When I look back on this adventure of ours I’m amused by our audacity. Our little excursion became one of those lived experiences that would lodge itself into my life story as a signifier of who I was back then. Maybe even who I am now? I mean, people change, but underneath it all this had a hallmark quality to it that seemed to speak to something more fundamental about the person who was part of it. Maybe an underlying quality of recklessness? Or fearlessness? Maybe a recognition there is a whole other world to be lived that resides between the lines, in the gray zones? Or maybe I was just young and careless with my life?
My idea of consequences was malformed. I lacked the maturity to see how serious the punishment could be. I assumed I would be getting out of the Marine Corps, which is what I wanted, so it was what it was: it didn’t matter so long as the end result was what I hoped for. I didn’t know what this entailed, but I didn’t imagine it was going to be that serious. There was certainly anxiety and trepidation, but honestly, there was a bit of excitement to even be involved in the whole ordeal, to be on this side of the rule making.
After absorbing the verbal dissatisfaction of the marines manning the company office for showing up on a goddamn Friday, at 4 in the afternoon, with 8 hours to go until we were declared deserters, for screwing up their ability to go home on time on a mother fucking Friday, we learned that C*** had turned himself in that morning. While our beratement lasted a few minutes before the amused office staff started to process us in, C***’s had lasted the whole morning and afternoon, from the company leadership all the way up to the battalion commander. Learning this, the sour look on his face was understandable.
We filled out paperwork, peed in cups, and were assigned rooms in the barracks. And like that we were back in the Corps with a weekend ahead of us. The whole process felt surreal. While we got our bearings we learned C*** had made it back to his hometown where he eventually wound up arrested on a drunk and disorderly charge. The recruiter who signed him up for the Corps bailed him out, put him on a plane, and flew him back to Camp Pendleton to turn himself in. Instead of going directly to the company headquarters he checked into a cheap hotel room on the outskirts of the base and proceeded to stay drunk for five days, finally turning himself in that morning.
“You guys were smart to turn yourselves in so late”, C*** said while we hung out on the barracks balcony making small talk and smoking. The sun was low on the horizon, soon to dip below the ocean's surface, and the sky appeared swollen with deep reds, oranges, and shades of mauve.
“It wasn’t something we planned. Just wound up that way. But I’m glad…”, K*** said with a shrug.
Word had gotten around fairly fast and marines from our company were dropping by to hear of our adventures. We learned we had acquired the moniker of “The Three Musketeers”, a moniker along with a reputation that preceded us. Even over a year later I would encounter marines from other companies in the battalion who knew of us.
A short time later, having thoroughly learned our lesson, K*** and I jumped into his truck and made our way a short distance from the company barracks, pulling off into an overgrown thicket. K*** had a small bud he had stashed away, and seeing as we had just taken a piss test, we proceeded to smoke it. I was nervous sitting there, feeling vulnerable and an easy target, so we drove slowly around Las Flores. I don’t recall what we spoke of. I only remember how surreal it all felt, how absurd the whole situation seemed now that we were back. Processed, boarded, and hanging out like any other Friday night. Overall, as if it never happened.
But Monday morning was a quick reminder that indeed it had. We were escorted about, standing in front of our company leaders, one after another, unleashing their anger and disgust at having been made to look foolish and incapable of managing their subordinates. Eventually we were led to the battalion office where we were to stand before our company leaders and our battalion commander.
This was it. This was where we would find out what was to become of us. We sat quietly on a hallway bench, left to wonder about the machinations of the whole process, this thing so much bigger than any of us could imagine. I wondered if I’d be home in a week or so, or if the results from my piss test were going to come back positive. After a time the Master Gunnery Sergeant of the battalion pulled us into his office.
The Master Gunnery Sergeant was a square, and meaty looking man. His skin was darkly tanned and leathery, and his voice sounded as if he ate steel shavings and shards of glass for breakfast. I imagined he had seen combat in every battle since the Korean War. Think Nick Nolte from “The Thin Red Line” and you have a pretty good picture of how he looked and sounded. He sat behind his desk, the three of us standing before him, silently sizing us up. He shook his head and sighed.
“I’m at a bit of a loss here boys. I mean, what jackassery inspired you to do this?”, he said.
We stood silent, and I wondered if this was an actual question or a rhetorical one. He quickly answered this for me with a bark, “Well speak up dammit!”
One by one we spluttered out variations on being dismayed, tired of constant harassment, disgruntled with the corps, unhappy with the reception we received when arriving at the battalion after so many months of being treated like human turds. Any sympathy we hoped to inspire was met with indifference.
“Now look, no one ever said this was gonna be easy. But it will get better. You’re going to have some great experiences, learning experiences you’ll never get a chance to have again in your life. You’re gonna grow into solid young men. You’re not going to be this worthless piece of shit forever. No sir, you’re going to grow, and mature, advance through the ranks and make your country, and your family proud. Now why would you want to turn your back on that?
So what is going to happen here is you’re going to go into that office over there, and you’re going to stand in front of the battalion commander and he’s gonna ask you some questions. Now, I want you jackasses to be respectful and honest with him, and we’ll see about getting you through this in one piece. I go way back with the commander, and I talked with him for a time before this. I worked some things out and asked him to go lightly on you, seeing as you’re young and stupid and you made a dumbass mistake. Because I know, you stay in my beloved Corps and a year, hell, six months from now, you come see me and you’ll be telling me you’re glad you stayed in. Mind you, you’re not getting off scot-free. No sir. You bet your asses there will be punishment.
Now, you tell me, are you ready to stay in my beloved Corps?”, he said and nodded toward C***.
“No sir, I want out”, C*** said. The Master Gunnery Sergeant looked as if he’d been slapped.
“And you?”, he barked at K***.
“I want to stay in”, K*** said. The Master Gunnery Sergeant looked pleased. He nodded toward me.
“No sir, I’d like out”, I said.
He mopped his face with his hand and mumbled something under his breath.
“Well, I’m not letting you out. Any of you. Come see me in six months. I guarantee you’ll feel different. Now get your asses up.”
We each took turns standing before the battalion commander. He asked us about our motivations, berated us for not speaking to our platoon leaders, noted how much we had disgraced ourselves and the Corps. Once he finished dressing us down he proceeded to dole out our punishment. We each lost a stripe, were each garnished a month's pay, and we were to report to the battalion office for after hours duties every evening for the next month. After hours duties consisted of the menial tasks no one liked to do: pulling weeds, polishing brass, cleaning toilets, stripping and waxing floors, etc.. Just like that I was a private again.
It didn’t register as much of a big deal when it was all said and done. To be honest, the price paid was worth the experience. I vaguely remember impressions of those evenings, on hands and knees, pulling weeds from the hard pan of the desert soil, the sun dipping low on the horizon, the air fastly cooling to a slight chill. I didn’t exactly like what I had to do - who likes to clean a bathroom? - but I remember thinking it wasn’t so bad. And when you were tasked with something outside, and the sun was setting? It was somewhat beautiful to find myself witness to those moments.
And then a week later K*** was pulled into company headquarters and notified his urine test had come back positive for marijuana. He would be removed from our platoon and would report to the company office on a daily basis while awaiting discharge on other than honorable conditions. He looked slightly ill when he told me.
From that point on K*** floated about in a kind of limbo, roommates with me, but separated and in a different world. For a time I did my best to connect with him and keep him within our circle, but I had soon drifted away, finding myself wrapped up in my platoon’s dramas, forging new friendships, and basically being a shitty friend. One day he was lamenting the time it was taking for the paperwork to come through, and the next he was gone.
I felt there was a chance for redemption when we arrived back from being AWOL and all was said and done. And for a short time it kind of was. I regained my stripe, and was coming up on Lance Corporal with talk of a meritorious promotion to Corporal. I was getting ready for a six month west-pac float and was excited by the thought of visiting countries I’d likely never see, or even have a chance to see, again.
Yet, with all of those positive things happening, I was drinking away all of my free time. It’s no exaggeration to say we drank all the time. The whole Corps mentality at this time was, “Work Hard, Play Hard”, and alcohol figured into this equation in an outsized way. Even though I had redeemed myself, I still hated where I was at and what I was doing. It felt like an impossible stretch of time until I would be free. Feeling miserable and drowning this feeling in alcohol only served to exacerbate my negativity and loathing for the Corps.
Eventually, inevitably, my friends and I found ourselves in trouble. There were DUI’s, drunk and disorderlies, assaults, derelictions of duty, failed urine tests, and other points of failure that snagged us one by one. Over time we were weeded out. We were the troublemakers, the little bastards who couldn’t play by the rules, the individualists without anyone other than ourselves in mind. We were a cancer on morale, and the sooner we were removed the better.
I never saw any of them again. They’re all ghosts now. I only have the pictures and the memories where we are forever frozen in our belligerence and youth. I do think of them every now and again and wonder what became of them, and wonder if they ever think of me.
Author: Jason Jacobs
Jason Jacobs is an artist, project manager, and frontend web designer living and working in Boise, Idaho. Beyond work he spends his time with family, as well as reading, writing articles for Uhmm, and working on his art. All words and opinions, etc., are his and do not reflect the positions or beliefs of anyone other than himself.