My Story Part 8

Part 8 ~ After the Graduation

With high school behind me I shipped out to the army. I was 18 and had zero physical ability but 100% will to never return home. My basic training was in SC and this is where I met one more of my best ladies. Aimee and I became friends on our first march. It was the 4th of July and it was insanely hot. By the time we got to our destination we were nearing tears and totally regretting our decision to be in the army. We starting talking and even though my first impression of her was that she was a nerdy little snot bag and she thought me to be a butch dyke, we discovered that we were a lot alike. Without that girl by my side I don’t think I would have made it out of basic training. One of the last things you have to do in basic is a field exercise. Our mission was to each dig two hole to lay in, in the prone position. We could not do this. We whined and complained and bitched until some boys came and started to help us. When the drill sgt. discovered this we were removed from basic duty and put of 1st sgts detail which meant we had to help serve food and guard the 1st Sgts tent. Basically we hung out in the woods and giggled. I remember running through the woods on this trip looking for Aimee and I tripped over the 1st Sgts tent rope. I sailed though the air like superman, my M16 went one way and I went another. The 1st Sgt ran out of the tent to see what happened and found me sprawled all over the woods. He looked at me and shook his head and in his best puerto rican accent said, “good lord private!” The night before our last physical fitness test, which we were sure we were going to fail anyway and have to stay at basic training, we ate an entire bag of illegal oreos and cried because we were going to have to leave each other soon. The next day we both pased. Im sure it was the oreos.
After basic I went to AZ for advanced training. Drinking was legal for those 18 and up because we were so close to Mexico. I was there for four months, out of those four I probably remember 2 months total. I drank myself to puking many times a week. It was really gross. It was four years of college crammed into four months.
I got out of the army after 6 months. Failure to adapt to military life.

When I came home I was barely 19. I stayed with my mom for a few months. This ended the night she threw a beer at my head in some kind of drunken rage. I ran after her to just honestly beat her ass but I was blocked by her house of a room mate. I left that night and moved in with Steph.
It was weird coming home after the army. Though not much time had passed I was different. I had been on my own and in the military and my friends were all still with their parents like nothing had changed but now they could be home to watch daytime television. I was desperately looking for something but I didn’t know what.