61 years ago on this day I enlisted in the navy. I will never forget that day. I went to the county courthouse at 9:00 am; mom and Joyce went with me.
There was a navy chief there who seemed nice enough; he told us we had 5 minutes to say our goodbyes before taking the standard military oath and we would begin our new lives in the navy. We raised our right hand and took the oath to defend our country from all enemies foreign and domestic.
As soon as we did, life changed. The nice chief became a bully. He picked the oldest of us and put him in charge, gave him train tickets and meal tickets and put us on a bus to the train station. We boarded the train bound for Chicago. The train seemed to stop every few miles to let off or take on passengers.
We arrived at the Chicago train station about 11:30 pm, where we loaded onto a bus for the Great Lakes naval training center. Once there, we were hustled into an open gymnasium that had nothing but bunk beds covering the gym floor. We were told to go to sleep at some time after midnight.
The next morning at 5:30 we woke up to the banging of an empty steel trash can and navy life began. We were issued what the navy called watch caps (stocking caps), marched over to the mess hall and stood outside to wait in a formation that was (in navy terms) tightened up asshole to belly button.
Thus my life in the navy began and for the next 12 weeks it only got worse. I was thinking that I had made the worst mistake of my young life. I was floundering about and not doing well at all. A fellow recruit named Charlie Rose took me under his wing and helped me get through this morasse called boot camp. I'm forever grateful for his help.
As it turned out,the navy was good for me. I spent 10 years and 8 months serving in the navy. I learned a lot in the navy. What I learned there gave me the ability to make a living for the rest of my working life. Without my time in the navy, We would have never had the wonderful life we had afterward.
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