Empire Range, Panama (1994)

As previously mentioned, I enlisted in the Army after I graduated from college. The week after the Black Hawk Down incident in October 2013.

I spent the Summer after graduating in Kill Devil Hills, NC trying to learn to surf and trying to figure out what to do with my life. A couple of weeks after I came home to live with my parents on Poplar Forest Drive in Henrico I remember my Dad passing me by in the hallway and asking me what I planned to do with myself now? I said, “I dunno. I was thinking of taking some time off.” (I guess I thought I was Dustin Hoffman from “The Graduate” – a book and movie that would have tremendous significance for me almost ten years later.)

I’ll never forget the look on my Dad’s face when he said, “Isn’t that what you’ve BEEN DOING all Summer?”

Problem was, things weren’t as easy as they are now. I had no life coach, no mentor, my Dad wasn’t giving me a roadmap, and the Internet didn’t exist as far as the general public was concerned.

If you wanted to find a job or career, the only thing pointing in that direction was the classified section of the local newspaper. (Remember those?)

So, I scoured the Want Ads looking for something and ended up working for a couple of Temporary Agencies.

I don’t even want to go into how horrible those low paying jobs were or how demeaning it felt to be shuffling off to one of those soul sucking assignments but I’ll say I did everything from file medical paperwork in an office full of middle aged women who constantly sexually harassed me, drove a forklift at a bottled water company in Eastern Henrico, and pushed a broom on a construction site in downtown Richmond. I even drove around on a truck with some guys and moved office furniture as well as collected all of the fixtures from a large business that had gone bankrupt.

Needless to say, my life and career were going nowhere fast.

I’d entertained the idea of joining the Navy right after graduating High School until my Dad literally told me, “Son, don’t be an idiot.” But I really couldn’t see any better option than to suck it up, enlist, try to get into Officer Candidate School, and jump start my career.

When I went into the recruiter’s office he was practically salivating to sign me up. “Wait a minute. You’re a college graduate with a 98/100 on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) and you want INFANTRY?”

“Airborne Infantry,” I replied (because I’d read a book about D-Day in the Fourth Grade and had become enamored of Army paratroopers).

I cruised through Basic and AIT but kept getting in trouble for stupid reasons in Airborne school. (More on that later.)

When I was informed of my assignment with the 82nd Airborne I was delighted because not only was it a legendary unit, it was also only a three hour drive back home to Richmond.

Little did I know that I would never leave Fayetteville for three years, with the exception of an emergency deployment to the Panama Canal to guard unruly Cuban refugees.

Since I was a college graduate and knew how to type (a rare skill in the Infantry), I was recognized by many of the officers as some sort of retarded cousin since I was still only an enlisted schmuck.

Regardless, I discovered that within the battalion there were three other Sigs, including the battalion medical officer (far left), with whom I (second from left) would later cruise around Fayetteville when bored looking for something interesting to do….

This is a picture of the four of us. I’m the only enlisted one in it.

Still Valid