The Colonel

I learned the despise the colonel quickly. As an officer, he was good: not particularly great, but certainly better than she whom he replaced, but instead of chronic inefficiency, we received debilitating degradation.

I had a sense of humor that kept me in his good graces. While he wouldn't agree with many of the things I did, I at least had the ability to make him laugh and temporarily forget the differences that we would have.

He was of the Cold War school of thought in regards to the Army. Culture, and anything that was in the remotest way related to things that didn't belong to America, were, at best, gay, and at worst, subversive. He constantly complained about his wife who would be nagging him to take her to see a Broadway show, or a ballet. I wonder for who's benefit his public diatribes were. Were they his carthasis, or subtle notes for us to take, as to say: "This is how you should run a battalion: in being completely closed off to the outside world".

God help any of us who might have mentioned that our weekends might have included a show, or a concert by a band whose name did not immediately conjure images of death and chaos. Even ignorance of a band's style, or a movie's plot would not spare him from making some jab if it had a "faggy title". We would just simply sigh and say, "yes sir", and continue to count down the days until we commissioned.