Negative One Days and Counting
You may ask how I am posting when I supposed to be at boot camp or at least en route. Well, a funny thing happened on the way to Basic Training. What follows is the complete story of my adventure at the Dallas MEPS. (MEPS is where all new recruits are sent to have their paperwork processed. My best guess is that MEPS stands for Military Enlistment Processing Station. I suppose alternatively it could stand for Monster Engine of Pain Silo.)
Monday afternoon I moved all my belongings, save shoes, (don't worry I have no logical reason for leaving them. I just forgot as usual) back to my room at my parent's home. I have no intention of sleeping a single night in the room again but it costs less than storage. I left Walt, Jesse, and Chris with no formal or informal goodbye which I deeply regret. (Bye Walt! Bye Chris! Bye Jesse!) But, I was short on time; which is not even a valid excuse but an honest contributing factor. I moped around the house as my family readied to attend my little brother’s soccer game; I was puzzled about why there were no parting affections. My brother was leaving early to coach the game so he wandered in to say goodbye. He inquired about when I would be departing on Tuesday and I replied that I would be sleeping in the hotel that night and leaving the next day. “So this is the last time I’ll be seeing you?” he asked incredulously. I answered laconically; “Yeah.” He then gave me his tearful goodbye speech (without the tears) and told my mom the news. Simultaneously, Sgt. Anstey, my recruiter showed up at the door. I quickly scrambled to get ready and bid my family goodbye. As I readied to leave for the MEPS, I heard my father prepare to launch his tirade against the good sergeant for persuading his naive firstborn son to enlist in the army, “How many college graduates have you put in the army this month?” Sgt. Anstey deftly deflected my Dad’s angry and tearful query, “Why are you taking my son?” with, “Sir, I am not taking your son. He left on his own.” She calmly explained what advantages the army had to offer and why it wasn’t such a crazy idea. I don’t think Dad approves but he understands more now.
I actually slept that night at the Holiday Inn this time rather than staring at the ceiling and listening to my roommate’s snores. After getting up at too early in the morning, (3:54 in my case) I went to breakfast and boarded the MEPS bus. After arriving and sitting through processing, I had a break which enabled me to engage in conversation with a future Army linguist and a future fellow DIV (Drill Instructor Victim) who would be joining me at Fort Jackson for tortuous self-improvement at the hands of a frighteningly enthusiastic DI. We talked for four hours and it’s hard to say what topic we did not speak about. Before and after Sarah, the linguist, took her Army DLAB (
Does it Look like i know whAt it stands for Buddy?) we explored topics including How the 7ft 6 in Sean Bradley (stick figure in the employ of the hometown Dallas Mavericks) could possibly have a normal love life with his tiny wife, the percentage of girls at Sarah’s high school who have been pregnant (more than 1 in 10!!), the importance of clean underwear when undergoing a military orthopedic exam in a room of 12 strangers (a careless recruit had poop stains a mile long on his white boxers. I held my tongue till every recruit waiting for a body fat test started snickering), female sexuality exams during physicals (the military has to verify that each female recruit is indeed female by examining her genitals. Apparently a few men got in as women…), the importance of a good sports bra (Sarah develops bruises when running without one for the same reason she can’t duck walk – big cozangas!), and my flawless eyebrows in comparison to the thick bushy thatches of hair that only slightly resembled eyebrows taped to the face of an Army Sergeant who worked at the MEPS (can you tell that I am jealous of anybody whose eyebrows are said to look better than mine? He looks like Droopy the cartoon character! My eyebrows are my secret beauty weapon!) The day came to an end when the MEPS misplaced some of my information and had to delay my departure till tomorrow morning. The delay was worth seeing the look surprise on my Dad’s face when he saw me sitting at the table at home again.
The story of my (mis)adventures Sunday night may have to go untold. It involves my buddy Jehon, the Navy Linguist; Jesse, my Marine roommate; gay men in Las Vegas showgirl costumes; freaky Goth girls; a Goth cross dresser; and a sultry club diva named Helena.
In what little time I have left, (hour, fifty minutes and counting!) I need to announce some changes that will take place on this blog. My brother will be editing the blog in my absence and I won’t be responding to email. I will still be controlling the blog in much the same way a mobster control his crime family from jail. I’ll also post an address where I can receive mail. The biggest change will be that I will stop self-censoring so much. Early on I realized that certain people I knew where reading the blog and I decided not offend these people. I don’t know these people anymore, so I am no longer worried about offending them. The problem will be learning to right naturally without holding back. It’s become second nature. Well I am done, done and on to the next one… (fans of the Foo Fighters know what I mean)
