Born a Marine, Die a Marine

I’ve been bound to this wheelchair for 37 years, five months, and three days, never to walk another step. I took 12 bullets to my chest, three hit my spine. I almost died from internal bleeding. Who am I? I’m Private Superman.”
“Welcome to Paris Island, boys! I have a few rules here that you will follow or you will suffer, and I mean suffer, the consequences. You will not speak unless spoken to! You will answer a Senior Drill Instructor beginning and ending with ‘sir’! You will not backtalk a Senior Drill Instructor! If you can fallow these simple rules your time here will be much more enjoyable. Do you understand? “
“Sir, yes, sir!”
“Good. Now after you have your uniform, boots, and what all placed in the barracks I have a little surprise for you all…”
As I headed to get my uniform and boots I couldn’t get this sick feeling out of my stomach. The feeling is like, when you were ten and you did something very bad and you knew you were going to get caught and you felt like you were going to puke and you couldn’t stop moving. I kept wondering if I had made the right decision by joining the Marine Corps. My cousin and granddad had always told me stories of being in the Corps and about boot camp. How one time when my cousin was in boot camp they had a huge fighting tournament type thing. My cousin made it to the final fight…he had to fight a guy who was so muscular he was out of everybody’s weight class. At the end of the fight he had a broken nose but he had won. I wondered if I would have to do the same.
“Now that you all have all your stuff situated, time for my surprise. Who is ready to run? Two things about running, number one, you will repeat after me with chants and number two you will not stop running at any time.”

The first five minutes felt like days. I guess it wasn’t such a good idea for a scrawny, white kid who hasn’t run a sprint since he graduated to just up and join. But somehow the chants kind of took your mind off of being tired.
“I Used to Sit at Home All Day!” the Drill Instructor would say.
“I Used to Sit at Home All Day!” We’d reply.
“If I Die Bury Me Deep!”
“If I Die Bury Me Deep!”
“Up From the Sub 60 Feet Below!”
“Up From the Sub 60 Feet Below!”
“Bo Diddley!”
“Bo Diddley!”
“Double Time!”
“Double Time!”
“Jody Boy!”
“Jody Boy!”
“Navy!”
“Navy!”
“Navy I'm in Doubt!”
“Navy I'm in Doubt!”
“Give Me that Old Marine Corps Spirit!”
“Give Me that Old Marine Corps Spirit,” and so on.
After our three mile run my legs were just about dead. Gladly that was the only thing we did that day. I was really not looking forward to tomorrow. A full day of that…
BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG, Is what I woke up to that morning. The drill instructors banging on trash cans, screaming a vulgar “wake up” rhyme.
“You maggots have five minutes to make your beds get dressed and then go straight to the mess hall!”
“Make your bed,” sounds like I am back home. This is my new home, I guess. Somehow I did it all in five minutes, but I did. Breakfast was **** on a shingle. Marines could win eating contests if it was for time. ‘In your gut or in the garbage!’ After breakfast we had to go back 2 the barracks. Part of me really didn’t want to know why.
“I’m going to drop a quarter on your bed and if it is made right it will bounce, if not you will re-make it,” the drill instructor stated.
Of course my bed had to be first. And of course the quarter didn’t bounce. What the drill Sergeant did next surprised me to no end. He grabbed my sheets, pillow, and blanket and threw it off my bed and started screaming at me.
“DON’T YOU KNOW HOW TO MAKE A BED?! ARE YOU DUMB?!”
“Sir, no sir.”
“THEN WHY CANT YOU DO A SIMPLE INSTRUCTION?”
“Sir, I don’t know sir.”
“WHAT IS YOUR NAME, PRIVAT?”
“Sir, Private Ronald Wayne, sir”
“RONALD! ONLY GAYS AND SAILORS ARE NAMED RONALD! ARE YOU GAY PRIVATE?”
“Sir, no, sir.”
“BULL! I BET YOU GOT A NICE BOYFRIEND AT HOME!”
“Sir, no, sir.”
“ARE YOU TALKING BACK PRIVATE?”
“Sir, no, sir.”
“I DON’T EVEN WANT TO LOOK AT YOU, YOU MAGOT! NOW MAKE YOUR BED RIGHT!”
“Sir, yes, sir.”
I always wonder why it has to be me. But I was glad I want the only one who messed up. I’m glad I wasn’t the only one to get screamed at, but I’m used to getting screamed at. That’s all that I listened to when I was at home. Maybe I was made to join the USMC. Sometimes I wished that I had told my mom when I left. She probably never noticed.
The next few weeks were nothing less than a living heck. So much running we had to do. I can’t count how many times I was screamed at. One thing you can never get used to is the mind games they play with you. ‘Don’t eyeball me! Look at me when I’m talking to you! I said don’t eyeball me!’, but on the bright side I could finally do 50 pushups at one time. Slowly but surely I was becoming a Marine.
The first time we did the obstacle course was the day that I became a different person. I had a new name. I was a Marine. We were on the part where you had to do pull-ups. I did 30 so the drill sergeant said “30! Who do you think you are? Superman? Get off my obstacle Private Superman!”
Graduation day couldn’t have come any sooner. I was finally done. I had survived. When I finished football camp in high school I had said the same thing. But finishing boot camp gave me a great feeling of accomplishment, like I was finally something. I was part of the few, the proud, the Marines!
When I went home after the graduation ceremony, I came home to only one parent. While was at boot camp my mom had died. She was on the way to the Marine sign up office to find out if that was where I had been, and a car never stopped at a red light and blindsided her. She died on impact. That night I sat in my room. I didn’t cry. I wouldn’t let myself. When you come home from Marine boot camp this is the last thing you think will happen. It hurt me worse that the last thing we did was fight. I was angry at myself for never making it better.
A week or so after coming home I received my letter telling me I was going to Vietnam. I honestly never thought I would read this letter. For some reason I thought I would just stay in the Reserves. I was going across the globe; it took me a long time to wrap my head around it. It’s what I signed up for, I guess. “Running through the jungles with my M-16,” I sang it.
I couldn’t hear myself think the propellers were so loud. It was complete darkness except for a red light here and there. I was accompanied by about 15 other Marines. I was on my way to Vietnam. I just kept looking at my gun, imagining how I was about to use it. Soon I was going to be walking through the jungle with Marines like myself killing everything we see. I only recognized one person in the helicopter, Private Snowman. He was a black guy about 6’ 2”, bad of course. In boot camp he slept in the bed next to mine. It gave me some relief that I wasn’t totally alone.
“We are almost at the drop zone!” the co-pilot screamed. “When you jump you will be about half a mile away from the camp! You will just have to head north and you’ll end up there!”
15 birds falling from the sky, is what we probably looked like from the ground. Jumping from the helicopter didn’t really scare me because I had been skydiving before. But skydiving with a 5” knife strapped to your leg and a loaded M-16 was new for me. I kept wondering how long it would take us to go a half mile to safety. I also wondered if I would find any other people from my boot camp platoon at this Marine camp. But for now I was fine with just Private Snowball.
When we hit the ground we almost immediately started jogging north. I wanted to sprint but I knew I couldn’t because we had to stay together. As of right then I just hoped we wouldn’t see any Vietcong. I could feel how much hotter and more humid it was here in an instant. I used to hunt so I was familiar with woods but this was nothing like it. My heart almost stopped when we broke through the bushes into the Marine camp. We were safe, for now.
“Welcome to our little camp,” one of the commanding officers told us. “I hope you made it here without a problem.”
“We made it here just fine, but I just have one question.” our commanding officer replied.
“And what is that?”
“Why were we dropped off in the jungle when there is a heli-pad right over there?”
“They didn’t tell you?”
“Tell us what?”
“This is a hot spot. There are no helicopters or planes allowed past where you were dropped off. Did they give you the mission log of what we are doing tomorrow?”
“No, they basically told us to grab our stuff and get on that helicopter.”
“That is so weird! I wish I knew why they did it like that.”
“Who knows? But could you show my men where they will be sleeping, and give me a copy of the mission log.”
“Yeah, just this way.”
When we got to our beds I just wanted to lie down. There was too much stress in this day already. That is just one more thing I had to get used to. But the first thing I did when we got to our bed I had to go talk to Private Snowman.
“Snowman, remember me?” I asked him.
“Superman, right?” he replied.
“Yeah. Nice that we got put in the same place.”
“Now I’m not like alone here.”
“I know what you mean.”
“Did you think we would be out here this soon?”
“No, I thought I’d be in the reserves for a while.”
“But I don’t think any of us expected to be here.”
“Good point.”
We talked for a little while. We caught up on what we had done since boot camp. Talked about what we plan to do for our Marine careers, stuff like that. A little while after our conversation our commanding officer came in to tell us about what we are doing the next day.
The basic jest of our mission was, we had received info from one of our Vietnamese informants and there was a large group of Vietcong headed to a Marine base. It just happened to be the base we were staying at. So our platoon was to head off into the jungle and intercept them before they reached the base. So in some ways I was excited. I was going to get my first KIA, and I was going to do what I signed up for. Kill anything that moves and don’t die. We were leaving at four in the morning to start our journey into the jungle.
That night I didn’t sleep worth crap. I couldn’t stop thinking about what I would have to do in a couple hours. I kept picking my gun up and looking over the parts, thinking about how we had to take them apart and put them back together ,in boot camp. I was somewhat relieved when our commanding officer woke us up, because the less I would have time to think the less time I would have to worry.
It was pitch black in the jungle that night. Not even a single light. I don’t know how many times I tripped. But with every step and every trip I was that much closer to killing some ‘congs. You never know how loud the night is until you are out in the complete nothing only hearing the animals, bugs, and Marine footsteps. And you would think that after being in the jungle for a while you would get used to the noises, well you’re dead wrong. Every little noise makes you jump. It’s a little like after watching a horror movie and every sound in the house scares you to death.
“The road is just over there,” the officer whispered. “We are going to slowly move over there. It is about ten minutes till the Vietcong are supposed to come through here but keep your ears open anyways.”
I set up by a tree about 15 yards away from the road. Waiting is jut torture when you know you are going to kill a man in about five minutes.
“Hey,” Snowman whispered to me and almost gave me a heart attack.
“What’s up?” I said.
“You ready to kill some zipper heads?”
“I’m always ready. Do you feel like you’re gonna puke too?”
“You have no idea! Wait! Shoot! Headlights.”
My eyes got about the size of the moon. And I have the sign to the commanding officer who was across the street. We all started to put our guns up to our shoulders and getting ready. There were three big cargo trucks two of which were full of soldier and the other was just cargo. The minute the trucks were in about 30 yards of us we opened fire.
The first truck’s windshield exploded shooting glass and bullets into the drivers face. When that happened all the soldiers from both trucks hopped out and opened fire on us. I shot a Vietcong in the chest for my first kill, splattering his blood all over the trees and plants around him. We were outnumbered by about 20 men.
“SUPERMAN!!!” Snowman screamed.
I looked beside me and there was a Vietcong standing above me with a 6” knife. Its blade was shining in the headlights of the trucks. As his hand started to come down to stab me in the face, his face exploded. Snowman shot him right between the eyes multiple times. I sat there for a minute with his blood running down my face trying to take in what just happened. But I didn’t have time to think I had to get back to shooting.
I lobbed a grenade into the cab of the second truck. Glass and metal shot up everywhere accompanied by flames. It was about the end of the attack and we hadn’t lost any men. They had about three remaining. But with those three a barrage of 12 bullets hit my chest. I instantly went to the ground. I just lay there screaming from pain. I looked down and with what light there was I saw nothing but red. That was about when it all went black.
I opened my eyes and I just heard people talking. It took me about five minutes to figure out where I was, and about another five to figure out what had happened. After I had fully woke up I looked over and saw Private Snowman sitting in a chair next to my bed.
“Hey there Red Chest Ronald,” he said sarcastically.
“What’s going on?”
“You got shot.”
“NO, REALLY?!”
“Haha, you’re welcome, by the way.”
“Welcome for what.”
He turned a little bit and I saw he had no arm.
“Um…”
“After you passed out they tossed a grenade right next to you, and I picked it up to throw it away and it exploded in my hand. It took about three surgeries to put my face back together. But you got messed up way worse.”
“Why?”
“12 bullets hit your chest and three made it to your spine. The doctors thought there was no chance you were gonna live so after the surgery they put your bed in the corner and just left you there to die. After I came to after my surgeries I saw you and had a huge fight with the doctors about what they were doing to you.”
“…um.”
“I hate to tell you but since the bullets hit your spine you are paralyzed from the waist down.”
“I’m a Superman who can only fly halfway, and you’re a Snowman with only one twig arm…”

THE END