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 finicky senior rater. Whenever he needed to unload garbage (soldiers that he deemed unworthy of his command), he would simply send 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, whenever my senior rater didn’t like something I did or a decision I made, he would fire me. I really thought that it depended upon which way the wind was blowing. And it certainly didn’t help that he wasn’t getting any at home. Plus, I think he was too afraid to go downtown and visit a massage parlor or a business woman. Way too afraid. If you ain’t getting any at home and you are basically a gutless wonder, you have to get your rocks off by taking it out on your people. As a result, people like me that he didn’t like got fired a lot. Let’s face it, in the bottom of the ninth inning, when your team is down three to nothing, and bases are loaded and you have just been called for your second out, your odds don’t look very good. The situation looks pretty grim for the home team. One more out is all that it is going to take. But is that really true? What if your name happens to be Wright? Does that mean you are always right? Does that mean the other team is always wrong? Well, if I were a betting man, I would bet on the person with the right name. I would bet on Wright. Cuz Wright is always right, even in our grim hopeless ninth-inning situation. Did I panic when Colonel Gross told me that I was fired? Oh, hell no. Picture this, a guy with the name “Gross” making a grotesque face and spitting all over the place as he is screaming at the top of his lungs, says, “You’re fired!” He doesn’t even so much as issue you an umbrella to protect yourself from the spittle spewing forth from his mouth like a volcano that has just erupted. And while he is standing there foaming and frothing at the mouth, you are wondering to yourself, I wonder how long this exercise in futility will last. I really don’t have a clue. Cuz he has done this before. Will he do it again? I don’t know. But, that all depends upon whether he reinstates the right guy again. Will he? The funny thing was that the second time that my senior rater fired me, he didn’t tell me to clear out my office. In fact, he didn’t even tell me to get the hell out of his sight. In other words, he didn’t try to throw me out of my own office, probably because I was way too heavy for him to pick up and he was way out of shape. I never saw him take PT (physical training) when the rest of the 501st Support Group headquarters performed PT. I wondered if my Battalion Commander was even aware that the Group Commander was in town? My guess was probably not. Since there was a pretty big crowd of soldiers gathered outside my door and they all had thousands of questions that they wanted answers to, I decided to pretend to go to the restroom and then I bailed out the back door. I walked down to the Battalion headquarters. When I arrived, I asked to see the Battalion Commander. His first question was, why in the hell I was bothering him? I thought that was an appropriately fitting question to ask, so I said, “Oh, no reason, Sir. I just thought I would drop in to inform you that you need to appoint a new commander for the 305th Supply and Services Company.” The Battalion Commander looked at me kind of funny and replied, “What in the hell kind of shit is that? Why do I need to appoint a new commander for the 305th Supply and Services Company?” “Well, you see, Sir, Colonel Gross didn’t appreciate the fact that I was using Sergeant First Class (SFC) Goodwin as my Headquarters Platoon Sergeant, so he decided to fire my ass about five or 10 minutes ago. What? He didn’t tell you?!? What a surprise! Anyway, he came down to my office and fired my ass. At least this time he didn’t try to throw me the hell out. He did spit all over my desk and my floor. When you ask him to reinstate me, could you also ask him to send one of his lackeys down to clean my office? You know. Cuz he made such a mess of it. It doesn’t seem right that my extra duty soldiers have to do it.” “God damn, that sonofabitch. You haven’t started packing anything in your office yet? Have you?” “Oh no Sir. Since he didn’t tell me to pack my shit and get out, I decided that he was probably waffling on the firing thing, so I held off on doing anything and came down here first.” “Well, you get your ass back up there to your company and calm your soldiers down and get back to work. I’ll take care of this shit. I hate that waffling sonofabitch.” “Yes Sir. This makes twice now that he has fired me for stupid shit.” Well, I went back down to my company and waited for word from my Battalion Commander. Once again, my fate rested in his hands. I truly believed that I was going to be vindicated and that I had once again escaped an exercise in futility.
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