July 8, 1970. Mannie joins the US Navy and encounters a miracle

The greatest secret of my life.

On July 9, 1970 I woke up and everything had changed...and it wasn't just because of where I found myself.

Fifty years ago, this morning,  I woke up to my first day at the Recruit Training Center in San Diego California.  That was the morning that I had expected to be thrown out of the Navy, and to have returned home in disgrace and embarrassment..

The greatest secret of my life.

I was really eager to join the Navy since I was about thirteen; a sailor is what I wanted to be when I grew up.  My mother was a realist, and often gently reminded me of why that might not work out.

I had a secret back then which affected my self-esteem and made me somewhat withdrawn and invisible in high school: I thought that the Navy would change all of that.

But I was pretty wrapped up in some specific magical thinking.

So I joined up, went to San Diego, and that first night I turned in for what I thought was going to be my last night in the Navy...and that I would have to return with my head hung very low and a made-up story of why I washed out.

But then, fifty years ago this morning, I had a transcendent moment.  For the first time, in seventeen years, I woke up...

with a dry bed.

And everything was better.

(Me, with the glasses)

If we were to transport back in time fifty years this would be a watershed day for me.

On the morning of July 8, 1970 my father dropped me off at the Federal building in Saginaw Michigan where I boarded an express bus to the airport in Detroit for a flight that took me to San Diego California, where another bus was waiting.

I and about two dozen other sad sacks were driven through the gates of the recruit training center for the US Navy. It was about ten in the evening.

When the bus stopped a second class petty officer, in whites, with a braided red cord looped around his left shoulder, stepped aboard. He was nearly screaming his greeting and instructions. I never heard the words "fuck" and "assholes" in such abundance and in such variation before, nor had I ever seen young men slapped so hard that they lost their balance (all of these practices are now banned in Navy boot camp).

I became number 63, which would be my sole identity for the next five days of processing.

After a harrowing evening of instruction we turned in at 2:00 am. At 4:00 am the lights came on, and now the real screaming began. "Welcome the fuck aboard, you fucking asshole pussies."

I spent the next twelve weeks running for my life and trying not to laugh at the inventive and colorful language.

I was an enthusiastic and model recruit; and I only got slapped once.

I was changed forever...in a good way.