One For My Baby

I have a black fedora with pin stripes. A lot of people have seen me in this hat. It is my favorite hat. I love this hat more than I love nearly everything else in my life. 

I know, you're probably saying to yourself, "How can you possibly love an inanimate object that much?"

Well, there's a reason. My grandfather left me this hat.

After he died.

I'll explain.

One day, I happened to be in Yakima, and decided that I wanted to go visit my grandfather in his nursing home. My father showed up, as well. As we're sitting around talking to him, other people begin to show up. A few of them bring cards. 

Really? You're bringing a blind man a greeting card?

Turns out, it was his 94th Birthday. I had no idea. I started to feel really shitty, because I had forgotten, and didn't bring him anything. 

My uncle and aunt showed up with cake and ice cream. A lot of my grandfather's friends showed up as well. We all went into the common area, and had a little birthday party. Every person in the room was at least 35 years older than me. Some were 60 years older than me. I felt VERY out of place.

After a while, I got an idea. I sat down next to my grandfather, and asked him a question.

"Grandpa, do you like Frank Sinatra?"

"Of course I do, honey. I love the Rat Pack."

"What's your favorite song?"

"One For My Baby."

"Oh, yeah, I know that one. Bette Midler sang it on the Tonight Show the last night that Johnny Carson was hosting."

"Yeah, I remember that night."

I stood up, and got everyone's attention in the room. I explained to them that I felt really bad about forgetting my grandfather's birthday, and not having anything for him. So, to make it up, I wanted to sing to him.

In front of my family and my grandfather's friends, I sang, a cappella, One For My Baby.

Everyone cried. Including me.

I walked over to my grandfather, and said, "Happy Birthday. I love you." I kissed him on the cheek, and walked out. I proceeded to sit in my car for the next 20 minutes and weep. I remembered when I was growing up, that he was always at our house before I was even awake. He would work in the garden, feed cattle, etc. He always seemed so strong to me. Seeing him in this nursing home, getting cake and ice cream all over his face because he can't see it.

That was the last time I saw him, until his funeral 4 years later.

I went back to Yakima for his funeral, dressed in my Class A Uniform. I thought I could keep it together the entire service. Once they opened the casket, though, I lost it.I cried until it was time to put him in the hearse.

I, my brothers, and my cousins loaded him in the hearse. His EIGHT grandsons. We went to the cemetery, and laid him next to my grandmother.

Afterward, we all got together for his wake. We ate some food, talked with distant relatives, and some of us were drinking whiskey out of the back of my brother's trunk.

After a while, I decided it was time to get out of my uniform. After all, it was the same one I got when I joined the Army, and I weighed 143 pounds. So, I went to my car, and grabbed my bag with my regular clothes in it. I went inside, changed and came back out to my car.

I will preface what comes next with this: I ALWAYS LOCK MY CAR. I don't care if I'm at home, if I'm only going to be away from it for a couple minutes, etc. I always lock it.

I get back to my car, and throw my uniform in the back seat. 

Sitting on the front passenger seat is this hat:

It was as if someone had placed it in my car for me. Some have said that it was just a coincidence. That someone must have put it in there while I was inside. My car was locked, though. There was no way to get in.

So, my grandfather gave me a fedora on the day of his funeral. I will have this hat until the day I die.

On leave, #1

I went to Yakima to visit my Dad and some of my friends that still lived there.

Being a Thursday afternoon, Dad was bowling in the Senior league. He introduced me to several of his friends. Every one of them felt the need to hug me. That was wonderful. Nothing like getting some old people love from strangers.

After our little visit, I went into the card room. They had black jack, pai gow, etc. I had a bunch of disposable income, so I wanted to play some cards. I sat down at the Pai Gow table, and started playing.

Not much later, I ended up hitting a straight flush, and won $250. Since I was up at that point, I decided to walk away. So, I got up, and headed toward the cage to cash out.

I passed by the Texax Shoot Out table, and noticed the dealer was a woman that I used to deliver pizzas with back in the day. "What are you doing here?" she asked. "What are YOU doing here?" I replied.

We spoke for a moment, then I decided to sit down at the table, as I had a few extra $5 chips.

The second hand I was dealt, I had an Ace and 8 of clubs. She then dealt five cards in this order: 9, 10, Jack, Queen, King of clubs.

That's right, I had a 7 card Royal Flush. I won $1000 for that hand. I wish I had did that on the Pai Gow table. I would have made about $30,000. So, I tipped the dealer, cashed out at the cage, and left. When I got into my car, I took a picture of my $1,250. Mostly because I knew I wasn't going to see it again.

The next day, I went to lunch with my Dad and my daughter's mom, Ange. We had a great lunch, and when the check came, I immediately grabbed it. Dad argued, of course. His train of thought was "I'm your father, I'll pay for lunch."

I then pulled out my camera, and showed him the picture of the money I won the day before. Then, I paid the bill, and handed him $200. "What's this for?"    "Just for being my dad."

After lunch, we went to our favorite bar for some drinks. Dad"s friend Craig showed up, as well as my friends Ron and Hannah. We had a few beers and talked about old times, while Dad and Craig played pull tabs.

After a while, I noticed that my dad was writing checks for pull tabs. "Knock that off, Dad. Here's some money, let me know when it runs out."

Since they were playing, I decided that I would play, too. There was an "In Til You Win" game that they had just put up, and the top prize was $500. I put $5 into the game, and checked out my tabs. The first one I opened was $5, and the second was $500.

"Well, the $500 is mine, and everything else is for you, bartender. I'm going to go smoke."

So, in less than 24 hours, I won $1,750. And I spent all of it while I was on leave. It was great fun, though.

North Fort

Just before my first deployment to Iraq, we were training on North Fort Lewis.

There was a nightclub called, ironically, "North Fort". Genius.

Anyway, one night, a friend and I were there, having some drinks, and went out for a smoke. While smoking I overheard the following:

"I don't know what you're worried about girl. You don't need a man. Hell, I don't need a man. I've got my vibrator, and that's more than enough. My vibrator doesn't give me problems."

I glanced at my friend, and he said, "No, leave it alone."

"Oh, come on. I gotta mess with these people."

"Alright, but be nice about it."

I walked over to the woman in question, and said, "I'm sorry to interrupt, but I couldn't help but overhear your conversation. Did you say that you don't need a man because you have a vibrator? Is that correct?"

"That's right. What? You think you can do better than my toy?"

"Honey, I hate to burst your bubble, but a vibrator can't hold a candle to any man in this place."

"Really? Why is that?"

"Because no vibrator can grab you by the back of the hair and say 'GET DOWN THERE! CHOKE ON THAT, YOU NASTY LITTLE BITCH!'"

She paused, thinking of some rebuttal, then realized that she had none. "You're right. I stand corrected. What are you doing later?"

Just so you know, I didn't go home with her. I had a girlfriend at the time. I just wanted to fuck with her world view.

It's all my fault

Every once in a while, you get a glimpse into the mind of the people around you, and what they think of you.

For me, this usually happened in the Army.

My last deployment, I was made a team leader. I had 2 other guys in my truck, and I was responsible for them.

Now, by this time, I'd been in the Army for 11 years, and had been a Specialist for 7 of those years. I had realized that I would not get promoted, so my career was winding down.

One day, our new squad leader (we had 7 in 9 months) asked me to meet him. He wanted to go over some of the things he expected from me and my team. He was a really good NCO, but not much of a combat leader. Which is fine. Not all people are suited to lead in combat. I don't know if I was, but I did it anyway. This man had been in the military for about 15 years, and was a Staff Sargent.

So, we talked about what he expected of the cleanliness of our rooms, counseling my troops and other issues. One thing he was adamant about was finances. He told me that he wanted a list of my guys' financial obligations, so he could keep up on them, and help out when they needed it.

Immediately after he told me that, I told him no. Just that. NO. I will not ask my team to provide you with a list of their finances. That is an unlawful order.

This surprised him. He wasn't used to a troop like me that knew the rules, and didn't blindly follow orders, or rail against them just because he liked to stir up shit.

I explained to him that at no point may he require that someone under his command give him access to their finances. I said that I understood the point of getting such information. He just wanted to help his troops. If they started getting into financial trouble, he wanted to help them out with it. It wasn't that he wanted to steal their identity or what money they had.

Now, I'm the kind of guy that will offer a solution whenever he brings up a problem. My solution was that I would relay his intention to my team, and let them know that if they needed any kind of financial help, he was available.

He paused for a moment, and then told me, "You know what, Grissom? I think you'll make an excellent NCO someday."

"You can go ahead and shove that right up your ass, John.'"

"What do you mean? You're young. You've got plenty of time left in your career. What are you, 22? 23?"

"I'm 30, John. I was born in 1977, I've been a Specialist for 7 years, and in the Army for a total of 11. Almost all of my superiors have told me that same thing. That I'll make a good NCO some day. Well, what day? I should have been one 5 - 7 years ago, but they keep thinking that I'm a kid because of my rank, and that someone else will mentor me. Well, guess what? Nobody has. They just keep passing me off to others or promoting kids that are younger than me, and expecting me to train them. So, either get me promoted so I have a reason to think about my career, or leave me alone to do my job."

At which point, he finally understood why I am the way I am. At least, militarily. He apologized, and asked me to pass along his request, as I suggested it. The rest of the deployment, he let me run my team without interference. I think he knew that I would do whatever my job was, and more. That I would always take care of my troops, as he had always strove to do.

Mind you, this conversation took place less than 3 weeks after he took over as squad leader. His first day, he took me and my buddy (who was also my driver) aside for a little chat. He sat us down, and said, "The two of you are responsible for the downfall of morale in the entire company."

I'll say that again:

"The two of you are responsible for the downfall of morale in the ENTIRE COMPANY."

My response, at first, was, "Thank you. It's nice to be included in something."

"Well, when you two get together with your little E4 Mafia meetings, you undermine the authority of the leadership, and basically make it harder for us to accomplish our mission."

Then I went off. I mentioned our asshole commander who was putting our lives in jeopardy for the sake of his career. I mentioned our idiot First Sargent who was more concerned about the length of our socks than he was about proper maintenance on our vehicles, or the welfare of his troops. I noted the fact that we were doing a job that we were never supposed to do, without proper training, and were excelling at it. The only thing HOLDING TOGETHER the company's morale was US. People came to us with their problems, and we helped them by either explaining the situation, or bringing it to the proper channels to get it resolved.

The E4 mafia was the only reason we didn't have any suicides or major injuries, why our troops always had proper equipment, and why our missions were completed successfully. So, to say that two lower ranking soldiers who have been doing the job of a Sargent Major were making things worse... well... that just showed me that our leadership actually had no idea what was going on, and didn't care to get it right.

Then, I walked out before he could say anything that might anger me more.

That might have been a contributing factor to him letting me do my job, and staying out of my way. Of course, I helped him whenever I could. I didn't want him to fail, and in turn, for us to fail.