At Fort Benning, The Benning School for Boys, aka the Infantry School, I was a good shot, good at hand-to-hand and the bayonet assault course, but I struggled with Land Navigation and Roadmarches.
I had trouble picking up the patterns and distinguishing between subtleties in the central Georgia terrain. I required remedial training in fact. I also apparently required a get-your-mind-right meeting with the Commandant of the Infantry School. While I wheezed in the front-leaning-rest, Colonel Davis informed me that I was not looking long “as a LEADER OF MEN” if I didn’t learn to find my ass with both hands.
I found retired Infantry Colonel Damewood. I worked hard at LandNav with 4 junior NCOs on Yankee Road as the Saturdays cooled in the fall of 1988. The Colonel taught Terrain Association, not Dead Reckoning. I learned that drawing the terrain forced me to really look at it. I learned that eyeballing it backwards gave me a clearer feel for its ass-to-ankle contours. That last lonely November Saturday night instead of being at the strip clubs on Victory Boulevard, I ran jungle-booted in a red-lens-lit, pissing-down, rainy-creek-crossing, final do-or-die examination. I had no further quality time with Colonel Davis.
I found retired Infantry Colonel Damewood. I worked hard at LandNav with 4 junior NCOs on Yankee Road as the Saturdays cooled in the fall of 1988. The Colonel taught Terrain Association, not Dead Reckoning. I learned that drawing the terrain forced me to really look at it. I learned that eyeballing it backwards gave me a clearer feel for its ass-to-ankle contours. That last lonely November Saturday night instead of being at the strip clubs on Victory Boulevard, I ran jungle-booted in a red-lens-lit, pissing-down, rainy-creek-crossing, final do-or-die examination. I had no further quality time with Colonel Davis.
I envied those long-legged infantry-officers. I looked like Roadrunner with legs spinning furiously. Prior-enlisted Lieutenant Jeff Ibbo and I spent our Sundays roadmarching up and down Yankee Road, Furman Road, Harmony Church. We did 12 and 14 mile roadmarches.
At Sevenoaks School in England I learned that my Dallas, Texas public schooling came up short. I spent every night at the kitchen table, drawing quadratic graphs, trying to understand the physics of momentum and acceleration, 9.1m/s/s. It took me a year, but I did catch up.
As a former Army Captain I knew how to lead. I knew how to work hard. I decided to take up a trade — database engineering, like pipe-fitting for geeks. My headhunter said you need an IT certification. I spent night after night, upstairs in in my loft studying and drilling Oracle databases. I took the four exams and passed them all first-time go.
My first three track years I ran on Bessie, my RumbleBee BMW R1100S. I made her do a bad thing. I reassessed, realized that coming to this later in life I needed to learn basic blocking and tackling, the rudiments of drumming, the seat time of tracking.
Wax-on, wax-off. Do the drills. Become the novice. Listen, learn, watch, then Be-Know-Do.
scrotocycles.rip 