The River Rats of Vietnam

During one of my regular reservist meetings the leader of our group passed out slips of paper with various naval ships typed on them, [submarine, carrier, destroyer, aircraft carrier].  They told us to mark in numerical order which ships we would be most interested in serving on in the event our status would change from inactive to active.  I chose the naval vessels that I thought would guarantee me the most amount of foreign travel. After we turned in these papers the leader told us to pack your gear your heading for Treasure Island in Vallejo, California to await your orders. 

            After that meeting was over I headed home to tell my new bride of my active status.  I knew this was coming, but that didn’t change the uneasy feeling I had in the pit of my stomach.  I started thinking about how we were barely making ends meet.  How was she going to make it with me gone?  Would I be able to get money to her if she needed it and would it be enough to pay the bills? After all, the military didn’t pay much and it was not like I could come home on the weekends to a part time job. 

            When I finally made it home that night Phyllis was watching TV as usual.  I sat down held her hand and we talked all night long.  We decided that there was nothing we could do about it now so we did the only thing we could do; we started getting ready for me to leave. 

            The next thing I knew I had to do was tell my mom and dad.  For some reason, that was even harder then telling Phyllis.  My Mom took the news as well as any mother would, I guess.  She didn’t want to make it any harder on me then it already was, but I could tell how scared she was.  Not so much by what she said, but by what she did not say.  Dad just listened and told me to remember that God had my back and to remember to take my Bible.  They both told me they would be praying for me and somehow that gave me a sense of comfort.   

The powers that be gave me a couple of weeks to get my affairs in order and Phyllis and I spent as much of that time together as we could.  We tried to cram a lifetime of memories into two weeks.  We went out dancing and spent hours just holding each other for all we were worth, then it came: My last night home.  I wanted to spend that last night alone with my wife, and thankfully my family understood.  Phyllis helped me pack my gear and tried to hide her tears. 

The day I left I told her I did not want her to go to the airport with me.  I didn’t want the public emotional scene that always comes with a husbands’ final farewell to his wife.  In the end, I decided it would be best if my father would take me. 

The next morning my father came to pick me up and, after a final goodbye to my bride, I got into my father’s car and we traveled the 15 minutes to the airport in an understood silence.  Neither one of us wanted to say what we both knew needed to be said.  Instead we just sat letting the silence do the talking for us.  When we finally got to the airport I turned back to my Dad and said “thanks for the ride Dad,” grabbed my gear and headed for the terminal.  If my Dad said anything I didn’t hear him. 

When I got to the airport I had two surprises waiting for me.  The first surprise was to see that four of my friends from the reservist meeting were on the same flight.  The second was that we were flying commercially.  We passed the time talking about what we each thought boot camp was going to be like and where we each thought we would end up.  We all wanted to be assigned to the big carriers and we laughed and joked about what countries we would see and what we would do when we reached each port of call.

When we landed at the San Francisco airport we were surprised to see various military men holding up signs that said Treasure Island.  We would find out later that some of the men stationed at Treasure Island would make a few bucks on the side by transporting incoming men to base in their own vehicles.  My buddies and I decided to pay the $.25 to take the shuttle instead, which is what our orders told us to do anyway.

When we got to the base we were escorted by the M.P.’s to our check in point.  We were given our bunk numbers and told to remember that number because that number became who we were.  The M.P.’s then showed us where we were to stand for our daily morning check in.  It was just a bunch of numbers painted on the ground right outside the barracks.