Coming home from the City in a driving rain the other day reminded me of times I have been caught in downpours and other unpleasant natural challenges.
I will never forget waking up in the middle of the night in a pup tent a fellow Marine and I erected on what was called the outpost of our command post headquarters. The event happened at the base of Mount Fuji in Japan, probably in the spring (I don't recall the date, just the event). I awoke to the shout of my comrade who was the awake sentry and as I moved I placed my hand in about three inches of water and my air mattress was floating. The more I moved the wetter everything got and finally the pup tent collapsed. It was a struggle to get out of the soaked sleeping bag and entangled tent. We spent the rest of the night trying not to drown. We had to abandon the hole we had dug as part of the perimeter defense. When daybreak finally came the rain slowed only for a few minutes and then we were deluged again. Later that day the gunny sergeant came to tell us we were relieved of our post and that hot chow was waiting for us at the mess tent. We got to the mess tent by clawing through a forest and ankle deep mud. When we arrived, we broke out our mess kits getting them ready for the hot meal that awaited us. Spaghetti with meatballs, garlic buttered bread, and canned peaches were slopped into the mess kit pans. I looked forward to eating all of it. However, as I stepped out from under the galley tent flap to sit down to eat, the rain poured into the pans of the mess kit and I watched it all float away in a cascade to the mud in which my boots were immersed. At that moment I wished I had joined the Salvation Army instead of the Marine Corps.
Another of those military moments that made me reevaluate my choice to be a military man came in the last days of my career. By this time the career path had changed from Marine Corps to the U.S. Army. Retiring in just weeks I had one more duty to perform and that was to set up the security for the 2nd Armored Division's big exercise at Fort Hood, Texas. Everything began as planned. The security arrangements I made worked and the extra top secret detail we had added to the exercise remained un-compromised. Then on the third day of the exercise one of those rains like the one that brought to mind these experiences started. A down pour does not adequately describe the weather. Deluge probably doesn't either. This storm came closer to be of "Biblical Proportions." Nothing could or did move. A personnel carried flipped over in a gully full of water and everyone inside drowned. The conditions were terrible. The last night of the exercise I finally got some time to rest. Back in the tent designated for our use I climbed into a damp sleeping attempting to go under into oblivion, but just as I finally felt the gentle call of deep sleep someone yelled, "Gas attack!" I awoke and found my gas mask, went back under the sleeping bag and slept with that damn thing on my face the rest of night. The next morning I thanked the powers-that-be that my military career had an end in just a few weeks.
One of the storm incidents I recall came on a cold Friday evening. By this time I worked for the Bureau of Indian Affairs at Wingate High School at Fort Wingate, New Mexico. A meeting in Albuquerque of church people of the Episcopal Diocese of the Rio Grande planned for that weekend put me on the road. As I departed Fort Wingate I noticed a large wall of precipitation off to the north west. I had to stop in Grants, New Mexico for gasoline (where the man at the pump wanted to sell me leaded instead of unleaded and my car was not configured to take leaded gasoline). I told the station attendant a big storm could be seen off to the north west and probably headed his way. Not more than ten minutes later, on Interstate 40 headed for Albuquerque the storm engulfed me and it seemed to be coming now from the east. Blinded by snow and not able to feel the highway or even to make it out I continued to my destination. Driving in the blinding snow at speeds of five and ten miles an hour put me behind the schedule I planned. Nevertheless, no turning back plan worked in my mind. I could only go forward. Finally, I arrived at Nine Mile Hill east of Albuquerque. The snow just stopped. The sky over the city sparkled with stars. When I arrived at my destination and spoke of the snow storm just nine miles away, everyone looked at me puzzled and asked, "What snow storm?" When I returned to Fort Wingate the next afternoon the evidence of the storm I had driven through had totally melted.
Weather like that I have described has turned me into an "indoorsman." No camping, no snow play, nothing out of doors interests me. I do not like picnics and certainly camping is off the list. I don't even like sitting out of doors on my deck in the back yard. Just give me a comfortable chair, and 47 inch TV, and a good cup of coffee in my house and I find full satisfaction. I can commune with nature of the National Geographic Channel.
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