Originally posted on September 26, 2010, by bojo8669
Eons ago, I first became a Marine. I had learned from my Dad that you never truly quit being one.
There was a book that came out during the height of the cold war, “A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich”, by Alexander Solhenitzin (I’m guessing at the spelling, I read it 20 years ago.) It was about survival in a Soviet labor camp in Siberia. Life was rough to say the least. I can’t remember much of the details of the book, but the last sentence was “All in all, it was a good day.” Actually it was a terrible day by our reckoning, but the narrator’s group of prisoners were able on the day in question to get on the labor crew that mixed mortar for the construction project they were working on. As such, they were allowed to have a fire, since the mortar would freeze in the Siberian weather. They were therefore able to stay warm and make warm soup out of something, I forget what, to give to their ailing and weak comrades. Their whole life was lived at a much lower common denominator than ours.
It’s good to have some experience at living at a simpler level, whether you intend to, like the Amish, or you are forced to by either economic or some other necessity.
When I was in the military as a late teenager, and on operations in “the bush” as we called all of Viet Nam outside the wire of the base camps and fire-bases, we got “C-Rations.” They came in cases of, if I remember correctly, 12 boxes of individual meals. They were all different, but one meal, in particular, I will never forget. “Ham and Lima Beans” was its name. Mention this to any Veteran of those times and he will immediately grimace and say, “Oh, you mean Ham and Mother F***ers”, because that is how they were universally known. The entree was absolutely horrid, chunks of fat gristly ham bathed in congealed grease that stayed in a chunk even in tropical heat and huge starchy and tough lima beans. To draw this ration was the epitome of bad luck, but there was a redeeming fact. Also in the meal was a dessert called “pecan nut roll” and it was delicious. You could trade it for something more edible or just enjoy it with canned peaches. So you could have a bad day by getting issued Ham and Mothers, but some redemption was yours due to the nut roll. If one was available, I gave my Ham & MF’s to a Vietnamese kid. This might explain why the Vietnamese wanted us to go home.
In the years since, I have, as all of us do in practice and in life, get issued Ham and Mother F***ers. It is no doubt by any one’s standards a bad day. Self pity is my fate, until I rustle around and find the pecan roll, and remember there’s only one ham and mother meal in the whole case, so tomorrow I might get that Epicurean delight, “Beef, with Spiced Sauce”
Terrible days are to be lived through and learned from, and they should teach you to hope tomorrow will be better. Tomorrow is always better, whether you are a young Marine or a vet student or a veterinarian , or anyone else. OORAH
SEMPER FI
Originally posted on September 26, 2010, by bojo86... (