Reflections: The Adventure Of A Lifetime
39 Years Ago I Made A Life Altering Decision
Fair warning, this is going to be a bit of a rambling story of being young, wanting a life of consequence, and how I found it.
Second warning, there will be a bit of cussing in here. Sorry, it’s my reality and my story.
39 years ago, after high school graduation, I goofed off for the summer. I hung out at the river bonfires in the evenings, went swimming, worked a bit at my summer job, but not really hard. I was admitted to California State University, Chico and thought I was going to head there at the end of the summer. I was 18, young, strong, tanned, and enjoying being a young man. I had nothing to worry about particularly. And I really didn’t have much in the way of goals, either. I did have the nagging sense that this wasn’t my real course in life, but I didn’t know what was.
In early August, I was sitting by the river, in the California sun, and pondering the world. I knew I had to do something, but what? The beer probably helped with the philosophical thinking!
College seemed awful, I had just finished 4 years of high school and hated it the whole time. The cliques, rote learning, bored teachers, none of that had been good. 4 more years in college seemed like a disaster waiting to happen.
Living at home, continuing my childhood, while working and trying to save money for my own apartment didn’t seem much better. I was ready to do other things and I wanted them to be more than the mundane. I could go back to work on a construction crew (the Cowperthwaite’s are all contractors and construction workers) and find that apartment. I wanted to travel and live a life of adventure, but the wandering hippie thing wasn’t attractive either.
I made a decision that would alter my life forever, change my relationship with my family and friends, and take me to every corner of the globe over time. Travel and adventure was definitely on the agenda with this decision.
I decided to join the Army. After all, most of my adult relatives had served in the Army (plus a couple in the Navy?) during World War 2, Korea, and Vietnam. I would be following in their footsteps and tradition. And I did love my country, very deeply. I was incredibly patriotic, although I didn’t really know how to express it at 18.
Side note: I learned many years later that young people join the Army for one (or more) of 7 reasons
Money for College - not a big deal to me
Skill Training - I could learn whatever, no big deal
Pay and Benefits - Money is nice, but not a huge motivator either
Travel - Oh yes, high on my list
Adventure - what’s more adventurous at 18 than being a soldier?
Tradition - That family stuff, be like my dad, grandfathers, uncles!
Service to Country - Pavlov totally understood me LOL
So, I went home, told my parents, and made plans to see a Recruiter in the morning. I walked in an Army recruiting station on August 9, 1985. On August 14, 1985 I was at the Military Entrance Processing Station (MEPS) and enlisted for 4 years as a tank crewman. This included a guaranteed assignment in West Germany for 2 years after training.
On August 18, 1985 I shipped to Fort Knox to begin what turned into the adventure of a lifetime!
That hill you see, with a road going basically straight up, that is one of the three hills at Fort Knox known as Agony, Misery, and Heartbreak. You walk up these hills in full gear as part of your training. And that tank driving in the mud is from WW2, but the driving course hasn’t changed a bit.
I spent 15 weeks at Fort Knox. Unlike the support soldiers, who spend 8 weeks in Basic Training and then go on to Advanced Individual Training to learn a particular job, Combat Arms soldiers go to One Station Unit Training. Combat Arms means the people that directly fight the enemy: infantry, tankers, scouts, field artillery. You know, “those guys in ranks with the sleepy look — the executioners” to quote Robert Heinlein in “Starship Troopers” explaining what the Mobile Infantryman does. For 15 weeks we were in “basic training” with a drill sergeant.
I learned a lot of hard and difficult things. Physical fitness is a whole new thing in the Army. Marching and walking everywhere is not something the average 18 year old did in 1985. Eventually I had calluses on my calluses. Pushups every time you managed to ire your Drill Sergeant was way different than physical conditioning while playing sports in high school. And carrying 40 lbs with you everywhere, all day long, is an experience that quickly toughens you and makes most things seem easy. Making sure your bunk is tight, your boots are shined, your uniform neat and pressed. Having a notebook, pen, pencil, knife, matches or lighter with you at all times became an indelible habit that continues in my life to this day.
We did all these things whether it was raining or sunny, cold or hot, snow on the ground, mud on the trails, it didn’t matter. And then there was the gas chamber. Every soldier in the Army is bonded by the gas chamber. A place where your drill sergeants set off tear gas (called chemical smoke in the military) and then have you take your mask off.
Okay, I had to stop and watch this. And then I was laughing. And it took me a while to get back to writing this. Sorry. Not sorry.
I learned to embrace the suck. Life is tough. Get over it and do the hard thing. It’s not about you. Obstacles are meant to be overcome. If you whine, your drill sergeant is gonna ask “want some cheese with that?” And then tell you “Get your sorry, goat smelling ass moving. Now. Like you have an actual purpose in life, private.”
But bigger than all of that, I learned to be part of a team. Putting the team ahead of myself and making certain the team succeeded was the big lesson.
Over time, I would learn that it was about a life with purpose, with service to my fellow soldiers, to my family, my country. The Army Values became part of me: Loyalty, Duty, Respect, Selfless Service, Honor, Integrity, and Personal Courage.
I was stationed in Germany during the Cold War and saw the unspeakable horror of Communism up close and personal. One morning, very early, on border patrol, we saw an East German trying to get across the border into West Germany. In this area, the Iron Curtain was a cyclone fence with barbed wire on top. And guards. We were not allowed to help the border crosser until they were 5 yards inside West Germany. The East German guards killed the man just as he managed to get over the top of the fence.
Embrace the suck.
Not everything was bad or tough or hard. The Army sent me to Germany, all expenses paid. I traveled throughout Germany, France, Belgium, and England. I skied in the Alps in Austria and Germany. I went to beer festivals and wine gardens. I learned how to be a good tank crewman, learned my job. I have friends that have lasted a lifetime from all of this, closer to me than anyone I knew from high school.
Eventually, I was stationed several different places in the United States, spent time in South Korea, Germany, and France on training exercises, and ended up deployed for combat during Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm. Saddam Hussein and the Ba’ath Party in Iraq are as evil as anything I’ve ever seen in my life. My only regret is that we didn’t finish the job the first time.
Today my life is shaped and formed by those decades in the Army. Daily life in the civilian world generally doesn’t seem to involve nearly as much “embrace the suck”. After all, there’s running water, air conditioning, electric lights, and no need to march 12 miles in 3 hours with 60 lbs of gear on my body. At 0400, there’s not some incredibly loud voiced drill sergeant tossing a trash can down the barracks hallway and shouting “drop your cocks and grab your socks, boys”.
I wouldn’t change that decision I made in 1985 for anything. I learned to deal with the tough times, to work hard, to play hard, and that I wasn’t the center of the universe. I learned to be a man in one of the toughest schools around. And I lived a life of consequence.
Maybe I’ll write more about those days.
Oh yeah, just for fun ….. me and my crew at Yakima Firing Center in Eastern Washington, sometime in 1989. I’m the guy in the center. I got in a bit of trouble over the flag. Totally worth it!
I changed the course of my life in August, 1985 and I truly loved it all, even when I hated it. It has been my great honor and privilege to serve. It enabled me to live a life with meaning and consequence and impact on the world.
Eric, this was not rambling. Thank you for sharing your story.
Like you, I graduated HS in the Bay Area and almost enrolled at Feather River College. I joined the Navy at 17 and processed out from MEPs Oakland. Was a Cold War warrior hunting Soviet submarines and also deployed to Desert Shield / Storm and every war up until I retired in 2010. I was blessed to have been able to live in Europe as a Cold War kid and teenager and then again twice more with wife and then with kid. It was a fantastic education and I hate communism. I’ve seen what it does.