I have had a few people recently ask me about my time in the military, so I thought I'd share the story of my first few weeks in the Air Force. Sorry for the long post... (
pics here) There aren't that many photos. We weren't allowed to have cameras until the last day. And the kid who was supposed to pick up my class book for me with my flight picture, stole my $50 and I never saw him again.
I couldn’t possibly begin to break down every week or day that I spent in Basic Training. The time there is mostly a blur with a few standout moments of horror and a few moments of happiness. The things you take for granted in your everyday life are what change the most while you are there. The time you spend alone, the time you spend peeing or showering, or eating or dressing or sleeping. All of it becomes a ritual that must be completed in the most efficient and orderly manner possible.
The night before I left for Basic Military Training at Lackland AFB, I spent in a boy’s hotel room. Well, more specifically, in the bathroom of his hotel room, trying not to wake up his roommate. Our chaperone had instructed all of us to go directly to sleep since we had to fly out early the next morning. But of course, you know if you tell a bunch of horny teenagers, especially those about to leave for a rigorous training camp, to go to bed, they will do exactly the opposite. I think on some level we just wanted our last night of freedom to last as long as possible.
I didn’t do anything horribly crazy (i.e. get deflowered) that night… we just drank cheap vodka and made out in the bathroom. He became my “pen boyfriend” (PB) during basic. Having a “pen boyfriend” is a necessity. During BMT you start to feel so closed off from the world; you start to forget what it feels like to be a girl. You aren’t allowed to wear makeup, wear feminine clothes or cute underwea, you don't even get to style your hair. So to get letters from someone who writes things like, “I’ve been looking for you everywhere when our flight is out marching. You have that great hair that is hard to miss…” seems like the best thing in the whole wide world.
The morning that I left for basic, I had put on my bravest face for my future. I had my favorite overalls on, my platinum hair, (complete with blue manic-panic stripe) and a teenage attitude. The chaperones herded us all onto the plane. We were a group of about 30 kids, all from Oregon, heading to Basic together. We sat laughed and joked and ordered adult beverages. (The flight attendants seemed sympathetic to our fates) By the time the plane landed, it was nearing dinner time. We were greeted at the gate by three men in camoflauge, tall hats, and very shiny shoes. We were ordered to pick up our bags and march single file to buses waiting outside.
There was an older man in civilian clothes driving our bus. As we each stepped on he gave us this sincere look of sympathy and a smile. It was the last smile I’d see from anyone for the next week. Everyone sat in silence as the trail of buses made its bumpy way to the base. We watched as each bus in front of us turned off at different roads in the training sections. Our bus finally stopped in front of this drab three story dorm. The door on the bus slammed open and a tall thin man wearing thick glasses jumped on to the bus and screamed, “I am your MTI, Staff Sergeant Hardy, you get your shit and line your asses up on the black top. DO IT NOW!”
We scrambled off the bus, grabbed our bags and ran to the black top in mass confusion. There were 6 other MTI’s (military training instructors) screaming at everyone. Screaming for not moving fast enough, for moving too fast, for looking them in the eyes, for seeming scared, for not seeming scared enough. It took 15 minutes for us to finally be lined up according to their demands. The night that followed was tiring, frustrating and a reality check for those of us who thought it might not be that bad. I was screamed at for the better part of the night, called names like “Bluto” and “Goddamn Smurfette”. Why I had gone to BMT with a blue streak in my hair, I will never know. They fianlly let us go to sleep at 4 a.m. Reveille sounded at 5 a.m. We were rushed out of bed and into formation. The first morning in hell had begun.
The first week is called “Hell Week” and rightly so. It’s AWFUL. Constant screaming. Trying to learn to march and do facing movements under extreme pressure. Simple things, like how you fall into line for chow and how you address you fellow flight members are regulated. You have to learn the proper ranks and spend hours in the classroom learning how to disassemble rifles, fitness requirements, medical training, flanking movements. The tiny beds. Everyone is scared and cranky. You aren’t allowed to wear uniforms yet. You have to wear these camo jackets over your civilian clothes. Everyone refers to you as a “Rainbow”. That’s how you could tell we were the new guys. Camo mixed with whatever color we had worn to the airport. You are made to pack away all your personal belongings. All your makeup, jewelry, and anything else that might make you feel secure or confident. You are assigned to a cot and a locker that will become your personal obsession for the next 6 weeks. Everything you wear, and the place you sleep, where you store your clothes, everything… is available for inspection. If you think that there can’t possibly be a regulation way to fold a bra, you are wrong. There is a regulation way to fold everything.
At the end of each day we would meet in the Dayroom (a kind of meeting room) and the MTI would let us know what would be happening the next day, who was in trouble and who had gotten mail. MAIL. That was one thing that just made everyone’s day. You are so isolated from everything you know and to receive just one letter was the best thing you could have. I was lucky. My mother must have gotten up in front of our whole church and town and told them to write to me. I got more letters than most people. I even got a few care packages. My sister sent me cookies, which my MTI made me give to him. He ate a bunch and then gave them to me. I had to get rid of them by the end of the meeting so I passed them out to all the girls in my row. I remember feeling like those cookies were the best thing I had eaten in weeks. I also lived for letters from my PB. He would send me reports about the mundane mostly, but all the same, it was nice to know that someone cared enough to write.
The following weeks are each different. They have nicknames like Formation Week (marching practice), Sleep Deprivation Week (breakfast at 3 am every day) and Field Training (marching miles in the mud with giant backpacks that cause you to be hunched over like a turtle). But each of the weeks are punctuated with a happy occasion. Church. It was my savior. In basic training, church is the only place where you might get to see your PB or friends from other units. You get to sit wherever you like, as close to whoever as you like, and no one can yell at you there. No MTI’s are allowed at the church. The most popular service is the non-denominational Christian service. There was a huge choir that sang all kinds of songs. Everyone’s favorite one at the time was the weekly rendition of, “I believe I can fly” by R. Kelly. I laugh when I think about how many times I heard that song and how it would make me cry. Everyone would cry. Church reminded us of what we were missing and that song reminded us of how far we still had to go.
Each week there would be a Redline Inspection. The uniforms and barracks would be inspected and we would be graded on our ability to follow attention to detail. If you failed a Redline, it would be grounds for you to be “washed back” which means you’d be sent back a week and have to take up residence with a different flight in a different barrack. That was the equivalent of dying. No one wanted to be washed back because it meant that you would be branded a failure and if by chance your parents had bought tickets to your graduation, they would be forced to try to get them changed to a later date. Everyone would know that you had failed.
I never failed a Redline. I came very, very close though. My MTI, Senior Airman Burlee, had an expression he used a lot, “If you prick my finger, I’ll cut your throat”. Basically, it meant that if we did anything to make him look bad, he would make our lives a living hell. We all lived in constant fear of this metaphor. Once, during an inspection of our personal drawers, we were ordered to let our bay chief do a walk through and examine our drawers before the MTI’s got a look at them. Somehow, while mine was open, someone found a razor cartridge (from one of those Schick replaceable razors) on the floor next to my drawer and tossed it in, thinking it was mine. I was told that my drawer was ready for inspection so I locked it up and waited for the MTI to inspect me. He examined my locker (all was good), my bed and boots (all was good) and then he started shuffling things around in my personal drawer. I gasped as he brought his hand out with the razor blade stuck to the end of his index finger.
He held it up in front of my face and whispered, “What the fuck is this?” He then shook the blade off his finger and blood appeared. I knew that I was in for it. He angrily ripped the drawer out of the locker and dumped its contents on the floor. He then flipped the painstakingly ironed uniforms out of my locker, and the bed sheets I had carefully tucked onto the floor. He screamed with a red face, “You FAIL!”
I was not allowed to show emotion or to clean up the mess. I had to stand still with my eyes straight ahead as he finished inspecting everyone else. When the inspection was over he walked back to my area where I had started to clean up the mess. “You better have a good explanation for why you tried to kill me. You clean this shit up and I want a 1 page essay on why you tried to kill your MTI on my desk in the morning.” He walked into his office and slammed the door. The girls around me helped me get everything back into my locker and they even helped me re-iron my t-shirts. Then my Dorm Chief told me that she would try to explain to him what had happened. I wrote the essay and she went with me the following morning to explain what had happened. He seemed apathetic about it and didn’t say anything else to me.
I thought I was home free. I was going to be allowed a retake on my Redline Inspection and I hadn’t even gotten a 341 pulled (a 341 is a discipline slip that you always carried with you. If you got on pulled by any MTI who saw you misbehaving it would get sent to your flight MTI and you would be punished accordingly) So, later that evening as I headed to the chow hall for dinner, I felt a sense or relief that it hadn’t gotten me washed back. I was wrong. You should never feel relief until you can be absolutely sure that Basic Training is over. Otherwise, they can always come back and get you for something.
As I made my way through the chow line I averted my eyes from the “Snake Pit” (where the MTI’s all sat during meals) I walked to the end of my row, did my facing movement and headed toward my table. As I walked away, I heard, “Hey you! Blondie!” I froze. All the clinking of silverware in the chow hall silenced. I did an about face and walked slowly back to the Snake Pit. SSgt Hardy, one of my other MTI’s stood up on his chair and called out, “Why did you try to kill your MTI with a nasty hairy razor from your drawer? Why would you do such a thing?” I felt my face turn purple. Everyone would know I failed, and it wasn’t even my nasty hairy razor. What could I say? I couldn’t try to explain. He already knew what had happened, but he continued to humiliate me.
After I didn’t answer him, he started to say loudly in a sing-songy voice,” Airman Basic Basey! Tried to kill her MTI with a nasty razor in her drawer. Ooooh, she’s nasty! A nasty, nasty girl, tried to kill her MTI with a nasty razor in her drawer! Oooh, that’s grosss! She’s nasty!” He continued on while the other MTI’s laughed and finally SrA Burlee waved me away and I walked to my table with SSgt Hardy’s voice still ringing out over the room. I tried to eat my breakfast but the lump in my throat wouldn’t let me swallow. A few seconds later he left the room and the clanking of silverware started back up again as everyone ate their food. I quietly dumped my breakfast and marched out of the chow hall and back to my barracks. I walked as quickly as I could so that no one would see the hot tears rolling down my cheeks. I passed a group of boys from my brother flight that had been eating chow as the same time. They yelled after me, “Hey Nasty Girl! What’s your hurry?” I hid in our barracks bathroom until bedtime. The worst thing about that incident was that everyone knew me as Nasty Girl for the duration of my time there.
I did manage to redeem myself with a perfect inspection. Later on that week the MTI asked our flight to come up with a logo design for our flight t-shirts. We were known as the 331st TRS, Flight 159, THE DRAGONS. Our motto? "Fire In The Sky". I got some colored pencils and a sketch pad and drew two large colorful dragons for our flight. Our dorm chief let him know that I had come up with a design. He looked over them and simply said, "I like it. She is our official T-Shirt designer. Make it happen Basey. " And I did. That was the first time Graphic Design saved me... :)
I knew that BMT was temporary and that was the only thing that made it bearable. Well, that and the people. I met a lot of wonderful girls and when the MTI’s would go home for the night, we would have a lot of fun talking and singing. We had to GI party (move the beds, scrub and wax the floors) the barracks one night and we all scrubbed on our hands and knees singing, “It’s a hard knock life”. It’s was pretty funny now that I think about it. Everyone had nicknames. Mostly plays off their last names. Except for my bunk mate. She was always complainging that she was sick. We called her, "Beth the BooHoo". We would write letters and share pictures of our PB’s and loved ones. We’d practice our pushups and sit-ups. We’d shine our shoes. There were times that were really fun and we all had a sense that this was a special time in our lives.
The toughest (and best) week for me was Field Training week. For the first time they took us out of the dorms and sent us to a “Tent City” out in the boonies of Texas. We had to hike for a whole day with giant packs on our backs to this dirt town where we were to spend our next week. It was like an advanced game of capture the flag. We had to guard our tents with (unloaded) rifles; we slept in shifts for about 2 hours at a time. We didn’t shower and we had to eat rations. That had to be one of the worst things I’ve ever eaten. The whole thing was pretty intense and I think back now and I think it was the most fun I had in BMT. It was when I stopped feeling like a “Nasty Girl” and started feeling like a real soldier. I guess learning to low crawl and fire semi-automatic weapons does that to you.
When I finally reached week 6, things got easier. Our MTI’s let up on us and actually sat down with us to explain what our lives would be like now that BMT was coming to a close. We started to feel like the Seniors of Lackland. Every now and then we’d be walking to the store and we’d pass a group of “Rainbows” and feel so sorry for them and what they had to go through still. The day we finally graduated, I was the only girl in the flight whose parents weren’t there. I spent most of the day feeling sorry for myself, even though I knew that my parent’s just didn’t have the means to fly to Texas. I ended up hanging with my PB and then spent the rest of the time with a girl who had gotten orders to the same tech school as me.
With BMT behind me, I felt a new confidence in myself. It’s how we were meant to feel. I knew that I could accomplish the things in my life that I’d never had the confidence to try. The Air Force made that time worth my while. All the abuse, the daily grind and the misery that I dealt with prepared me for all the things that a life in the military would bring me.
After I got my orders, they took us all to the airport to send us off to our respective Tech Schools where we would learn the trade that we had been selected to do. I had been selected for Video actually. It wasn’t until I arrived at Fort Meade, Maryland and got settled in that I switched to Graphic Design. But, I’ll have to tell you the rest of that story another time…
All the same it was good to see Tiff. She seems more relaxed then I’ve seen her in a while. Being done with college agrees with her. Also, I had to pay for my parking in this weird machine that gave me $17 in quarters as my change. They guy in the booth was like, “What? It’s money isn’t it?” yeah…okay buddy…
