Category: The Green Machine
Arkansas National Guard 1st Sgt. Kenneth Johnson, assigned to Alpha Company, 2nd Battalion, 153rd Infantry Regiment, 39th Infantry Brigade Combat Team based out of Harrison, Arkansas prepares for an interview about his annual training experience at the Joint Readiness Training Center, Fort Polk, La., July 24, 2021. (U.S. Army National Guard Photo by Sgt. Marie Bryant).
Categories
Have a Cav Day!
Now I am going to say right up front that I was nothing Special when it came to Soldiering. Period.
If you were to open up my old duffel bag and dare look inside. You would find my neatly & folded away Old B.D.U.’s*.
Upon which you will never find a Ranger Patch or a Special Forces let alone a Delta Team insignia.
Nor did I hold an Officers Commission. (I seriously did look into it when I was in the National Guard.)
But the all of the Officers that I trusted & when asked about it. All of them said that it is just not worth it. (Even the West Pointer said so.)
In that its is basically just another full time job on top of your real job.
Also more than once. I had seen a Good Officer get his ass handed to him. In front of the troops no less for no real good reason at all.
The other reason why I did not go that route. Was that I was just beginning my Teaching Career. If there any other Teachers out there, I think that you would agree, When you start out at first. 
There is never enough time under the Sun to get everything done on time.
That and trying to start up a family at the same time. So in truth I just did not want to pay the price for the Brass.
Bottom line – I was just your Basic Line Animal.
Now for the good news!
Going into the Army was one of the smartest things that I ever did on my own!
In that it gave me a lot more good useful stuff than I ever gave it.
In that
1. It knocked a lot of shit out of my mind. I also learned a lot about duty & responsibility.
2. I got to see how the world really works. Not the way I thought it should.
3. I got to meet some folks that I would never have meet otherwise
4. I learned to get more stuff done than I ever thought possible in a shorter time than I thought possible
5. I learned to get my shit together and hold it together
6. The Army I saw in the Movies & TV is not the REAL ARMY
7. I got to work with a lot of really great folks*** & some not so great folks
8. I got into the best shape that I ever was in.
(I lost 50 pounds in Basic. Pity that it came back and then some later on. But that is all my fault)
8 a. I also learned the true meaning of being tired and sore from muscles I did not know that I even had.
9. When I went to Graduate School. I found it a hell of easier than my classmates. Who almost all of them said it was “hard”. Yeah right.
10. I learned how to take orders and how to intelligently follow thru on them.
I also learned how to give orders and make sure that they got done.
(Never trust any one and always always check up on stuff)
11. When I took the Exam to be considered for a Teaching job. You get ten extra points for being a Vet. This is basically true for almost any civil servant job by the way.
The other thing that the Army gave me was some bitter pride, some hard earned confidence** and some pretty useful leadership tricks. That amazingly worked pretty well if I say so in my classroom.
Bottom line – I can say it was a good experience. Is it for everyone/ HELL NO!
There are a lot of folks that should stay the hell out of my Army.
Yes its my Army but I let the President play with it.
As my Wise Old Dad told me one.
“You put a good man in the Army. He will come out a little better man. But you put a fuck up into the Army. You will get a bigger Fuck up when it comes out. If it comes out alive.”
*Battle Dress Uniform. It was the field Uniform or work Uniform of the Army during basically the 1980’s. It was alright in its way. But the first models were made of 50% cotton and 50% nylon. As you can guess it could make a Trooper mighty hot.
If I could get away with it. I would wear the Old Jungle fatigues of the Vietnam Era Army. Until it was declared illegal to wear. It was a great outfit but that’s the way it is.
** My Senior Drill told us that if you make it thru the Basic. You will never have to prove yourself to anyone ever again. But you gotta get thru me first.
*** Some of the Non Commission & a few officers had this gift of having everything right at their finger tips. “You what? Okay here you go.” It was both very impressive and slightly scary to watch these folks in action.
It was from them that I learned the highest compliment in the Army. “Yeah he can be an asshole but he really has his shit together!”
