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Being a Vet....
Nov. 12th, 2007 11:18 amYou know what being in the military was like for me?
It was enlisting in the Navy because I wanted to give back to my country and having my Bishop tell me that only whores join the service and that I was risking my soul to persevere.
It was getting up before dawn in a hot Florida bootcamp and watching the triangular rays of the sun break the horizon as we marched to breakfast.
It was wearing a envelope-cap that flattened my hair for about 6 inches right down the partline so I looked like a kid from Our Gang.
It was being spit on whenever I walked through a city wearing my uniform.
It was being stationed 300 miles away from my fiance while pregnant - and having to request permission to stay in the service - to keep my oath to my country - because women were automatically discharged if they conceived.
It was losing both the fiancee and the child thanks to the pressures of military life and gaining my beloved husband shortly afterwards when we were stationed together.
It was earning a sharpshooter's ribbon and then the sick feeling from having to pull a gun on a California Highway Patrolman because that's what my orders said I should do. (Luckily he backed out of the 'secure area' and I didn't have to kill him, or him shoot me.)
It was spending months of soul-searching with my husband to decide if we had the right to risk having a child while both of us were in high-security jobs in a world that didn't worry about kidnapping and using one's family to force secrets from one when we were living overseas.
It was learning that someone I'd trained with, or gone to school with, had died. And the guilt of being female and not being allowed to face the same risks. I would have traded my life for one of theirs many times over.
It was being called a slut for being in a uniform - by others in the same one - because I was a woman. Having my not-yet-born son declared a bastard by my workmates 'because no WAVE has the moral fiber to sex with only her husband, much less have his child".
It was greeting that same husband with every broom and mop in the house tied upright when he came back from an exercise after my squadron had sunk his ship (and clean-swept the other team).
It was 5 miscarriages because I refused to ask for special treatment just because I was expecting. Thank the Gods, only one of them was past 4 months.
It was saluting the flag during Taps and feeling my heart swell near-to-bursting with love, and pride, and a deep, deep appreciation of how lucky I was to be an American and to be able work to protect the same for everyone else.
It was enlisting in the Navy because I wanted to give back to my country and having my Bishop tell me that only whores join the service and that I was risking my soul to persevere.
It was getting up before dawn in a hot Florida bootcamp and watching the triangular rays of the sun break the horizon as we marched to breakfast.
It was wearing a envelope-cap that flattened my hair for about 6 inches right down the partline so I looked like a kid from Our Gang.
It was being spit on whenever I walked through a city wearing my uniform.
It was being stationed 300 miles away from my fiance while pregnant - and having to request permission to stay in the service - to keep my oath to my country - because women were automatically discharged if they conceived.
It was losing both the fiancee and the child thanks to the pressures of military life and gaining my beloved husband shortly afterwards when we were stationed together.
It was earning a sharpshooter's ribbon and then the sick feeling from having to pull a gun on a California Highway Patrolman because that's what my orders said I should do. (Luckily he backed out of the 'secure area' and I didn't have to kill him, or him shoot me.)
It was spending months of soul-searching with my husband to decide if we had the right to risk having a child while both of us were in high-security jobs in a world that didn't worry about kidnapping and using one's family to force secrets from one when we were living overseas.
It was learning that someone I'd trained with, or gone to school with, had died. And the guilt of being female and not being allowed to face the same risks. I would have traded my life for one of theirs many times over.
It was being called a slut for being in a uniform - by others in the same one - because I was a woman. Having my not-yet-born son declared a bastard by my workmates 'because no WAVE has the moral fiber to sex with only her husband, much less have his child".
It was greeting that same husband with every broom and mop in the house tied upright when he came back from an exercise after my squadron had sunk his ship (and clean-swept the other team).
It was 5 miscarriages because I refused to ask for special treatment just because I was expecting. Thank the Gods, only one of them was past 4 months.
It was saluting the flag during Taps and feeling my heart swell near-to-bursting with love, and pride, and a deep, deep appreciation of how lucky I was to be an American and to be able work to protect the same for everyone else.
