my father wanted me to become a man
my mother just wanted me to be away while they were getting their divorce
i’m still not sure why i ended up having a nervous breakdown at fourteen years old
but i think being at that military academy had its influence
all my parents said was that they had the third largest organ in the whole united states
and that they had this marching band
i thought it was all kind of neat
you get these new clothes and all these expensive toys
and cooked meals three times a day
and that organ
my father said
be a good boy
just do what they tell ya
and you’ll get to play on that organ
i never had a great physical constitution
so that would get me into trouble
cause in certain kinds of activities i couldn’t keep up
i’d talk back to the officers
that would get me into trouble
or i wouldn’t use the right reply
big trouble
or i wouldn’t say something loud enough
one hundred push-ups!
look beyond the straight part
of your hat at all times
or you’re eatin horseshit for breakfast
is that clear?
yes sir
i can’t hear you
yes sir
this is the worst company
in the whole fuckin place
yes sir
the girls over there
are better than you
yes sir
i’m not a sir
do i look like a sir to you?
i’m a sergeant
yes sergeant
lang
what did i just say?
you’re a sergeant sir
_____________
now that i think of it
the guy was only about seventeen years old
how did he immediately take on such authority with me?
you see
the abuse is written into the system
it’s not really even abuse if you happen to like
running around the quad
a hundred times backwards in the rain
if you happen to like
taking cold showers at three o’clock in the morning
if you happen to like
having some sergeant barge into the rec hall
while you’re playing the piano
and you’re totally into playing this song
and the shithead just barges right in and says
LANG
go do the hall!
if you happen to like
crying yourself to sleep
having to muffle the sounds into your pillow
_____________
i never did get to play on that organ
but i would look at it whenever i went to church
i remember one time the priest said that
jesus christ was a man
he was just a man
and that touched me
it made the world so much smaller
all these great people were just men or women
and none of them ever meant for the thing
to get so out of proportion
so i got to admit i owe a lot to that military academy
for inspiring that revelation
although i don’t think that’s what the priest
was actually trying to say at all
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