Time flies when you are having fun. Where did it all go? Somehow I had become a career Military man. I have a huge anti-authority complex. According to the psychologists and the psychiatrists there is absolutely no way on God's green earth that I should be successful in the military. Looking back at it all now, in hindsight, I don't know if I really was successful, but one thing I have always been good at was perseverance. I understand root hog or die really well. I'm not sure why it was that I made the Navy a career. I think it was because I was scared to have to go out and get a real job. All through my first hitch, I couldn't wait to get out of the Navy. I had come in an E-3 and had rapidly made E-4, I just as rapidly made E-3 again. This would be the start of a pattern for me. For some reason, the Navy frowns on you trying to beat the shit out of your boss, even when you are unsuccessful and your ass is the one that gets kicked.
Not too long after that incident, I started getting tired of getting DT's everytime the ship got underway, so I quit drinking and getting high. After I had been clean for about six months, the Navy decided in it's infinite wisdom that I needed to go to rehab. Not just rehab, but serious rehab. They wanted me to go to alcohol rehab first, then when I finished that, they wanted to send me to drug rehab out in California. In the meantime, while I was waiting for a bed to open up in the inpatient treatment center, they would run me through the outpatient program. I was considered an emergency case. I kept trying to tell people that I had already quit almost 6 months earlier and that I was heavily involved in a 12 step program, but no one would listen to me. I was told that if I didn't get rehab, then I would die and I didn't have a choice in the matter. So I went to rehab.
Outpatient wasn't bad. I learned a lot of stuff there about Anger management, stress reduction, coping skills and the like. Inpatient treatment sucked. I kept being told that I was doing it wrong, that I wasn't attending the right meetings, that I wasn't doing the right stuff, that I was on a path toward self destruction. I didn't understand. I was clean. I was doing what it was I was supposed to be doing. I was staying out of trouble. What exactly was it that they wanted me to do that I wasn't doing? I never found out. Three days before I was supposed to graduate from the course, they kicked me out of rehab. I was told that I was un-rehabilitate-able. They then started procedures to throw me out of the Navy. I was a belligerent little shit and had drunkenly demanded that they throw me out several times before and they had always refused. Now that I quit drinking and had cleaned up, they decided that NOW they were going to do it.
I didn't want to get kicked out of the Navy anymore. Sure, it still sucked, and I still hated it, but you see, I had met this woman. We were going to spend the rest of our lives together and live happily ever after. That is just as soon as she got rid of her husband who was currently out at sea, and just soon as she quit screwing my best friend, and quit screwing her other boyfriend. Yes, just as soon as she got rid of all of those other guys, we would live happily ever after.
For some reason, that relationship didn't really work out, but it did start a another pattern.
Somehow I ended up beating the discharge. I eventually made E-4 again and finally E-5. My life was going along pretty good. I was getting my shit together, I was highly respected at my command, I hadn't tried to choke anyone in longer than I recall. Then something terrible happened. I was in love again. This one was perfect. Oh she had a few minor issues, but then don't we all? She just happened to be a heroin junkie, kind of. She had recently kicked the heroin and had even been off of Methadone for almost a whole week. She had the cutest little ass, and an adorable one year old son. We were going to spend the rest of our lives together and live happily ever after for the rest of our lives. Just as soon as she got that divorce from her husband that was out to sea on a Merchant ship. My enlistment was soon up and I was planning on returning to Tennessee to do whatever it is that people in Tennessee do to make money. As I was making plans to return to civilian life, the Navy offered me $20,000 if I would re-enlist for 4 short years. My new sweetie really wanted to leave Norfolk, Virginia where I was stationed and head out to the West Coast where she had grown up. The Navy told me that I could go to California if I stopped off in Chicago for three years enroute. Chicago? I didn't like Great Lakes Naval Training Center when I was there the last time for schooling. Why in the hell would I want to go back? For three years? One look at the fine ass on my new sweetie reminded me that I could handle 3 years anywhere if I was accompanied by the possessor of an ass as fine as that one. So off we went.
Living with my sweetie up near Chicago wasn't quite the fairytale I thought it would be. I couldn't decide whether to marry her or kill her. I couldn't actually marry her because she had never gotten divorced from her husband. We went through that re-enlistment money like Grant went through Richmond. I was too damned immature to have that kind of money. I can't blame her. If I hadn't spent it on her, I would have spent it on some other chick somewhere. it just happened to be her turn at bat. Before long the money ran out and things got even uglier. I knew we could work this out if we could only sit down and talk and then get naked. All I wanted was to be loved... and to have the evil demons exorcised out of the hateful black-hearted bitches non-existent soul. We quit having sex, at least with each other. All my friends seemed to be hanging out around the house a lot when I was gone though, and they all looked very happy and relaxed. Well, no sense in letting an ass that fine go to waste. I'm glad somebody got some use out of it.
She soon kicked MY sorry ass out of MY house. She took MY furniture, she took MY records, she took MY money, and she took MY heart. I wanted my damned records back. She could have the rest of that crap, but not my records! I walked around for a couple of years with my head up my ass. I swore off relationships. I figured all my friends had gotten laid enough by now. If not, let them find their own damned crazy women. I proceeded to try and screw myself into a coma. I believe it was Dr Phil who once said that was the recommended way to heal a broken heart. I wasn't real choosy about who I ended up in bed with either. Of course, the women I was sleeping with probably said the same thing about me. It's a miracle I wasn't shot or that my pecker never fell off. Navy life was starting to seriously suck. I had just made E-4 for the third time. I was still obsessed with the woman who had broken my heart. All I could think about was that if I could only get her away from the seven or eight guys she was sleeping with, then we could be happy together forever. Never mind the fact that we hated each others guts.
Just as I was finishing up this hitch, my second, I made E-5 for the second time. It became time for me to make a decision. I realized that I had ten years invested with the Navy. I was halfway toward retirement. I then convinced myself that I liked my job and I liked being in the Navy. Actually, what I really liked was that $20,000 they were offering me to re-up once again. I bent over, grabbed my ankles and told them get busy. I didn't need any lubrication, no reach around, all I needed was that check in my hand. Armed with cash money, a Colt .45, a 1963 Martin D-18 guitar, and a new 4x4 truck, I was off to California...this time without a chick. I had a guitar, who needs chicks when you have a guitar?
More to come...
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the torment
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