned later were screened, and anyone who wrote a negative comment seemed to get extra duty and “attention” from the DIs. So we wrote “happy” letters. The two hours we got to attend church services was the only relief we had from the yelling of the DIs , and even the atheists in the bunch took advantage of it!
I was fortunate. My brothers and I had grown up hunting, camping, in sports and Boy Scouts, and Mom had taught us how to iron, sew, and keep our stuff neat, so I stayed mostly out of trouble. Plus my dad and uncles who had served in WWII gave me good advice: “Don’t volunteer, keep your mouth shut, don’t gamble, don’t loan anyone money, make your bunk cover tight and your rifle spotless.”
We had one “conspiracy” that took our minds off our “suffering” – and drove one of the DIs nuts. One guy had a small transistor radio that we took turns hiding. It easily slid down the rail of our bunk beds. It only had one earpiece that we had to share and only got one station, a local country and western station. A new song had just come out by Freddy Hart called “Easy Lovin’.” We would sing this song daily, and since we had no access to radio, TV or newspapers, our DI searched every day for a radio he knew we had to have. He never found it.
After a few weeks, everything started to fall into place. We marched well and in-step and had become a cohesive unit. At graduation, we marched proudly in our dress uniforms, took pictures, and exchanged addresses.
The military and boot camp changed my life. I went in as a cocky, scrappy, confused kid with not much of a future. I had gotten kicked out of college, drank and got into fights. Boot camp gave me the discipline I needed, the opportunity to meet other guys with varied backgrounds, and a respect for authority. When I finally got to go home on leave, my dad had become so much smarter! And my new respect for him surprised me. He had not changed – but I sure had.