Basic Training

Drill sergeants are aptly named.

Their purpose in life is to drill a hole into every raw recruit that steps off the bus that Mom and Dad said goodbye to yesterday, to drill a hole right into their hearts and stick their hard-ass tongues into the hole and suck out every last drop of humanity that every young innocent who arrives to stand shakey-legged in front of them like the proverbial "deer in the headlights" stand staring.. blinking at the unknown force coming right at their faces, sometimes only inches away.

Frill sergeants.. also known as "D.Is" (drill instructor).
How can anyone forget those hats that the DI wears. Those straight brimmed, cocked forward, no-nonsense and unflappable hats? Somehow all authority lies in those hats, just under those damnable hats.

If previously Mom and Pops taught you that a benevolent God watched from Above I can assure that a malevolent one surely of near equal in power over your earthly judgements stood before you now... under that damn hat.

I arrived at Ft. Leonardwood, Missouri along with a bus load of other guys. There were no young things, young ladies for any of us to try to talk with.. just guys. Guys with grand heads of hair rivaling the Beatles in the early days. We all knew we were going to shorn of our beauty locks of hair and then who would we be?

As it so often is, whenever there are no females within proximity of guy in a group, inevitably we revert to our raw guy group ways.
Loud, foul-mouthed, stupid for some, familiar behavior we had honed to perfection by 6th grade, some of us with a natural bent toward silence sunk further into our equally hned to perfection of self-protection and withdrawel.
But each and every one of us hiding our apprehensions in the best way we knew of what lie ahead once we arrived at our destination in the heartland.

The bus pulled into a large gate with guards.
Armed guards with m-16 rifles strapped to their shoulders. Little did I know that I too would so soon be hefting one of the "kill sticks" as well.
Well so what, I think? Being raised on a farm, rifles and shotguns were entirely familiar to me. Country boys are well known for being able to knock the head off a sitting sparrow at a hundred paces.
I was no different.

With the slightest of grin from one of the guards, as though he knew all to well what we "civilians" were in for, opened that those big gates (to hell) and waved us on through.

The process of filling up the emptiness with absolute obeyance as a dog can be trained to obey without asking why is the DI's job. It's what he gets payed for. He has come to enjoy his job of power over the endless line of smart-ass boys in men's bodies with all that hair, the crowning badge of individuality.
In "Basic Training" there is no individuality. In Basic Training there is no democracy but only the chain of command, orders from Above and coming down like heaps of hot coals upon the poor pre-solder's head.
You don't ask why.. you just do what you are told ..or else. The threat of "or else" never leaves your options.

We disembarked from our bus and stood in a heap with our small bags. Someone who was not a "hat" put us all into some kind of order, several small lines formed and all of facing forward, alphabetically according to our surnames.
Soon another solder with stripes on his shoulders came forward to give us an overview of what was about to happen.
We were led to a barricks, one of large and long 3 story buildings that would be our homes for the next two months.
I was installed on the first floor along with many others who had also arrived that day from all parts of the midwest. When all the buildings were filled with recruits this would be our Company that we train with and compete with.

Hardly any time at all had passed before those of us who had just arrived were being herded back outside in front of the barracks and into our loosely ordered small group.
Somehow word spread between us what was coming next: the dreaded HAIRCUT!

40 seconds.

That's how long we each sat under the barber's buzz.
They start at the front, just above the forehead and draw their electric clippers back.
Row upon row, front to back, front to back, first to the right then to the left. buzz cuts for all.
Then up the back of the head all the way around until all of that individuality lay upon the floor with the mounds and mounds of other individualities. Gone. I have begun to be gone.
We each walk outside, running our hand over the top of our heads, false smiles and feeling the coolness on our nearly bare scalps.
Not having that lock of hair just sitting there on my forehead made my eyes feel exposed even. I'm blinking and squinting.
My "I"ness has taken it's first real hit. Something vital has just now been lost and it lays there on the floor, being stepped on and kicked around by the barber who has long since stopped being a some one. He and his little buzzing machine have become one with each other.

Back to the barracks.. back to "home". What next...? The day was getting long. I can't keep from touching my head. I'm glad they are giving us caps.
Olive drab baseball caps.