The traditional war story begins “No shit, there I was…” This pat phrase is inevitably followed by a tale, often tall, recounting the narrator’s exploits “down range.” The Ur anecdote goes on to say “… hip deep in hand grenade pins.” The speaker was clearly 1) in combat, 2) in trouble, and 3) managed to survive. One of my best friends, a helicopter pilot, completes the phrase “…inverted in zero visibility. How did I know I was inverted? My air medals were dangling in my face.” OK, not so much a war story, but rather a joke about war stories. There is a lot to unpack about physics, aviator egos and self deprecation in a couple short lines.
Truth is, my most hair raising stories mostly involve horses, not warfare. I’ve come a lot closer to death or dismemberment riding than I ever did in the Army. Kicked, bitten, fallen off and on. Generally horses, even well behaved ones, can kill you easy if you are inattentive or just plain unlucky. I grew up on a thoroughbred farm (Little Sunswick Farm). Racehorses are many things, but “well behaved” is almost never one of them. (Horse people have their own versions of the “no shit” story, but we’ll leave that for another time.)
Nonetheless, I did have some hair raising episodes in Army. There was the time I popped my head up in front of the SAW gunner on a live fire range. There was the 107 mm rocket which detonated next to my hooch in Afghanistan. The scariest was getting my mortar platoon off the top of a mountain in the dark at the National Training Center. Please don’s ask how (or why) I took two gun tracks, an FDC and a HMMWV to the top in the first place. Let’s just leave it at “I was an infantry lieutenant.”
These are everyday soldier stories. They are vivid memories to me, but are only really relatable to my fellow servicemembers. They are not necessarily funny, except in the mildly grim “ha ha, you effed up” manner that permeates veteran humor.
Most of my “no shit” stories involve PowerPoint. “No Shit, there I was, five slides in to a 35 slide presentation and the CODEL (congressional delegation) was getting bored.” Not exactly a threat to life and limb, but awkward, humorous and grim.
But do these stories have a point beyond getting a laugh and building rapport amongst those who were “no shit, in the shit?” They also serve as a verbal “I love me wall.” An “I love me wall” is that space, usually behind the work desk, that displays all of the plaques, awards and mementos accumulated during a life a service. Its meant to inform, impress and intimidate. It’s also very vain. And, while vanity is often considered a sin, as I’ve been told by many a mentor, “if you don’t tell your story, nobody will.”
I have both an “I love me wall” and a collection of war stories. Hopefully the stories are funny, and the wall is impressive. More importantly, are they relevant? I curate my plaques, just like my stories, because they remind me of events that I shouldn’t forget and all of those events happened in the context of 50 years of global history. So what I am going to do with this blog is pull out an artifact, tell a personal story that may or may not warrant a “no shit” and then I am going to explain why it was important to me and why, based on the events of the day, it might be of interest to you.
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