Military Memories (page 1)

This is the first installment of what might be the first of many or perhaps the only "Military Memories" posting. That is, my somewhat fading remembrance of my U.S. Army Days in the early seventies.

SATURDAY!

(Ft Sam Houston TX - Early 70's) Greatest day of the week if you don't count Sunday. I did count Sunday so it was really the second greatest day but close enough to first to fill me with joy. It was about 1100 hrs and the barracks were pretty much empty. Just a few of us hanging around and it was a nice quiet day. I was laying on my bunk enjoying a book. If I remember correctly (And I might not be) it was The Death and Life of Harry Goth

Suddenly the sound of a truck stopping outside the barracks, one of the doors opening, a sargent, a stranger to all, appears and says (while jabbing his finger at everyone in the room), "You, you, you, you, you, you and you. Outside! Into the truck! The General's Wife wants a rock garden."

"What is this?" someone said. (It might have been me. I certainly thought it.)

"Look", said the sargent. "I don't like this any more than you do. The General's Wife got it in her head to have a cactus garden with a bunch of rocks. I got saddled with the job of getting a detail to gather the rocks. You got saddled with the job of being that detail. The sooner we get the rocks and drop 'em in her yard the sooner you can get back to your bunks."

At that point in our lives we did not know that we could sue the General's Wife nor that she was misusing government property (we G.I.'s) not to mention the destruction of the environment by having us take rocks from point A to point B. (The earth is still reeling from the impact. Watch AlGores movie, An Inconvenient Truth and he mentions this event in the middle somewhere). We were naive back then. Little did we know we were impacting the GLOBAL WARMING ISSUE.

So, as ordered, we climbed into the back of the deuce and a half truck. Made ourselves comfortable. (Thats a joke son!) and wished we were driving the damn thing so we could at least have an idea of where we were going.

So much for SATURDAY!

Well, The truck finally stops in the middle of the Texas desert (which is what is Fort Sam Houston is mostly composed of). We climb out and the sargent explains that he doesn't want little bitty rocks but real good sized ones so the General's Wife can have a real good rock garden and no future soldier will have to come out into the middle of this God forsaken desert and get more of the damn rocks.

The way he said it we were doing this for our children's children...

So we started picking up rocks and throwing them into the back of the truck. Good sized ones like he said to get. Good Lord! We got into the spirit of the job. We did enjoy the sound of the rocks landing in the truck. Sometimes two guys would manhandle a rock up to the truck and it would take three of 'em to lift the sucker in. I, of course would supervise just to make sure they did it right.

Well! It didn't take long before all the loose big rocks were in the truck and then we took to digging and yanking a bit to get 'em out of the ground. Would have helped to have a crowbar but there were enough of the rocks that had edges a body could grab onto and yank 'em free then carry 'em to the truck.

I found a good size rock that was just like that. Sort of a corner I could grab onto and yank on and up it came easy as pie. (Not the kind of pie mom used to make. Maybe I should compare it to fruitcake...)

Only one difference from this rock and the few others I had snatched from Mother Earth (Gaia). This one had a few bugs under it that instantly started running in circles in the depression where the rock had once hidden them. I realized at this point I was disturbing the ecology of the desert and let the rock settle back to it's rightful place of being.

I knew then that we were doing wrong.

So I walked up to the sargent and explained to him in words he could understand how I felt about our rapine of Mother Earth (Gaia).

I said, "I quit!"

"What?" said the sargent?

"I quit! I'm not moving another rock!"

"You can't quit! You're in the Army!"

"Cum'meer! ... Lift up that rock!!!" I said and pointed to the exact one where I had disturbed God's creatures beneath it.

I said this with such authority that the man had no choice but to do my bidding. Even though he outranked me he lifted the rock, saw the nest of scorpions I had beheld and was not as gentle as I when he dropped it back on the half dozen or so scorpions. (We both failed to count them.)

"OK men! That's enough rocks for the General's Wife. Get back in the truck!"

I was so glad that the sargent had common sense. He too recognised that Mother Earth (Gaia) is not to be trifled with.

We rode in the back of the deuce and a half with our feet on the seats in case any of God's creatures similar to the nest of scorpions had ended up in the truck. No one dozed during the trip. Some of our lively discussion was about spiders as well as scorpions. We quickly but cautiously dumped the rocks in front of the General's Wife's house and rode back to the barracks with our feet still on the seats. Just in case...

Moral of this story: Don't hang around the barracks on Saturday morning!

~~~~~
~~~~~
Write in Cary Cartter for President in 2008
~~~~~

Technorati Tags -
Military -
Story -
Army -
Life -
Global Warming -
Humor -

More On the Birds and the Poor

My previous posting linking to Quantum Thought's post, "The Enigma of The Bird Feeders." did not bring in any responses. I was figuring at least a couple liberals would complain about the story and say that Norm and myself were heartless and cruel for thinking ill of the poor.

None did.

It was not thinking ill of the poor for Norm to write his story. It really tells of how misguided enablers will draw to themselves those that are users.

I like Norm's story because I've seen it in action. Although his story is fiction it had a major element of true/real life in it.

I wrote to Norm and he included my comment in his posting.

Did I mention I like the story? - I've seen it happen through our church at one time. FREE FOOD! was the cry. Until we started demanding a bit of work through painting, gardening etc...

Hey! Where did the poor people go???

Here, in this posting, I write my remembrance from the 80's of what was behind that comment.

A mile from our church is a park that had become a hangout for "Urban Campers". Some might call them homeless. A few people from our church decided to do something for these poor folks so one Saturday they dragged a couple bar-b-ques down there and set up a huge picnic for them.

Huge success.

These folks were so grateful for the delicious meal and were very friendly and quite a few were receptive to the Word of God that these good Christians were sharing with them. All were invited to the church the following day.

The following day (Sunday) none of them made it the mile away to the church service perhaps because they didn't know where the church was or felt they would be out of place amongst all them 'fine church folks'.

The following Saturday with each meal served assurances were given they would be welcome to come to the church service the following day. Perhaps connections could be made for jobs etc...

None showed up.

~~~~~~~
However, during the following week quite a few people come by asking for help. They really needed/wanted money but seemed satisfied to take a bag of groceries each. The next week even more came for 'help'.

I believe it was a Wdnesday that one man came by as Mitch, our church custodian, was finishing up some gardening. He was approached by this man who asked if there was somthing that the church could do for his predicament.

Homeless and hungry...

Mitch said the man would have to wait a bit while he finished what he was doing. As Mitch coiled hoses and put away the gardening equipment the man sat and patiently waited. He was so patient he did not feel the need to hurry Mitch up in his work by lending a hand. He just patiently waited for Mitch to finish.

After the gardening tools were put away Mitch led the man to a paint shed and explained that the church would be happy to give him food and some pay if he would help with just a bit of painting.

The man got irate and after a few choice words that sailors use normally outside of earshot of ladies he left without getting a bag of groceries.

The word must have spread pretty quickly because the beautiful people requesting help from out little church thinned out to nothing in two days time. None would lift their hand to paint or garden. None showed up for the next Sunday service either...

prying1 sez: I am not against charity and I'm pretty sure Norm is not either. What I am against is enabling people asking for handouts so they don't have to work. I could write more on this but I think this posting along with that of Quantum Thought's is 'nuff said'...

~~~~~~

Technorati Tags -
Homeless -
Charity -
Enabling -
Truth -

Poor People and Birds Is There A Relationship?

Quantum Thought Gives Food For Thought

A PRY exclusive!

Well, Maybe not too exclusive. Norm Weatherby posted this and I thought I'd lead you to it. Norm does not have comments on his site so if you want to put your two cents worth in you may do so here. - Keep it clean folks - This is a family friendly blogsite...

"The Enigma of The Bird Feeders."

There is an interesting comparison between feeding the poor and feeding birds.

Our friend "Charlie Good Guy" moves into a house with a bird feeder and lots of trees. He notices the feeder is empty and there are few birds around. He fills the feeder and many birds come. Too many. Eventually they start fighting each other for food. Naturally Charlie, being a good guy, buys another feeder. Problem, there are now a lot more birds and many more fights.

Alarmed Charlie buys ten more bird feeders to handle all the "obviously starving birds" in his treed lot.

Click here for "The rest of the story!"


Technorati Tags -
Quantum Thought -
Charity -
Story -