I don't know how the ranking system works in the military any more.  I do however these days, see a great deal of National Guard and Reserve personnel being used in Iraq and Afghanistan. Which means I believe, Uncle Sam is relying on part-time military people to do a lot of jobs that full-time people did back when I was in the military at the end of the 'Nam era.  The next obvious thought might be...should be, well, part-time people get paid less - Bingo!

    Anyways, back during 'Nam, the prevailing wisdom was that if you stayed in the service for three years and maybe did a tour overseas some where, you should be able to become an E-5 pay grade by the time you arrive home.  An E-5 was the equivalent of a three-stripe Buck Sergeant.  Back in my day they also had the rank of Specialist-Five (Spec-5).  Specialists were usually in technical roles in lieu of leadership positions. 

    You basically rose up to E-4 fairly routinely, provided you stayed out of jail and refrained from telling your Sergeant to go fuck off too many times.  An E-4 was either a Corporal or a Specialist-Four (Spec-4).  

    A few months before my service obligation was to be over, my old Platoon Sergeant came to me and reminded me it was time I thought about bumping up to E-5.  It would require a bit of tuning up and extra good behavior.  It should also require some simple things like taking a bit of responsibility now and then and wearing proper uniform and the like.  

    Ol' Staff Sergeant Jackson had 23 years in the Army.  He been in the Army at the end of the Korean War era. When asked, he would tell you he was in just in time to help clean up after that war.  Viet Nam was a different story.  He had pulled a couple tours over there.  I remember one story he told more than once, about recovering a Viet Cong rocket that was unexploded and stuck in a tree top near their base camp.  

    Jackson told it like this:  "{First Sergeant Davis came to me and said, "Jack, I need that fuck'n bomb out of that goddamn banana tree, and your the man who will do it."  Keith, I shimmied up that tree, tied a rope to that fuck'n Commie bomb and had Ol' Jimmy Jones help me lower it down.}"  Then Sergeant "Jack" would always laugh with a faraway glance. 

    Sergeant Jackson was a good guy and could retire any time he wanted having been in the military longer than 20 years.  "I'm just a visitor here Specialist Keith; I am just waiting for my fishing boat to be delivered from Montgomery Wards and when it gets here, you will catch my black ass out on the lake in a fuck'n Hawaiian shirt."

    During a time when I was assigned as the driver of a Rough Terrain Scoop Loader for our platoon a punctured tire simply went flat in the motor pool parking area.  For those that do not know heavy equipment, the tires on this thing are hugh.  And, we frequently had to fix a flat on our own as the operator.   I pulled the tire off the hub, let it drop to the ground, and then pulled it off the rim to plug the puncture.  After plugging the whole and checking the inside for damage, I got the tire back on the rim, but it had to be lifted and bolted back on the hub and then wrapped with a strap to inflate it - the tire was tubeless.   Sergeant Jackson was strolling around the motor pool and noticed my dilemma.  I could not lift the large tire assembly myself.   Sergeant Jack took off his fatigue shirt so he was only wearing his t-shirt.  He was obviously a large man, but I never paid much attention other than thinking he was a guy in his early forties getting a paunch.  Not so, I noticed right away.  He was just a big guy and his stomach was mostly solid - and his biceps looked like bowling balls.  He wrestled that big tire around like it was a pillow.  Reflecting nowadays that when I was in my early 40s, I was often a train wreck and in and out of the hospital from time to time... I am embarrassed. I've had a couple of good runs with regimens of weight lifting to try to bring my aging body back in gear, but Sergeant Jackson was just in shape at 43... just because that's the way he was. 

    Now decades later, Sergeant Jack might be one guy I have in mind when I came to the conclusion there are only two types of people in the world.  Those that get you killed in a war zone; and, those that do not.  In retrospect I would error on the side of Sergeant Jackson keeping me alive before 99 percent of the whole of the Earth's inhabitants - former and present.   

    But back in that same motor pool one day when Sergeant Jackson came to Ol' Bob to remind him to tune up for the next step up in rank promotion, Spec-4 Hardhead, Mister Sanctimonious-smug-prick 20-year-old, E-4 Bob, told Sergeant Jack that the Army sucked and that he and his Army should...basically...in short order...fuck off.  

    I remember he took it well but looked just a bit tired just then, and maybe even a bit hurt.  Unbeknownst to my ignorant ass at the time, and something I would find out years later, if your underlings do good on the job, it makes the boss look good too.  I would painfully find this out when 10 years later I myself would be a supervisor at the City of Dallas over a diverse group of crass, blue-collar workers.  And, I was told from time to time by someone who I thought was a promising employee that I and my City should...basically...in short order...fuck off. 

    I arrived home in Wisconsin unceremoniously just a few months after my conversation with Sergeant Jack, forever recorded in some dusty records' building in Kansas City or some other god forsaken place as, Specialist Fourth Class Robert G. Keith. 

Note: This blog "Fate Fairies" - book version Category is a work in progress. The original vignettes are being edited for book form. Go to the Cooldadiomedia Web site and the Fate Fairies Page for an ordered chronology of the book vignettes (chapters).