Alas, Poor Aaroneous...

Alas, poor Aaroneous.  I knew him well.

Pitiful impulsive man-boy, lost in a world and situation outside of his control, proud in his ignorance with illusions of invulnerability.  It was March of 1991 when he found himself almost two months into a 16 week Basic Training cycle on Sand Hill at Ft. Benning, Georgia.  

***

He’d been a senior at Indiana Wesleyan Univeristy just two months prior and due to a premature midlife crisis he’d made the seemingly inexplicable decision to join the Army after GHWB declared war on Iraq.  Something burned in his patriotic breast.  It may have been reflux.

Or maybe it was depression that drove him to this madness, but whatever it was he found a way to turn it into an adventure of sorts.  BFF Tibor was brought along for the ride to a mystery location off campus.  When they pulled up catty-cornered to the recruiting station the Hungarian looked at the coffee shop next door to it and exclaimed, “Buddy!  We’re going to have coffee.  How nice!”  

“We’re not here for coffee, Tibor.”  He followed Aaroneous out of the car and into the Army recruiting office where the wayward college senior announced he wanted to join the infantry.  Within an hour it was a done deal, the papers signed, and his parents didn’t even know yet.

***

So here he was on Sand Hill where the days are like weeks, the weeks are like months, and the months are like years.  Sleep was scarce and highly regimented with a regular fireguard duty rotating trainees through an allnight roster one hour at a time patrolling the barracks with a flashlight.  Days were spent strenuously from before sun-up to after sun-down.

There was complete deprivation of contact with the outside world apart from the precious few times allotted to call home which could just as easily be taken away if someone in your platoon screwed up.  Most were rule-followers to minimize any extra misery doled out by the Drill Sergeants, but Aaroneous was different in that way.  He was quiet, unassuming, boyishly naïve, but a lot went on behind those hazel green eyes of his.

In that first week when the scrutiny was at its highest intensity and trainees were afraid to breathe wrong, Aaroneous slipped out at an opportune moment and cut through an adjacent forest to the back of the base PX.  When the sidewalk next to it was empty he stepped out from the shadow of the trees to walk casually into the PX and buy some Skittles.  Back at the barracks lights-out was drawing near but there was some time to relax just a bit before the on duty Drill Sergeant came to do the last headcount of the day.

Aaroneous laid on his side and casually spilled out his Skittles onto the bunk where only the trainee next to him could see them.  The young man’s eyes widened considerably before breaking into a perplexed grin. “Holy shit Haney!  Where did you get Skittles?”  At that point early in the cycle there were frequent inspections to make sure we did not possess any contraband and the borders of the barracks were considered sacrosanct and off limits on pain of mental and physical torture.  He shared them with this bemused fellow and a few others who treated it like some exotic food from a faraway land.  “I’ve totally guessed you wrong, Haney.  Goddam!”

***

So, we are back again to almost two months into Basic Training.  In retrospect it was the be-all end-all of quarantine and shelter-at-home type scenarios.  Aaroneous felt his personhood was beginning to erode under the dehumanizing conditions and isolation.  He needed a break of some kind.  A few days earlier they’d marched past the base movie theater and he noticed the marquee was featuring Mel Gibson in Hamlet.  Maybe not his first choice but almost anything would do.  

Once again he found a time that he could slip off unobtrusively and hightail it the half-mile or so to the theater without being seen.  It was glorious!  He luxuriated in the soft theater seats and took in the Shakespearean spectacle of Mad Max emoting.  It is impossible to describe the pleasure of such a thing after so many weeks of being made to feel one is not a human being.  He laughed.  He cried.  And right as it was getting to its most powerful moment with his emotions at a fevered pitch he glanced down at his watch... 5 minutes until lights-out.

He literally jumped up from his seat and ran out of the theater.  He ran across the parking lot.  He ran across a grassy field or two.  He didn’t stop all out running until hitting the border of the barracks area and then quick-stepped to his barracks in order to not look too obvious to any casual observer.  He laid in his bunk with his BDU’s and boots still on and pulled the covers up to his chin just as the Drill Sergeant came barreling through the doors for headcount.  

Poor Aaroneous.  A fellow of infinite jest.  Caught in the spider’s web but avoiding the spider.  


***

Korea