The
Written Word
I became a traveler early in life while I was still in high school. I would set in class, dreaming about the journey to far off places and great adventures. Was it out of boredom, perhaps so, but I knew that this was my true calling in life. I was raised in a small mountain town in Colorado. It was a grand place and I had a good childhood, but when I learned that there was more out there, that the world was large and different, I had to see it. I wanted to experience it. I realized to live my life I had to live it large. These thoughts keep me in the school library. It became a sanctuary a place where I could get lost in a far away land, but that would only last for a short while. Finally I had enough. I was a wild child and developing a hedonistic personality that not only wanted to see the world, but also wanted to feel it. I had to see, feel and experience anything and everything. I was seventeen years old and it was time to make a move.
The only course of action that was open for me to act on quickly was to join the Army, which I did. This life altering moment came after having a confrontation with my algebra teacher. I was talking, or flirting with one of the girls in my class. By this time I had also learned about the wonders of the female body and was obsessed with them. I was working at service station, because my newly acquired lifestyle and attraction to female flesh was expensive. It took money to be with a girl, it took money to have transportation to be with a girl and it took money to keep a supply of pot on hand. To be cool during these times you had to have a stash. It was the early 1970’s and everyone got high. Marijuana was cheep easy to get and made everything better.
Because my flirting was disrupting his class, not to mention the differences in our personalities, he yelled,
"If all you're going to do is pump gas all your life you don't need this class."
In a short rage and to keep my standing of "cool" to my peers, I jumped to my feet and yelled back to him,
"You're right, I don't need this fucking class."
As the room went silent, my algebra book went sailing from my hand towards the teacher that was distracting me from my never-ending plains of getting laid. With this juvenile act of violence I walked out the door, and what I thought was a cool act of defiance turned out to be the first huge mistake in my life. By quitting school I missed out on a lot of the great things about growing up. I was the only one in my graduating class to do something so stupid and have regretted it all my life. Even though while I was in the Army I went back to school and got my high school diploma, it never replaced the one I should have gotten with the people I grew up with at Bayfield High.
My parents were not to grand on the idea of me joining the Army, but then they were also not happy with the life I was heading into by staying at home. Due to my ability to find trouble around every corner, they did not hesitate to sign the required papers. I think that my father sighed a sign of relief. He was a veteran of World War II and he knew what going into the Army would do for me. He was right, it did and I was forced to grow up and show some type of responsibility. I also learned another important part of life, how to play the game without changing the person that you are.
With their signature I begin a new adventure. This was 1976 and post Vietnam. The first thing the Army taught me was this small town country boy was not near as tough as I thought I was. There are a lot bigger, tougher and cooler guys out there then I ever thought about being. I didn't like being in the Army, though I have now forgotten, or softened on the worst parts. The regimented life I thrust myself into was not what I was looking for, although it did get me my first taste of foreign countries. Like the men I served with I adapted and persevered and got through my three year commitment. I will also never forget the phrase we spoke often; "War may be hell, but peace time Army is a mother-fucker."