A Memory of Boot Camp

   As I stood there in the bright morning sunshine, I watched the long black car pull out of the parking lot, speeding off down the road towards the interstate. I was able to glimpse the back of my son's head in the rear window. He was turned around watching me with a stillness that belied his near panic at finally being shipped off to boot camp. Superimposed over this scene was another just like it some 30 years ago, almost to the day, when I was the one in that long black car, turned around looking out the window at my father. He who was the one standing there in the rain watching me being driven away. I bowed my head a moment and asked God to take care of my son, I no longer could. I had done my job and it was now his turn to live and learn and oh what an adventure he was going to have. If he survived boot camp. I wondered as I walked to my car if my father had said the same kind of prayer for me. I will have to ask him next time he calls me.
    Boot camp I thought about it as I had not for the last 30 years. How young I had been, naive. Just because you have graduated from high school does not make you an adult. I vividly remember seeing my Dad out the rear window of the greyhound bus. He was standing there all hunched up with his raincoat on, the day appropriately raining. I put the palm of my hand, fingers spread, upon the window. The last act of my childhood.
      I watched as Dad pulled his hand out of his pocket; palm up, fingers spread, he returned the gesture. The last act of a father to his adolescent daughter. I stayed turned around; watching until I could no longer see the crumbling old greyhound bus station, built of brick and mortar, standing sentinel there on the end of the bridge. I watched long enough to see my father wipe his face and slowly turn away.  I turned around then and thought about the new adventure I was going on, how it all began with this bus ride.
     It was a nice bus as buses go black leather comfy, squishy seats. I woke up as we were pulling into the station in Portland, did I mention the late night party the night before? My friends, being my friends, wanted to make sure I got off to boot camp in the right frame of mind, which was namely, hung-over. They had gone to great lengths to ensure that I would only remember the important parts of the trip. Getting on the bus, and then getting off the bus. Luckily, upon arriving at the indoc center in Portland, there were other hung-over teenagers getting off the bus with me; if I was in the wrong place, I would not be the only one. We were really a motley looking crew that is for sure.
     We were immediately met by a man wearing a tan uniform who hollered a lot. I wondered if he had throat lozenges in his pocket. He caught me wondering and wanted to know if I was retarded, his words not mine.   “No sir,” I said, at this point my eyes almost fell out of my head looking at him, “I am not.”
     “Then why are you not paying attention?”  he asked me, looking me straight in the eye.
     I swear the only thing I could think to say was, “because I like a challenge sir!..?” So NOT a good move. For the rest of my overnight stay in Portland, I was known as, ‘The Girl Who Liked a Challenge.’
     Portland was the place that a potential service member began their screening by any chosen branch of service. Think of it as separating the wheat from the chaff. That is where our teeth were initially examined, yup, I had some. We spoke to a psychiatrist. Yup, most of us could put three words together to make a sentence. There was a marine wanna-be that had to have the questions repeated a couple of times, he still passed though. Did I mention I was going in the Navy? A lawyer went over the final service contracts with us; yup I really did sign my name on this, this, and this, line. They sent us to a hotel while they typed everything up. Fortunately there was one of us of legal age to buy alcohol, and again we showed up at the office the next morning, miserable and motley looking.
     We were again counseled on contracts, we saw the doctor one last time, and then we all gathered in the blue room. I do not know if that is the name of it or not but the walls were deep blue, the carpets were deeper blue and the furniture was even bluer. The only contrast was the gold and brass accessories and the American Flag. We all had to stand and be sworn in to our perspective branches. Then handing us our orders and shaking our hands we were welcomed aboard the fleet, hustled out the door, and sent to the airport.
     The airport was interesting. I was excited because it was my first plane trip.  It was not a good experience. We were almost half way to Orlando when we hit a thunderstorm over the Carolinas. I do not know what the storm was like down below, but in our little plane above, the women and some of the men were screaming. things were falling out of the overhead racks, babies were crying, and I was writing my last will and testament. It was short document as I did not own anything.  I held the hand of a little old lady sitting next to me for the longest time.  When the plane finally landed in Orlando, everybody was still crying and hugging, even the stewardesses. They hugged the pilots. The fellow who met the plane asked how the flight was. I really wanted to say, I like a challenge, but I could not quite get it out of my mouth through all the blubbering. I believe he understood, “Not Good” though.,