I t was a Sunday morning on Parris Island, and we normally got an extra hour before reveille meaning 0600 instead of 0500.. This particular morning my body did not want to function, I could hear everything that was going on but the eyes would not open and and the body would not move. The Duty Drill Instructor is hollering for me to get out of the rack , but happen to be calling the wrong recruit’s name a private Shipley.. I don’t know why but the body just would not respond. The next thing the Drill Instructor does is walk up behind the rack and picks it up to chest level then drops it. The mind was screaming to move, still I couldn’t get the body functioning.
The Drill Instructor leans down and in not much more than a whisper says “well any day you want to join us sweetheart”, the tone in that whisper sent a chill down my spine that ignited every muscle in my body, I will swear to this day that I levitated clear of the mattress and landed on the line in front of my bunk at attention. The fear now was what the DI was going to do to me next.
We were a little late, and had to get to chow. When we got back from chow the Duty DI changed, then we went to church. For the following week I kept waiting for the other boot to drop, and have to pay for that Sunday morning, I never payed directly for that incident.
I never had another morning of not being able to get up, but I was to experience that same chill down my spine again on several occasions during my military career and those situation were when my life was in danger. Am I saying my life was in danger, not really but when it was happening you would have thought so.