On a lovely fall California evening a bunch of my buddies and me who have just finished up our Basic Training at Fort Ord and are awaiting orders for whatever’s next have been sitting around the barracks all day drinking as much beer as humanly possible. By now fairly well toasted. As it’s getting late one of the guys tells us he’s heard that the National Guard is holding maneuvers out on the beach in the sand dunes just north of Seaside. And that we, as real hero’s, should go out there to show those weekend weenies what being a genuine soldier is all about. Why, one of us is worth at least ten of them and the dozen of us could easily kick their whole battalion’s ass. Being drunk as skunks this makes perfect sense and it’s decided we should raid the wimps then kick ass and take names. We all pile into a couple cars and taking the beer with us, head for the beach.
By the time we arrive at the beach it’s getting midnight. We get out of the cars and stand around talking up our courage. After a few more brews we start sneaking up on the Guard.
We must not have been too quiet because before we get very far into the dunes we hear, “Halt! Who goes there? Stand and identify yourself.”
One of our group yells, “Fuck you!”
All of a sudden we see a hell of a lot of flashlights coming our way with even more voices hollering at us to “Halt!”
‘Well now’ I think, ‘this is where the men separate form the boys.’
It’s now time to stand and fight and show these weenies just who is boss. Except when I look around there’s only Steve still standing besides me. All the rest of my buddies have turned tail and are running back toward the cars! It’s too late for me to do the same because here come the Guard. I turn and take off but there’s a Guardsman right on my ass yelling, “Halt or I’ll shoot!”
I weave, I bob, but I just can’t shake the bastard. And now he’s jabbing me in the back with his rifle and threatening to shoot me if I don’t give up.
There’s only one thing I can do. I fall to the ground. The Guardsman is too close behind me to stop. He trips over me dropping his rifle. I am up. I run over him and as I pass over him I snatch up his gun. Now he’s really pissed yelling and screaming at me but by the time he gets to his feet I am too far ahead. He’ll never catch me now.
I see a marshy looking area just across the road that parallels the beach and head deep into the cattails. I hit the soft ground and abandoning the rifle, crawl to the back of the marsh. I figure I’ll just hide out here until everything quiets down then sneak away and walk back to the barracks. There’s still a lot of yelling but I just stay put hoping my friends, even though they are a bunch of wimps, get away.
Just as things start quieting down I see a duce and a half full of Guardsmen coming down the road from the Guards camp and it’s got a big spotlight mounted on top of the cab. I think I’ll just lie low until it passes, but as it gets to the marsh one of the Guardsman (mine?) tells it to stop because, he says, there’s a guy in the cattails. They hit the spot and shine it my way. Seeing as the cattails are all dead and tan and I’m dressed in dark green, it doesn’t take long to spot me.
“There he is!” they holler.
I am up and running and the chase is on again, only this time instead of one dude behind me, there’s at least six. They’re all armed and they’re all yelling, “Halt or I’ll shoot!”
I’m drunk enough that this doesn’t scare me at all so I turn my head and holler back, “Shoot me in the back ya sissies, but I ain’t givin’ up!”
After a short run I come to a canal about 8 feet across. I don’t even hesitate and jump right in. The water immediately comes up to my armpits. I swim across and scurry up the other side then continue to run. The Guard however, has stopped at the canal. Seeing this I stop and turn back watching them. They’re arguing about going in and getting wet. Laughing at them I say, “What a bunch of pussies! Afraid of a little water, boys?”
One of them yells back, “Fuck you!” and jumps into the canal.
As I take off once more I see the rest of them jump in too. By the time they get across and up the bank I am so far ahead that I know they’ll never catch me. After another short run I come to a large corps of big trees. I find what looks like the biggest one and hide behind it. After awhile the Guardsmen arrive and seeing the trees know they will never find me. However, they make a few half hearted attempts anyway shinning their flashlights into the trees and yelling at me to “give up!” before giving up themselves and heading back towards the beach. This time I wisely keep my mouth shut until they’re gone. Now what?
Wet, cold, drunk and tired I start walking away from the beach. I must have walked a couple miles before I came to a stretch of blacktop. As I looked both ways there seemed to be a light about a quarter mile down the road. Mise well check it out. As I got closer I saw it was a gas station now closed, but it had a pay phone, and I had a dime. Well, I can walk the 10 or so miles back to the barracks, or I can call the sergeant who’s on duty there which will I’m sure, mightily piss him off, or I could try calling this girl who lives in Monterey and who I’ve dated a couple times. What the hell, I dial her number.
“Hello Christy?”.....
"It’s Tai. Yeah I know it’s late, but I kinda have an emergency.”.....
"No nothing really too bad. Ya see, me and a few of the guys got a little drunk and took on the National Guard. And well, we lost. So I’m stuck out here on the highway and need a ride back to the base.”...
"I know it’s 1:30 but I’d really appreciate it if you could come out here and get me. I promise to pay ya back bigtime.”.....
"Yeah sure, anything ya want.”
She says she’ll come get me and asks where I am. I give her the name of the gas station and tell her to look it up in the yellow pages. She does and tells me she’ll be here in half an hour. I also ask her to bring a towel then thank her profusely and hang up.
True to her word Christy shows up about half an hour later. She stops, opens the door and throws me a towel. I thank her again for her kindness. She just shrugs and asks me to tell her the whole gruesome story. I do.
When I finish she laughs and says, “Sounds to me like it was you guys who were the weenies.”
I hung my head and agreed.
She told me that her house was a lot closer than the base so I mise well spend it there then she’d drive me back to the base in the morning. I told her that sounded real good to me but she laughed again and informed me that I would be sleeping on the couch all by myself. Oh well, but still a lot better then any of the other scenarios
Next day I walk back into the barracks and see all but one of my buddies sitting around. I act like I’m pissed and ask what the hell happened to them? They just laugh at me and tell me the story.
They told me that they were all way too drunk to fight anyone, let alone somebody who’s armed, so at first sight of the flashlights they had all turned tail and ran leaving me and Steve behind. Being so wasted it took no time for the Guard to capture all of them. After the Guard rounded them up they called their commander who, after letting his men harass them a little, asked who the hell they were and what the fuck did they think they were doing? They, now being POW’s, would only give their names, ranks and serial numbers. One of the Guardsman told their CO that two of us had gotten away. The Guard commander asked for our names but our buddies refused to give them to him. He then asked them what was their company and who was their commanding officer. They told him. He told his boys to hold our guys and went to call our CO. Of course he got out duty sergeant instead, who after hearing the story agreed to come and get our guys. While waiting the Guard used the opportunity to harass our guys even more telling them what a bunch of wimps they were. Our guys said that if they hadn’t been so drunk that they would have kick the Guards ass. After which a really heated argument ensued. The Guard CO told all of them to shut the fuck up!
A little while later one of our corporals showed up driving a duce and a half. After berating our guys right in front of the Guard for not only the stupidity of their actions but for getting caught as well told them to get into the back of the truck. They asked about their cars and were told they’d have to retrieve them the next morning. When they got back to the barracks the corporal told them they were all getting Articles 15’s on Monday then to get their asses in bed. I asked if the corporal or the duty sergeant asked about Steve and me. They told me no, so as far as they knew we were in the clear. I then asked if they knew where Steve was. They told me that the last time they had seen him was when he was standing next to me. They then wanted to hear all about my escape. I told them the story with only a few exaggerations about my courage in the face of adversity.
That afternoon Steve walked in and told us that he had spent the night in the dunes. He too had outrun the Guard then had found a place to hide. While in his hidy-hole he had passed out and slept till morning then had walked and hitched back to the base. He asked what had happened to us. We all told him our stories and he agreed that we had all gotten off lightly. The guys, except for Steve and I, were all called onto the CO’s carpet early Monday morning but instead of being given Article 15’s they were simply chewed out, mostly for running away and then getting caught. They were all given a warning and KP for the next week.
Steve and I never did catch any flack over the incident, which goes to show that even though the guys were a bunch of pussies at least they weren’t rats. I did see Christy a few times after that too, but two months later I was transferred to the Presidio of San Francisco and that’s a whole other story.