With x-rays in hand the dental
assistant quietly walked over to the Navy dentist who was examining me and in a
soft business manner said, “He has four cavities.” In a somewhat agitated reply he said,
“Pull’em all!” I’d heard stories about
this familiar horror story from several old timers and only partially believed
it. Everyone knows the military is tough
and impersonal, but to saddle a young man with dentures off the bat pushes the extreme; the
place was like a bus station and the line was long.
The day had begun quietly enough as
if it was just an ordinary trip for three tourists going the Kansas City
International Airport. We’d left AFEES,
the induction center, at about 5:00 P.M. with our orders in hand and, in my
case, not much else except a yellow woolen sweater. We were scheduled to arrive in San Diego’s
Marine Corps Recruit Depot across from Lindberg Field at about 9:00 P.M. their
time. We must have had a layover in
Denver considering it’s only about a two or three hour flight from Kansas
City. Of course, it being a special
occasion, my two traveling companions promptly got sloshed.
The staff sergeant who met us at the
airport was a tall fellow who wore one of those modified Barry Goldwater
monstrosities which, in combination with bald heads, provides Marines with one
of the most effective birth control schemes ever known. He hustled us into the waiting buses that
quickly pulled beside those yellow footprints at the receiving barracks. War movies show
them, but they do not show scared guys jumping from the windows to get on them.
Even after 38 years,
the memories aren’t that vague. First
stop: haircuts and I can say with all sincerity that it was almost worth joining
the Marines to see the long hairs get wacked.
I can hear it now, “If you have a mole or wart, place your finger on it
or it will be cut off.” (Several weeks later, one of my drill instructors
discovered a wart on someone’s hand and actually cut it off in front of the
whole platoon.) When we were hustled off
to the cow bins to receive our uniforms and pack away our street clothes, I was
surprised that some recruits carried dope.
I never liked group showering even
after many years playing basketball in high school, college intramurals, and
AAU. I suppose to the homosexuals who
enter the Marines now it’s like winning Powerball or their equivalency of a
straight guy who gets to shower with the Dallas Cowboys' cheerleaders. There were 76 of us in there: blacks, whites,
city slickers, good old boys, several Mexicans, a Hawaiian, an Iranian, a
diabetic, mamma’s boys, fat, tall, and a felon - all equally worthless. At 26 I was the oldest.
Of course, I pulled Fire Watch the
first night and didn’t get any sleep, nor did I get any for days. Several DI’s quietly filtered in the squad
bays about 5:00 the next morning and told me to get up against the
wall. They commenced shouting and
overturning the bunks of those who didn’t wake up. For many days there was more processing. Potent cocktails of serum were pressure
injected into us by bored Navy Corpsmen and electronics was actually my best
test score! Oh, I forgot to mention that
the guy with the cavities was not me. I
made sure I had a checkup before leaving for basic.
