Day 4

Day 4: Marine Corps: Parris Island, Boot Camp; Camp Pendleton; Commander Rhodes WC: 1687

Parris Island was hot and very humid. The mosquitos were thick, black, mean biters. During inspection, when we had to stand at attention and not move a muscle, the short sleeve uniform I wore gave them lots of skin to bite. My forearms were covered with them, their little black stinging bodies coating my arms from sleeve bottom to my hands. It felt like they were all inserting their little needle bites at the same time. I gritted my teeth with the agony of it, but did not move. The blue eyed woman squad leader stared into my face. Then in a slow purposeful gesture, she reached out her arm and wiped them off my arms. It was an awareness and kindness I had not expected. I appreciated it and she knew it. She did a right turn and stepped to the next marine in line, and faced of f with her as well. Evidently the next woman was not as attractive to the mosquitos, for her arms were not as covered as mine, and the squad leader continued on down the line. I prayed the inspection would end soon so I could clean up the little spots of blood the mosquitos had left from their feast on me. It was like the blood drips left by vampires. Awful, simply awful. To be frozen in positon and not be able to wipe them away was torment.
During the day there were Marine Corps history classes and also classes on military dress, behavior and rules. There were specific ways directed to make up a bunk, with the sheet turned back over the edge of the blanket and then both tucked in tight, with mitered corners folded carefully. The locker trunk we each had was to be packed a certain way and was subject to inspection at any time. The underwear, shirts, shoes, and all the rest had to be cared for in the prescribed military way. We were taught how to “spit shine” our black leather oxfords so that they had a shine like patent leather. And we had to clean the bathrooms, toilets, and sinks, as well as mop and wax the barracks' wooden floors and buff it with a power buffer. I operated it once or twice. It was a heavy machine with a heavy circular buffer that seemed to go where it wanted. The weight of it made it hard to control.
Graduation day at the end of boot camp, many parents had come to see their little baby girls all turned into military women. My parents could not afford to come, but I was pleased just the same to be done with it. I was to be sent to Camp Pendleton, assigned to a computer operations team there. Each of us had a destination, different military bases all over the country. Camp Pendleton is nestled in the hills and slopes of Southern California. There are open land areas there where you could have a naked picnic lunch and no one would ever know. The military base is very large, and there are mens and womens barracks. I had a bunk in the women's barracks, about two blocks walking distance from The Green Hat, a club for Women Marines only. The women marines felt safe with men excluded.. they could dine and drink without being hit on and without having to be dressed for a date. They could relax there and spend time sharing the experience of being women in the military. One of the woman bartenders there, also a marine, liked me. She was Italian, nice looking, and a little bit tough in attitude. She was most definitely lesbian. She always saved a table for me and gave me drinks on the house. One drink was all I ever needed to mellow out a little bit, let go of any stress lingering from the day. I never got involved with her; I was not and still am not interested in lesbian alliances.
There was a very pretty redhead who also was a lesbian, and she was so pretty that if ever I would have considered such an experience, it would have been with her. But, fundamentally, I am enthused only by men, as faulty as they can sometimes be. The Green Hat was where one night I really got a buzz on and danced the best I ever have in my life. I was completely loose and into the music. Later that evening, back at the barracks, my friend Terry dared me to go outside the barracks to the parking spaces in front and tell one of the men sitting inside it to move his car immediately.. and I was to do it with nothing but a raincoat on.. completely naked under it. I did and did so with such authority that they moved without question. I felt a new power, drunk and silly as I was. Maybe that was the start of my bolder side, that seems to have grown stronger with the years that have passed. Terry and I used to go way back into the hills of Pendleton to sunbath in our bathing suits. Terry was well endowed, with big beautiful breasts. I had much smaller ones, but they were nice enough. We wore matching suits, but the vital difference was that she filled the top of hers fantastically. It was our private fun, watching the eyes of any wandering soldier looking at first her, then me, then immediately back to her. We laughed at how we manipulated them with her boobs. Men could so easily be distracted and controlled. Terry was fun to spend time with, and in the half year of so I was there, we spent time shopping and watching movies together.
I met a man and dated him.. a man who soon frightened me very much. He was a Marine. He and I went on several dates, then on one outing he was driving me to somewhere out in the country. We were driving on a road high on a hill, with a sharp dropoff on one side. He got depressed and took out a gun. He laid it on the seat between us, and asked me to kill him. God, I was scared. I did some slow and easy talking to him, and somehow took him away from those thoughts and persuaded him to take me back to the barracks. I must have told him there was something I had to be back for and people would be questioning where I was... I do not recall. Perhaps I have blocked some of the incident from memory. He had told me he was secret service, CIA, all kinds of odd things that I did not believe. Today I do not even remember his name.
The Women Marine Commandant at Pendleton was named Rhodes, which coincidentally was my birth name as well. I had not married yet and still carried the Rhodes last name. All the other women though that we were related. Not to my knowledge, unless distantly of course. At any rate, whatever accomplishments I racked up on that base was attributed at least in part to some relationship I had with her. In truth, I managed to get ahold of the computer operations manuals and read them.. technical though they were, I enjoyed it. I then just began using the assortment of machines on my own: the sorter, collater, interpreter, and the mainframe IBM 360. So I reinforced my occupational specialty on my own. The office was a smoothly run and neatly organized space, and in my uniform crisply pressed and polished oxfords, I felt terrific. I knew I looked attractive and efficient and I did my job to the max.
In those days I do not recall what books I read or what things I liked to do, other than making new friends. I had not yet tried any of the things that would later captivate me. I had only a high school education and was like a tadpole whose legs had not yet fully developed. I was swimming aimlessly through the water, hungry for any opportunity that should come along. Only one thing was in my mind: having my own life, under my exclusive control, and getting ahead. I did not want to be like my mother who saddled herself with such a lot of children and an unbalanced marriage. I wanted to be successful at something, and make money. I wanted to be smart and worldly. I wanted to travel and have adventure with romance mixed in somewhere along the line.
At Pendleton, all I had was a bunk, a locker, and a uniform. I also had just discovered the power of self discipline and the lifestyle of being young and single. The world was mine, I just had not staked a claim on it yet.
The pay was not much, but it was enough to go to a movie and dinner once in awhile. I did not have a car yet, and not even a drivers license yet. Every time I went somewhere, someone else did the driving. I was content and felt that my path to a more complex life lay straight ahead. In school I had studied Spanish and Russian, and the Peloponessian wars. I had learned a bit of archery and gymnastics. I was tanned and without an ounce of fat on me.. in the best shape any young woman would hope for. The three years I had signed up for was just beginning, and I felt it was a good decision I had made. Whatever I achieved, would be to no one's credit but my own; I would owe thanks to no one, for I was not going to borrow any money nor take student loans for the college I would later begin. I was doing it all myself. That pleased me tremendously, that no one would ever be able to say: it was because of me that you made it.