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I love my grand kids. Well, all of them except Peter. That kid is a world class dipshit. I have 2 children. Michael and Jessica. I wanted to name Jessica, Edith but my wife, Caroline thought Edith was too old fashioned. It was 1962. I felt old fashioned. Kennedy was President. The space race was in full swing. Marilyn Monroe died. I can’t tell you how many times I tugged myself off while inside Caroline while thinking about that broad. It wasn’t her complete lack of intelligence or her overflowing tits. I think it was the respect I had for DiMaggio that made her that much more interesting to me. No wait. It was the tits. I was always more of a leg man but when needed I could easily be a tit monger. I met Caroline in 1958. I was 28 years old and 5 years out of Korea. They say it’s the “forgotten War”. Fuck you. I haven’t forgetting one round I fired, one man I killed, or one whore I fucked while firing rounds to kill those fucking slants. Sure, we didn’t have the glory of World War II. We didn’t have a bunch of hippies trying to fight in Vietnam. We had stand up, hardnosed fighting men who had been groomed fighting in Europe and the God forsaken Islands of the pacific. I lost my left eye in that war. Lost one of my nuts too. The ball was bitten off when I refused to pay for the services of an aging Korean lady. The eye was lost in a bar fight when I refused to pay for a tab I didn’t create. I learned later that I did in fact start the tab. I also learned that I had dared the barkeeper to stab me when I refused to pay. I was young. Stupid as a Mississippi cock hound. I wasn’t just unbridled youth though. I looked up to my staff Sargent like a Carolina Prick dog looks up to a Virginian Hump Hound. Ignoring Army regulations at the time, he was the proud owner of a full thick beard that said “I have more dick in these fucking fatigues that your wife will ever see in her life you goddamn pussy.” Every morning we would have PT. He would have us line up outside the barracks and walk up and down the line real slow. I still remember the smell. It was like old leather being smoked out of a cigar while someone mixed motor oil with cheap brandy. He would stop in front of someone at random. Maybe he could smell the fear. Maybe they would make eye contact.
“What…the…fuck?” he would ask. And he expected an answer. No one got it right of course and he wouldn’t really scream at you like the movies. He would just start beating your ass. You couldn’t fight back. You couldn’t really defend yourself against rage like that. The kicks were the worse. Once you were down just kick after kick. It was bad to get it but just to hear the kicks impact an already unconscious body. One time the Lieutenant was close enough to see what was going on. He made the mistake of trying to stop it.
“Sgt. Roddenthick! What in the hoot is going on here?” He would yell. Poor kid. He couldn’t have been more than 22.
“I’m kicking the shit out of this no named asshole. What does it look like I am doing?” He replied through yellow stained teeth that looked like that had seen hell itself.
“Stand down this instant! If you kick that man one more time I will court martial you faster than you can lace up your boots. And why haven’t you shaved that beard? That is a…” He was cut off when the Sargent grabbed him by the tongue. The lieutenant just made a kind of animal moan sound trying to talk or scream or cry.
“Listen to me. Calm down and listen to me.” Said the Sgt. “You are shit. Human shit. So is your whore of a mother, so is your limped dick father. Your rank is an imaginary title given to you by men who have never seen war, death, or suffering. I will kick and beat whoever I want and you will watch. I fight my way. I lead my way. I know what is best for my troops. I know what is best for my face. It is this beard. A beard I earned in the sands of Iwo Jima. You haven’t earned anything. And you never will because you are shit. Nothing. You don’t matter. You never will. You will either die here or die in a shitty job in your shitty town that your impotent father gets you. If you raise your voice to me again I will show you hell and you will beg to die. I’m going to let you go and you are going back to your office to find other ways to keep yourself off the front while real men stay out here and prepare for battle.”
Tears were streaming from the Lieutenant face. He had shit his pants during the ordeal. The Sargent let him go and he scurried away. He was soon sectioned 8 and the military was nice enough to write it off as shell shock but he had never even been in battle. I heard he made it back to his hometown with a job his old man had lined up.
Look at me. I was writing about Christmas with my family and I got side tracked by the war from all those years ago. Happens a lot these days. I think I was talking about my daughter Jessica. Well, she grew up and married a boring fuck then got fat and shat out two kids like a billion other daughters have. Fuck it.
-Dave Pelmore
Dec. 2005