33. My Greatest Move

Deweerdo Podcast

Look, we all have our hang-ups. I could go on and on about mine. But I choose not to. In my search for peace and happiness, I have stumbled upon many patterns that you could easily duplicate in order to find what is pure and good.

My childhood was complicated—to say the least. Luckily for you, I hate talking, writing or even thinking about that shit. You’re welcome.

What I will say is that I had to think on my own and find sources of inspiration that kept me going over the years. One thing leads to another, and wham! I’m writing it down to share with the world.

I like to think that my life really began when I joined the Army, in the fall of 2007. I owned nothing but a backpack and whatever its contents were at the time—damn sure wasn’t filled with Rolex watches and diamonds.

I left Dallas, Texas on a greyhound bus headed to the airport. We were told that there was one rule, “no alcohol” and we broke that rule inside of a half hour. All of us had different destinations to begin Basic Training but there was one other guy who was flying to South Carolina with me. We were headed to Fort Jackson, or “Relaxin’ Jackson” as it was unofficially known.

I remember getting ‘smoked’, or forced to do a lot of push-ups, on day one for not knowing the Army song. I didn’t even know the Army had a damn song. Luckily, he didn’t ask, “Does the Army have a song?”, because I likely would’ve said, “negative Drill Sergeant!”. More push-ups for me.

Once you get the rhythm of Basic, time just flies by. Before you know it, you’ve graduated. One of the funniest things that I remember from the early days of my service, is that the rumor mill is real. And it sucks. I stayed nervous for my entire first year in the Army. Yet, every time, the rumor turned out to be false (or misleading) and away the stress goes until the next round of juicy military gossip.

This became the same song and dance for a decade, moving across country and intercontinentally, that I had faith that if I just worked at it, I would eventually figure it out. Now this is not to say that I am a savant or even good at all the things that come with a military move—new house, new city, new rules, new bosses. It simply means that if I can make abrupt life changes, and handle it well, then so can you.

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