When I closed the last property book for the 508th Maintenance Detachment at Fort Lewis, Washington, and folded the guide-on, there was no fanfare, there was no marching band, and there was no parade. In fact, nobody showed up at all. The inactivation of my unit appeared to be a ho-hum event that drew a whopping -3 on the Nielsen rating scales. The only problem was that we weren’t being rated by the Nielsen rating scales. Those scales are used to rate the popularity of television shows. But you get the idea. It seemed as if nobody gave a shit, or two shits for that matter, whether we were alive or dead. It’s always nice to feel the love. My first Sergeant asked me, “Sir, is somebody supposed to show up and formally stand us down?” I looked at him and replied, “First Sergeant, that is an excellent question. Why don’t we go over to the deputy group commander’s office and give him our guide-on?” “I thought you were going to keep the guide-on, Sir?” “I’m way ahead of you, First Sergeant. I already had the supply Sergeant order me a brand-new one that I got at the house. Why should I keep the old raggedy one?” “Good point, Sir.” So, we went over to the group headquarters and stood outside the deputy group commander’s office being general nuisances until the deputy commander finally acknowledged our existence. It was quite apparent that he did not want to see us. In fact, his level of concern with seeing us could be measured in nano-give-a-shit’s. Let me put that into perspective for you. A nano-give-a-shit is so damn small that it is smaller than a pimple on a gnat’s ass. Raise your hands if you know what a gnat is. Excellent. Excellent. That’s what I thought. Pretty much all of you know what those little gnats are. A whole damn swarm of those pesky little gnats is as big as a bumblebee. If you run with your mouth open on a hot day, you can swallow a whole damn horde of those little bastards. Now I’m not suggesting that you go out and run with your mouth open on a hot day just so that you can eat a bunch of those damn gnats. But as sure as I’m sitting here, someone reading this is going to try it. Watch. Anyway, the deputy group commander finally snarled, “What do you two want?” Taking that as an invitation to come in, we walked in like we owned the joint and said in unison, “Hey, Sir, how’s it going?” When he didn’t speak, I started in again, “Sir, nobody showed up for the inactivation. I have here two things that I must give you. The first is the unit guide-on. The second is the final property book for the 508th Maintenance Detachment. It has been closed and audited by I Corps in accordance with property book audit procedure. Since you are the next ranking officer in my chain of command, I am surrendering these final two pieces of unit property to you.” “Well, Captain, I’ll take the property book. As for that red rag your First Sergeant is holding there, you can plant that where the sun don’t shine.” “Can I quote you on that, Sir?” “Get the hell out of my office.” So, we left. My first sergeant looked at me and asked, “What in the hell was that bullshit that he said about the guide-on?” I replied, “Oh, that. Basically, the shithead said that you should use that as toilet paper. I guess he has no concept of standing down the guide-on when you stand down the unit. So, basically, that means you can keep that one.” I looked at my watch and said, “I think it’s Miller time. What you think?” “I agree, Sir. But I have one question. Where are we going to get beer at this hour?” “Seems to me that the Class VI store will be open, and they have cold beer.” My First Sergeant and I were the last two official soldiers assigned to the 508th Maintenance Detachment when it was inactivated. My First Sergeant was subsequently assigned to the Advanced Noncommissioned Officers Academy (NCOA) enroute to Germany. I was subsequently assigned to degree completion at Southern Illinois University- Carbondale extension with duty at Pacific Lutheran University ROTC (Reserve Officer Training Corps) detachment, Tacoma, Washington. I worked as a college recruiting officer for the ROTC program at Pacific Lutheran University while I was finishing my college degree. My first Sergeant could not get over the fact that the deputy group commander had desecrated our unit guide-on by calling it a red rag. He was really upset that a Lieutenant Colonel had told him to plant our unit colors where the sun didn’t shine. For my First Sergeant, our visit with the deputy group commander would forever be remembered as an exercise in futility.
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