Standing on "Third"

As the big 707 touched down in Okinawa, Japan, everybody felt great. It was the first time we'd be on "friendly soil" in a long time. We'd be there for three days, and fly back to the states on the 4th. They put us in the "transient barracks", and from there over the next few days, we'd go through physical exams and attend "re-indoctrination classes" that would supposedly teach us how to "behave" in society again. (Returning Vietnam Vets were all considered "psycho" and prone to building sandbag bunkers in backyards, set out boobytraps for the mailman, ambush the ice cream truck and kill every protestor we saw).

Nonsense! They made us turn in our weapons and C-4 at DaNang!

ANYWAY, on our 2nd day there, we were given "liberty" to go into TOWN that evening. I had a slight advantage over most of the other guys in the barracks, because Jim Cheek (who I'd known at Barstow), was STATIONED right there at the Camp as a supplyman, and he knew every inch of the town! I'd gotten in touch with him earlier in the day, and he was waiting at the barracks when they cut us loose that evening.

We left the Camp through GATE TWO, and headed down a strip that all the locals knew as "Gate Two Street" It was made of mostly of souvenier shops, bars, steam baths and "other things" to help you get your system "cleaned-out" while the military worked on the REST of you. To THIS point anyway, it was probably the most memorable night of my life!

The THIRD night was pretty "memorable" as well. There were only a couple of us from "K" Company that got on the plane from DaNang, the other 80 or so guys were from all different outfits as well, so nobody really knew each other to speak of.

Not so, with this ONE character........HE was known by 2 or 3 guys in our barracks. Not allowed into town again, we all had finished packing for the flight home tomorrow, just came back from the mess hall and were sitting around reading, playing cards, etc.

This ONE dude had found the Enlisted Club, proceeded to get drunk as a skunk, and came wobbling back into the barracks. He gazed around the card table, started pointed fingers and began stumbling up and down the barracks, cursing everything and everybody he could think of---------THEN he cursed everybody out all over again, I guess just to make sure he hadn't left anybody out! He plopped down on an empty bunk, mumbled some other crap and passed out.

One of the guys playing cards, and a buddy of his, had known this dude from 'Nam and they said he was always stirring up trouble. They got up and left the barracks. Nobody really thought much of it at the time. The card game continued, everybody went back to what they were doing, and our "drunk" was HARD asleep.

About a half hour later, these two guys came back with a Marine Corps pickup truck (nobody asked where they'd stolen it from), they got a few of us to help, and we picked up the drunk-----bunk and all, loaded into the bed of the truck, those who helped, jumped in, and they took off.

Four of them came WALKING back into the barracks about 15 minutes later........no truck, no drunk. The one guy got back into the card game and everyone else scattered out a little.

Less than an hour later, the MP's drove up to the barracks door, and had "our drunk"------bunk and all, in the back of THEIR truck, and he was WIDE AWAKE now and very confused!

.................what had happened........OUR guys drove over to the Officer's Club, and when the coast was clear, they had UN-loaded our "drunk" under the big awning that covered the walkway of the entrance to the "O" Club, jumped back into the "borrowed" pickup and took off, leaving our drunk passed out in his bunk, for every officer to see as he came to the Club that night!..............

"YOU GUYS KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT THIS???"

("About WHAT?.............everybody dummied up).

The drunk spoke up, still in his bunk, in the bed of the pickup.............."THEY DID IT!...........ALL of these (*&^$WE%$*'s.............

The MP's asked if any of us at least KNEW him.........."Yeah, he's processing back to the states with the rest of us tomorrow."

"WELL GET OUT HERE AND UNLOAD HIM...........KEEP HIM HERE...........AND IF WE CATCH ANYBODY ELSE OUTSIDE OF THIS BARRACKS TONIGHT, YOU WON'T BE GOING HOME TOMORROW. YOU'LL BE IN THE BRIG!!"

We ALL understood that. For all of us, Vietnam had been a long run around the infield, so if you're lucky enough to make it to "Third base", and can finally see homeplate......this ain't the time to get "picked off." We'd all be on our best behavior-------to whatever degree THAT was!

So we got him back into place. He grumbled a little and passed out again. He was still pretty hung over the next morning, but was able to get on the "Freedom Bird" with the rest of us and HEAD HOME!

I seem to recall the stewardesses on our final flight, being even PRETTIER than the ones who picked us up in DaNang. Maybe because after a year, they ALL look great, or maybe it was America itself back then.......and the closer you got to home, the shorter the skirts, and the tighter the sweaters............

For some of the guys, this would be their last flight in uniform. Their enlistment time was up, along with their 'Nam tour, and they'd be discharged when we landed in L.A.

For OTHERS, including me, we still had enough time on our hitches to be re-stationed somewhere. I would be spending my last year or so back at Camp Pendleton, but going HOME first on a 30-day leave.

We'd been briefed in Okinawa that sometimes various protesting groups hung around outside of airports to wave North Vietnamese Communist flags and shout obscenities.....................well............."K" Company wasn't the ONLY unit to see those "first aid kits", and just because we were dis-armed in DaNang, didn't mean we couldn't stomp some hippies!

I'll never know, because I had a connecting flight to San Jose, and never got a chance to even LEAVE LAX.

"DO you know the WAY to-San-Jose.......da-da-da-DA-da-DA-da-da-da-da..............."

Yeah I DID!