Reinstated – An Ode to Military Humor

When I served as the Commander of the 305th Supply and Services Company in the 227th Maintenance Battalion At Yongsan, Seoul, Korea, the company passed several major tests and milestones.  And the company picked up new missions without skipping a beat.  The company had climbed up out of a huge morale hole.  But it seemed that none of that mattered to my waffling senior rater.  He did, however, love to unload garbage (soldiers that he deemed unworthy of his command) by simply sending them to the dump ground.  In this case, the dump ground happened to be my company.  However, whenever he dumped those unwanted castoffs off on me, he dumped them with strings attached.  I couldn’t use them as I saw fit.  I couldn’t put them in positions of leadership or authority commensurate with their rank and experience.  Additionally, my senior rater had a certain affinity for taking exception to actions I took or decisions I made.  And whenever he took exception to my actions or my decisions, he would fire me.  It really depended upon which way the wind was blowing or what day of the week it happened to be.  Plus, I think it had a lot to do with how often his wife made his ass sleep on the couch.  I’m guessing that he slept on the couch pretty frequently.  And let me tell you something.  In Korea, if you are command sponsored, and you live in base housing, all of your furniture is provided by the furnishings branch of the base housing.  That means you get what they give you.  Now, they might give you brand-new shit.  But let me tell you something else.  That shit is still shit.  And that is some goddamn uncomfortable ass shit.  You might as well be sitting on an Army cot or an old steel Army office chair.  Those old steel Army office chairs are rigid and stiff as hell.  Those sons of bitches weigh a goddamn ton and they don’t slide worth a shit.  No.  They ain’t on rollers.  You got to pick those sonsofbitches up to move them.  And the cushions on those things are stiff as hell.  They might as well not even have cushions.  But in all likelihood, they will survive a fire or an explosion.  And if you have to sleep on an Army cot, well, you’re going to be damn uncomfortable.  No doubt about it.  The only thing worse would be sleeping on the floor.  Well, that’s not entirely true.  Sleeping on the ground would actually be worse than sleeping on the floor.  Cuz then it would be cold as hell and uncomfortable as hell.  At least, if you were sleeping on the floor, you would just be damned uncomfortable.  So, sleeping on the sorry ass couch, while it ain’t all that great, is a helluva lot better than sleeping on the floor or sleeping on the cold ass ground, especially if it’s raining.  And you know what they say about rain.  If it ain’t raining, it ain’t training.  Even though Colonel Gross was a colonel, somewhere along the line he had to start out as a Lieutenant.  That means he knew all about Army training.  He may not have liked it, but that’s okay.  The Army don’t pay you to like shit.  They just pay you to do shit, even if it’s stupid ass shit.  If you are familiar with my recent escapades, you are well aware of the fact that my senior rater fired me for a second time for some stupid shit.  However, the second time, my senior rater fired me, I couldn’t really tell if he was firing me or not.  That was because he always seemed to be waffling.  The second time he fired me was no exception.  For example, the second time he fired me, he didn’t ask me to pack my shit and clear out my office.  I thought that was really odd.  Second, he didn’t bother to inform my Battalion Commander that he had fired me.  That also struck me as kind of strange.  Of course, Colonel Gross did exhibit rather bizarre behavior at times.  And he was known to act rather quirky.  After I informed my Battalion Commander that my senior rater had decided to fire me for a second time, I bet the odds that I wasn’t really fired, and that my Battalion Commander would get me reinstated as the commander of the 305^th Supply and Services Company.  Plus, I was banking on the fact that my name was Wright, which meant that I was always right.  But in order for me to be right, that meant that my senior rater had to be wrong.  My senior rater had to be wrong in the sense that he didn’t really mean to fire me.  I am certain of that point.  So, imagine my surprise when the phone rang and my Battalion Commander said, “Wright, I have spoken with the Group Commander.  You are going to remain in command of the 305^th Supply and Services Company.  He will be calling you shortly.”  Not two minutes after I hung up the phone, it rang again.  This time, the Commander of the 501^st Support Group was on the phone.  My senior rater said, “Hello, Wright.  I hope that you know that I think that you are a pretty good commander.  I would never fire you for something petty like putting a senior noncommissioned officer (NCO) into a leadership position.  I just hope that you understand the gravity of the situation with Sergeant First Class (SFC) Goodwin.”  I replied, “Yes Sir.  I understand Sir.  And I understand your concern about SFC Goodwin.  However, I have him marching the straight and narrow.  And my first Sergeant and I continuously monitor his actions and performance.  I assure you that we are well aware of the situation.  But I do know what I’m doing.”  “I appreciate that, Wright.  As I said before, you are a pretty good commander.  You are doing good things with that company.  Keep up the good work.”  “Thank you Sir.  Does that mean I am no longer fired?”  “God dammit Wright.  I thought I made that pretty clear.”  “Well, I just wanted to make sure.  You know the old saying, better safe than sorry.”  “You know, you’re a pretty good commander, but you’re so full of shit.  Get back to work.”  “Yes Sir.”  Just like that I had been reinstated.  I had once again escaped from an exercise in futility.

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