I joined the Army in 1973 when I was 17. A short stint of military service ended up being a 40-year career. I grew up in a small town in the mountains of western Maryland - Oakland, in Garrett County. It was a typical blue-collar town next to our hillbilly state of West Virginia. Oakland was very isolated and had one gas station that was usually out of gas on payday. When we needed to fuel up, we had to go to the neighboring town for gas and other supplies. I was bored and disinterested in most things, like a typical teenager in the '70s. A teenage boy in a small town with nothing to do but cause trouble and make my mother mad with worry. My father was an alcoholic and did not provide me with the care a young boy needs. My mother was the only thing stable in my life. She tried to guide me in the right direction but gave up and frowned on my bad choices in high school. My senior year in high school was half-days because I had taken most of the classes needed for graduation. I should had gotten a job during my free time, but I spent that time being lazy and drinking, with my friends. About halfway through the school year my grades fell, and by second semester I was failing my senior year.

Since I was failing high school, I decided to go see my friend Dan, known as Pebbles because his brother's nickname was Rocky. Pebbles had recently moved to Florida with his family, and I went to go see him. For a kid who had never left Maryland, Florida to me was like seeing the world. Pebbles had moved into a trailer park in Rancho Margate and asked me to come and live with him. I thought, what the hell. My parents did not seem to care what I did. So the next day, I walked to the nearest highway out of town and started hitchhiking to Florida. I had no money and no food and only the clothes on my back. It took me a week and a half to get to Florida. I slept along the road and used public bathrooms to clean up and rest. After one short ride after another, I figured I must look and smell pretty bad. The people who picked me up along the way did not seem to go very far, so my two-day trip to Florida ended up taking much longer. I got lucky when a truck driver picked me up and took me from Virginia all the way to Fort Lauderdale.

I arrived in Florida at my friend’s trailer finally after a week and half on the road. I was surprised to find out that he had found a girlfriend and she had moved in with him. Needless to say, he no longer wanted me to move with him. Here I am in Florida with no money and no place to live. I decided to stay and make the best of it. I lived on the streets for a week eating out of trash cans. After a week, desperate, I was standing outside a Gulf gas station and was planning to steal a candy bar or a bag of chips. Just then, a pickup truck pulled into get gas. I had to change my plans fast because I was afraid of getting caught stealing.

The guy in the pickup truck saw me and ask me what I was doing, I told him my short story and he looked at me in my disheveled condition and gave me $20. He said, “Go to the hardware store and buy a hammer and a tool belt, and come back and stand at the gas station.” I took the $20 and did as he asked and came back to the gas station. After about an hour another pickup truck pulled in and began pumping gas. The driver saw me and my hammer and my tool belt and asked me if I was a construction worker. I said “yes” even though I wasn't. The man said, “Hop in the back.” The next thing I know, I was on my way to a job.

I was now part of a construction crew. During the first two weeks, I ate off the other workers and slept at the job site. When I got my first paycheck, I thought I was rich. $300 for two weeks of working 16-hour days. The first thing I did was get a hotel room for one night, bought some blue jeans and T-shirts, took a shower, and went to a real restaurant and had a big dinner. That night, I slept like a baby.

The next day, in my new blue jeans and T-shirt, I went back to the construction site for work. Once again, I slept on the work site, but at least I could eat a little and had some new clothes. One day, the site boss took pity on me and told me I could stay in an extra room at his house until I could get on my feet. I am not sure if he took pity on me or was rewarding me for my hard work. Maybe it was a bit of both.

I took him up on his offer and moved in with him and his wife. I really can’t remember this guy or his wife’s name because when I moved out I wanted to forget them forever. I only stayed with them for about a month. During that time, I watched him (and heard him a lot) abuse his wife both physically and mentally. I tried to ignore it because I had a bed to sleep in and food to eat. I was 17 and homeless, but I knew that this was not right. The wife kept bruises and black eyes, and on a couple of occasions the ambulance came and took her to the hospital. After about a month of living with this so-called boss and watching him beat his wife, I moved out. I could not take it anymore and told him I had to move out even though I had nowhere to go. When I told him why I was moving out, he fired me and told me not to tell anyone what I had witnessed. Once again, I was homeless and jobless.

I walked many small-town streets in Florida, holding on to what money I had left from the construction site. I used truck stops or public restrooms to shower and clean myself. I got to the point where I was so low, hungry and destitute that I used some of the last of my money and called my father. I explained to him my situation and asked him if he would wire me enough money for a bus ticket to get home. I told him I would pay him back when I got home as soon as I could. His response to me was “how did you get there? That’s how you’ll get home!” Then he hung up the phone.

I went to the Margate Diner in Margate, Fla., and ordered a cup of coffee, it was a silver train car-type diner with red booths and stools inside. I sat at the counter contemplating my next move. Should I start for home? Should I look for work? Should I just jump off a bridge? The cook in the dinner named Jim noticed me in my moment of complete and utter loneliness. The cook was a heavy-set guy but had a kind face. He asked me if he could help me. I told him what had happened to me since I arrived in Florida. I left out the part about my dad hanging up on me. I didn’t see the importance of that piece of information and I was embarrassed by it. The irony of that. I was more embarrassed to tell him my father didn’t care about me than I was about my poor and pathetic appearance. Jim said, “I’ll be right back.” I could see him behind the counter making a phone call. About an hour later a man came into the diner and sat down in my booth. He introduced himself as Don Schmidt and said he owned an asphalt and paving company and was looking for help. He said, “The job is hard and doesn’t pay much. If you want the job, it’s yours.” I accepted his offer and went back to my corner at the bus station to get some sleep excited about the job. The next morning Don picked me up and off I went to another new job.

I worked as a labored spreading asphalt. That night I returned to the bus station to sleep. It was the best place to lay my head because no one bothered me. On occasion, after pay day, I would stay in a motel and take a good hot shower and sleep in a bed.

I was on the job for a couple of months when Don Schmidt came to me and said, “My truck driver just quit. Can you drive a truck?” I replied, “I think so.” I thought I was lucky. I could drive a truck and get out of the hot Florida sun pouring asphalt that was 450 degrees. I realized very quickly why no one else wanted truck duty. The truck was not air-conditioned and was 10 times hotter than standing outside. At least outside the truck a nice breeze would kick in from time to time. I stayed with Don Schmidt for a few more months’ and then decided to head home to Maryland. I was still penniless but had some work experience under my belt.

In October 1974 I started the journey home, and the only means I had to get there was to hitchhike. I was hitchhiking on US Route 1 because as a stupid teenager, I didn’t know about Interstate 95. I started in Fort Lauderdale, and it took me two weeks to get to Florence, S.C., because of one short ride after another. My appearance was downright disgusting. I knew no one wanted to pick me up because of my presence, but I stayed on Route 1 with my thumb out for three days outside Florence, sleeping in the woods when I got tired and eating nothing. On the fourth day, I walked the two to three miles from Route 1 to the heart of downtown Florence. The only procession I had left in the world was my class ring. I found the nearest pawn shop in town and hawked it for $10. I used the money to eat and wash my clothes. I stood in the back of the laundromat in my underwear early in the morning while my clothes washed. I took a shower at a truck stop and headed back out to Route 1 to start the process of getting home again. At least this time I was cleaner and had fresh clothes.

As I was leaving town, I passed an Armed Forces Recruiting Station. Although I had nothing, not a red cent to my name, I felt I was too good to join the military. I was still too arrogant to stop. I got back to Route 1 where I stood hitchhiking again for the next eight hours without even a hint of a ride - all the while the thought of the recruiting station in the back of my mind. At about 4:30 in the afternoon on Oct. 29, 1974, I started to walk the miles back to downtown Florence. I walked into the recruiting station I snubbed hours ago. It was a joint recruiting station. There was Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines, but the only one still open was the Army. As I reflect back on that day, I believe that it was by design, as the Army treated me so well over the years and taught me so much.

At the desk was a man to this day I will never forget. At that time he was a staff sergeant. His name was Michael Judd, and little did he know he saved my life that day. He was in his late '30s or early '40s. He looked up from a piece of paper that was on his desk and said, “Can I help you?” At this point in my not-so0adventurous trip to Florida, I was depressed, hungry and tired. I said, “I don’t want to have a conversation. I just want to know if I join the Army can you get me home?” He thought for a minute and said, “If you pass the test and complete the contract, I will take you home myself.” I sat down in the chair and said, “Let’s do it.” Back in those days, recruiters could give the entrance exam and complete the contract. The only thing the Military Entrance Processing Station (MEPS) did was the physical and the swearing-in, which was called the Entrance Exam.

I took and passed the entrance exam, completed and signed the enlistment contract and was officially in the Army Delayed Entry Program. With the test completed and passed and the contract completed and signed, SSG Judd put all the papers in a big manila envelope and said, “O.K. Let’s go." He shut off the lights, shut and locked the door, and we got in his lime green recruiting sedan with "U.S. Army, for official use only" pasted on the side and headed for Oakland. My first day in the Army and I was going home. SSG Judd fed me and even bought me a beer on our road trip to Maryland. He was a great man. During our 6-hour drive, he shared his Army stories with me.

When SSG Judd and I arrived at my home, I introduced him to my mother. SSG Judd explained to her that I had joined the Army and asked her to sign the papers, as I was only 17 at the time. My mother looked at him questionably but was happy to sign the papers. I could tell by her expression that she thought this was the best thing for me. Mom thanked SSG Judd and he handed her the envelope and a bus ticket and told her I had to report to the Pittsburgh MEPS in two weeks. SSG Judd shook my hand to say goodbye and got in his lime green sedan and headed back to South Carolina. I never saw him again. He probably didn’t know how he saved my life that day, just like most recruiters in the military.

Years later, after I had left the Regular Army and joined the Army National Guard and was assigned to the National Guard Bureau, I went back to Florence, S.C., to see if I could find the pawn shop and my class ring; as you might imagine, the pawn shop was gone and so was my ring, The diner was still there, so I had coffee and something to eat and thought about how my life had changed in the Army and left.

I loved the Army so much that i spent 40 years and was promoted to Chief Warrant Officer Five and retired in 2014. That is how and why I chose the Army, and I am glad i did.