Operation Cure Boredom

When I was a kid, I loved going on adventures. But growing up trapped in suburbia with little more than my imagination, I had to improvise. One time I accidentally set my father’s tomato garden on fire with gasoline. It was so incredibly thrilling I was forced to hide out in the woods for hours from my impending punishment. Another adventure involved turning my bedroom into a ball pit to mimic the Star Wars trash compactor scene, made up entirely of crumpled-up newspaper. My mother was less than enthused as I emerged from my room, hours later, blackened with headlines. As I got older, I turned my restless, inquisitive teenage spirit to the night sky, where I would lie in the grass in my backyard and stare up at the stars. And it was in this sky that I logged in one of my most memorable adventures. It began with me spiraling headlong through a wormhole en route to the constellation of Orion, and ended what seemed to be four hours later when I opened the door to exit the Burger King bathroom, in search of more acid.

But the greatest adventure was the one that constantly eluded me: the adventure of dating girls. There’s the thrill of the chase, the highs and lows of courtship, the excitement of always wanting to be with this one awesome, amazing person that you somehow found, bumped into, was introduced to randomly at that party you weren’t even going to go to because it was raining and you found a half-eaten bag of Reese’s Pieces. But then it happens, the world moves on around you as you stumble over the look she levels at you from across the room. Like being suspended in midair. You forget about everything. Your heart is like a greyhound whining to be let loose. You move closer. There isn’t anything that can stop you now…

Unless you’re nineteen-year-old me, and you realize you’re just watching a movie. Every day I sequestered myself to the den to watch men go on the ultimate adventure of dating women. Shy, awkward, and prone to snuggling my cats, I dreamed about adventure through my favorite of these men: my hero, Harrison Ford. As Indiana Jones, Han Solo, or hell, even Jack Trainer from Working Girl, Harrison Ford was what my teenage brain considered a real man. That guy had adventures that were both globe-trotting and heart-stopping. Whether he was rescuing treasures in North Africa or fighting against political traps in a corporate Manhattan office, Harrison had wit, charm, and the thing that got him all the ladies, a bullwhip. As an awkward kid, with no driver’s license and too much time on my hands, that kind of life felt out of my reach. Moreover, my shyness meant no conversations with them, much less getting in close enough proximity for an actual sexual encounter, and believe me, my sock drawer suffered for it. So I did what countless hormonal, sex-starved boys before me have done. I turned to drugs.

My friend Brady made the introduction.

You want to hang out and smoke a joint?

At the time, drugs weren’t even on my radar, but growing up in suburbia meant limited activities, a lot of boredom, and after school, a clear schedule.

Yes, I said.

That evening, after getting high for the first time, we went to a classy party in the woods, behind the VA hospital. Standing around the keg, much to my amazement, were quite a few girls. At some point, and I don’t recall how, I found myself having a conversation with one of them. We didn’t hook up or exchange numbers. Our small talk lasted all of a minute and a half. The incredible thing, though, is I didn’t get self-conscious. I couldn’t feel the pimples throbbing on my face, and I wasn’t worried about my hair or the high-water jeans I had on. It was almost as if I didn’t care what people thought of me, a kind of freedom I’d never experienced before.

You might say that I fell in love that night, with that girl, of course, but mostly with drugs. All of a sudden, I began having some adventures. Not exactly ones where I was cast as the hero, but fun nonetheless. Like the one that started at my junior high school dance, where I tried to impress a girl by being broody and mysterious, forcing eye contact from across the cafeteria, which ended with me getting kicked out for being creepy.

Getting high all the time became my mission because it rid me of my awkward and shy self. This way, I thought, I’d always be able to talk to girls. On a limited income of pawned CDs from my music collection, though, staying high soon became a problem. My well-thought-out and brilliant solution: turn to a life of crime. It didn’t occur to me that being a juvenile delinquent might be a turnoff to some girls.

Not to worry, it didn’t exactly work out.

In order to make any real money as a criminal, you have to take risks, but I didn’t have the temperament for, say, breaking and entering or boosting cars—felonies that might produce an actual income. Also, my connections to the dark and seedy suburban underbelly were nonexistent. I stuck to shoplifting the random Mounds bar, or a pack of Now & Laters, small items I could shove in my pants and peddle to my friends, which wasn’t a solid business plan. It turns out that metalheads and stoners don’t have any money either. We’d just end up high, eating up any profit I might’ve made and talking about girls.

My friends were no help when it came to getting laid. It didn’t occur to me that my buddy Riley, packing a glass pipe for us to smoke with Angel Dust before American History 101, might’ve known less about how to talk to Lisa, who was bound for Cornell, than me. In fact, none of my new friends knew how to convince a girl to get naked any more than I did. We were clueless. Standing next to the railroad tracks to get high should’ve been a hint. But I never added it up. All that I knew was that girls still did not want to talk to me. So eventually I gave up. As far as I was concerned, sex was a mythical treasure, locked away and just out of reach, no matter how many Harrison Ford movies I watched. But a young man can dream, or conjure it up in a LSD-induced Wednesday, and I hoped one day I might meet someone who could help.

Aware that a student licking plywood might have an issue, my woodshop teacher sent me to the vice principal’s office. What made this more confusing for my foggy mind than for your run-of-the-mill stoner is that the vice principal and my father shared the same name. Bill Martin.

Looking at your attendance, I see you’ve missed most of your classes this semester. You have incomplete grades across the board.

Listen, Dad, I’m sorry—

Dad?

Mr. Martin ushered me out of his office, past the school’s trophy case, and down a long hallway. He asked me rhetorical questions about my future and suggested I think about the life path I’d apparently chosen. At the end of the corridor, he stopped in front of an emergency exit. I’d been listening to him, but I didn’t seem to grasp the symbolism of the door in front of me. Mr. Martin pushed it open and held his hand out, in the direction of my future, a parking lot with no one around.

Good luck, he said as the door slammed shut behind me.

I turned to face a sign that read Not an Entrance. I’d been expelled. I stood there, and as my high wore off quicker than usual, I began to feel more alone than ever before.

A new door opened the very next morning, though; unfortunately, it led to the Brunswick Psychiatric Hospital, where my parents dropped me off. I met a gentleman named Eric. He spent his days drooling and tanning his penis at a picnic table after swallowing an entire sheet of acid during a police pursuit. Eric had taken a long trip. Eight years later, he was still vacationing.

At one of the parental visitations days, my mother sat across from me and Eric at the picnic table.

Well? she said, and nodded at him. Is this how you want to spend the rest of your life?

Vacationing for eight years didn’t seem so terrible, but I guessed that most girls didn’t go in for the slobbering and slack-jawed, nude sunbathing type.

Let me think about it, I said.

Disgusted, my mother left. It wasn’t until several rehabs later that I started seeing her point, sobered up, and came home for a whole new journey.

By the time I returned, all of my friends had graduated high school and moved off to distant foreign lands like Stanford, Harvard, and UCLA. When they came back on break, I listened to their stories. They said words like coeds and parties.

I’ve made a horrible error in judgment, I remember thinking.

The odds of dating a girl while unemployed and living in my childhood bedroom were pretty slim. So I picked myself up, along with my certificate from rehab and my GED, and took all three things as far as I could at the time, to a department store job. As the sock and underwear specialist, I spent my days devising a plan to get out.

I dabbled in community college but rediscovered an inability to complete anything labeled homework. A friend from rehab and I took a road trip, hoping that some clean air would refresh my brain cells and bring a solution to my dilemma. We managed to end up in a dirty hotel room in Daytona Beach during spring break, sober, miserable, and broke, unable to enjoy the festivities because we were sober, miserable, and broke. Then, believe it or not, Harrison Ford solved my problem. He had a small role in a movie that made me see that maybe I could leave my small town, go on amazing adventures, and perhaps, if I got lucky, get a girl.

As soon as the credits rolled on Apocalypse Now, I found myself sitting across the desk from a military recruiter. He talked about discipline, honor, and duty. Those words had never meant that much to me, but tie them to exotic places like Norfolk, Virginia, and Fort Worth, Texas, and I found myself intrigued. I listened to an array of possible enlistment bonuses, none of which I qualified for as a result of my poor entrance exam scores. I decided to focus on the basics.

All the meals are free? I asked.

Guaranteed, he said.

As he rattled off a list of potential careers, I worried, not just about my lack of specific skills, but about my lack of any skill whatsoever. I didn’t even have a working knowledge of current events. He asked me what I was good at, and I tried to convince him that loitering isn’t as easy as it looks. You have to be patient and zone out. The recruiter stared at me. I started to panic. But then he just shrugged and said, Doesn’t matter, son. The military will train you.

The recruiting office had posters on the wall of soldiers marching through sand dunes and swamps. They all wore serious, stern faces, and none of them appeared excited about wherever the hell they were going. I felt a stab of doubt about this military idea. I’d never been good at taking orders. My response to being told to mow the lawn or take out the trash had always been a well-timed nap. Then I thought how I’d been spending my recent lunch breaks, making igloos out of laundry detergent boxes in the drugstore storage room and dozing in them until the manager found me. Maybe some discipline is what I need, I thought. I stuck around for the spiel.

Petty Officer Anderson spoke to me about procedures, chain of command, and saluting. I gazed at him with a blank face. He moved to phrases like defending freedom and something about We the people. I picked at a hangnail. Shifting gears, he talked about massive warships and cannon-like firepower. I stifled a yawn. Then he said something that changed my life forever.

You ever heard of a banana show, Martin?

"A what?’ I said.

Tommy, as Petty Officer Anderson told me to call him, filled me in on what a Japanese woman could do with a banana in a Tokyo bar. He had me. From the age of thirteen on, I’d been trying and failing to get a girl to take her clothes off for me.

You’re going to get so much pussy, Martin.

How? I said.

Girls love guys in uniform. Camouflage is a pussy magnet.

I eyed the posters on the wall. The soldiers were decked out, head to toe, in uniforms of green and brown splotches. I was skeptical, but decided to trust him on this one.

Now, all of a sudden, with little education required, traveling the world, having adventures, and meeting women seemed within reach. Maybe I could follow in Harrison’s footsteps. Yesterday I’d been a virgin, stuck in a small town. Tomorrow, I thought, I can see the world and have lots of sex. LOTS OF SEX.

I said, I’ll sign up for twenty years.

He said, Relax, bro. Let’s start with four and see how you feel. Okay?

Tommy passed me the enlistment questionnaire and told me that if I got stuck on anything, I should remember that honesty is the best policy. I was still filling out the forms when he returned an hour later.

"What are you doing, Martin?’

It says to list all the illegal substances I’ve taken. There’s not enough room.

He plucked the questionnaire out from under my forearm and slid it into the shredder. Then he placed a new one in front of me.

Let’s try this again, shall we? You were at a party once, he dictated, and someone, not a friend, offered you a joint. Because of peer pressure, you took a drag.

I started writing down what he’d said when he grabbed my hand and stopped me.

But! he said. You didn’t like the taste.

Oh, man, I said, and ran a hand through my hair. That’s impossible. Brady always had purple and gold skunk. Have you ever tasted that?

I suspect Tommy, tall and brash, enjoyed his own reflection. As a recruiter for the Navy, the guy did a good job, too. He kept me interested. Every day, for a week, he’d pick me up in his Scout II, call me sailor, and buy me lunch. We’d talk about how great life would be once I shipped out for boot camp. If I ever voiced any concerns about injury, death, or dismemberment, he’d counter my fears by telling me the story of his riding a horse bareback in Hawaii at three in the morning with a beautiful local girl. At a different lunch, he might tell me about the time in Manila when he had Captain Silverman’s vehicle, though he couldn’t remember why he had it. MPs found it hugging a Chinese maple tree in the morning. He didn’t know how that happened either, but the girl with him, she was a crystal clear vision.

For the first time in my life, I had a purpose, a goal, and an adventure on the horizon. It didn’t matter that my low test scores wouldn’t even get me a position on a ship. The Navy, Tommy assured me, would be the best of my drug-induced behavior without having to hide from my dealer to enjoy it. He let me know that my friends in college were never going to have the opportunities I’d have. I relayed this message to my friend Rob before he left to study biochemistry at Harvard.

You don’t even like horses, he said.

"Whatever. Have fun at college," I said.

A week later, I showed up at the recruiting office so Tommy could drive me to Fort Hamilton, where I’d take my oath and ship out. He wasn’t there, though. I spoke to the guy sitting at his desk.

What’s up? Where’s Tommy?

Petty Officer Anderson has shipped out to submarine school.

I chuckled, knocked on the desk, and sat down in the chair across from him.

Fuck off. You’re kidding, right? He’s supposed to—

The angry stare coming from this petty officer made me swallow the rest of my words. An intense silence filled the room, or at least until the two marine recruiters sitting nearby started laughing their asses off. I straightened up in the chair.

I said, Sorry, sir.

During the long, quiet ride to Fort Hamilton, all the excitement I’d had about joining the military leaked out of my pores. Outside, the rain came down in ominous sheets. An unpleasant omen, I thought. I was headed for an unknown future where a person in white bell-bottom slacks would scream in my face and give me a shitty four-year job. I shifted in my seat and broke the silence.

What was your job in the Navy before you became a recruiter?

I was a metallurgical corrosion specialist.

Cool. What do you do in that job?

The recruiter kept both hands on the wheel and gave me a sideways glance.

Scrape barnacles off the sides of ships, he said. That way, guys like you have a smooth surface to paint.

So I joined the Air Force.

When I got to the recruiting office, Sergeant Michaels didn’t need to sell me on God or country or why freedom isn’t free. He only needed to answer one question.

Let me ask you something, Sergeant. Have you ever been to a banana show?

He cocked his head to the side and took a moment. Then his smile widened, as if remembering something fondly, then looked back at me and leaned forward.

Get ready, Martin. The world is a great, big, wild place, and you’re going to have an amazing adventure.

Part One

Training

Sergeant Masterson, MD

The mentally retarded love the military. I was unaware of this fact until it was pointed out there were so many of us.

What’s your name, Airman!

Dan, I said.

We ain’t friends, shitbird! Your fucking last name, retard!

Before I could answer, he turned to the guy next to me.

How about you, Airman? What’s your name?

Thompson, sir.

Sir? Do I look like a goddamn officer to you? I’m a sergeant, you fucking retard! Now get off the goddamn bus!

I realized this would be the kind of a place where you learn from other people’s mistakes and beat Thompson to the door in a dead heat. Two dozen other guys sprinted off the bus at Lackland Air Force Base with me. We became Air Force Flight 283.

All in all, Air Force Flight 283 looked like a healthy bunch of guys. Sergeant Masterson dispatched that idea immediately. I learned that most of us suffered another common condition, Dumbassitis.

The symptoms ranged from a smirk on your face to failing to execute a proper salute. Second opinions were available, but office hours for these were held at four thirty in the morning and included a bat slamming against a garbage pail, inches from your face.

In truth, I’d been well prepared for the Air Force. Prior to enlisting, I had voluntarily enrolled in a drug and alcohol rehab facility. It helped me see the poor decision-making I’d made with narcotics, but it did so with the kind of tough love that only unlicensed counselors of 1980’s New York City could devise. We lived under a military dictatorship. For the first year of my two-year stay, I only recall being allowed outside, under extreme supervision, one day a week. Some days we ate breakfast standing barefoot on a freezing tile floor wearing only boxers while a grown man screamed and spat in our faces. The rules were everything. Skip a step on a staircase, and you’d find yourself sitting in the Prospect Chair, a wooden seat facing a blank wall, for hours on end to contemplate the reasons for your overeager stride. Fall asleep in that chair, and one might be scrubbing pots and pans until three in morning, again, in nothing but his boxers. It was the kind of place where you dealt with your feelings, or else. It proved to be beneficial preparation for a career in the military.

Any fantasies I had about walking out of rehab and going home to suburbia were squashed by the surrounding neighborhood, a crack house community in Queens. Attempting to flee might’ve resulted in serious bodily injury from either a mugging or a gang initiation. Neither option seemed pleasant. I stayed inside and finished the program.

After a while, though, the incessant yelling, threats, and discipline lost their meaning. As a result, I developed a coping mechanism, albeit a poor one, that stayed with me throughout my life.

You think this is funny, Martin? Sergeant Masterson screamed.

No, Sergeant, I said, and tried not to giggle.

I’m fucking serious, son!

This never ended well. It did, however, improve my cardiac capacity with all the laps Sergeant Masterson forced me to run because of my errant, uncontrollable grin.

Considering I joined the military to meet girls and found myself surrounded by dudes, I started to believe that I might in fact have Dumbassitis. Then, late one night, I heard some of the reasons my fellow airmen enlisted.

My girlfriend got pregnant. I didn’t want to get married, Thompson said.

Bad credit and collection agencies coming for me, Garguilo said.

Best friend dared me, Reinis said.

I breathed a sigh of relief. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one with Dumbassitis.

Boot camp isn’t an ideal place to meet girls. I know that now. After a week of marching and jogging all over the place, I hadn’t seen a single one, though I knew they were on base somewhere. Just catching a glimpse of the female form, I felt, would’ve eased the pain and drudgery. Then again, Sergeant Masterson, with his boisterous distaste for everything I stood for, would’ve made for a terrible wingman.

The only certificate I ever saw on Sergeant Masterson’s wall claimed that his flag football team finished first in the league. That small technicality didn’t stop him from continually dispensing his expert medical opinion, though.

Without using any modern medical technology, tools like a thermometer or a stethoscope, or even a tongue depressor, Sergeant Masterson diagnosed me, and twenty-seven other airmen, with the contagious disease of homosexuality. His preferred method of treatment involved shoving you against a locker and making you inhale his onion-scented breath until you confessed to your affliction.

"You’re a homosexual aren’t you, Martin?"

Yes, Sergeant, I said, and realized he didn’t see the irony in getting cheek to cheek and pressing his body against mine. I decided not to point it out. Not that it mattered, because he soon prescribed the cure.

Of course you are. Fifty laps, you queers!

Sergeant Masterson fancied himself a specialist in most areas of medicine, especially gynecology. In times of great pain and stress, like when I fell behind in a formation run, heaving and gasping for air, the sergeant waited for me, clearly worried about my well-being.

Do you have sand in your pussy, Martin? The way you’re running, it looks like your vagina hurts.

No, Sergeant, I said. I’m just tired.

This led to an additional series of conditions I didn’t know I had. For starters, he diagnosed me as a clear-cut moron. My inability to keep pace meant that I was defective, like a coffeepot that wouldn’t brew or a volcano that made ice cream. Then he suggested, as any good nutritionist would, that it might be my diet.

Maybe you wouldn’t be so full of shit if you just stopped eating it all the time!

I thought he had a valid point there.

A couple of weeks later, after another long run, I discovered that Sergeant Masterson must’ve also been schooled in vocational counseling. He insisted that I find a job in the fashion industry because every good woman knew how to sew, or that maybe I could stand at the edge of the driveway and hold the mailbox because the post had more smarts than I did, and was needed elsewhere. The sergeant also recommended that I lie down in a garden and join the rest of the rocks, but added that I might be good at wearing a target and running around the firing range, too. Ultimately, though, Sergeant Masterson decided I’d be perfect for hurling myself off a cliff, since so many other airmen needed the space that I took up.

Just when you thought you’d seen every side of our versatile sergeant, he’d surprise you with yet another, as if the six-sided die you thought you were playing with was suddenly, magically, a twenty-sided die. Sergeant Masterson knew the value of a soft touch and the power of positive reinforcement. As I emptied the contents of my stomach onto the obstacle course, he sidled up next to me and laid a reassuring hand on my back.

That’s it, Martin, get it all out. Now, just relax and take a second.

I dry heaved a few more times, and then sat on the rubber tractor tire and tried to catch my breath.

Thanks, Sergeant.

He smiled and leaned in close.

What’s your best friend’s name, son?

David, Sergeant, I said, not sure what direction this would go.

And what’s your girlfriend’s name?

An image of Denise Saddler popped into my mind. She’d made the mistake