Transition

After returning from my vacation New Orleans I found a no-brainer job as a car hop at Steak n’ Shake, and moved into an apartment with a guy I met named Fred.  The money from slinging burgers and fries, mainly tax free tips, was fairly good and I had a little saved up so I decided to register for Junior College at the Florissant Valley Community College.  

I had to take general math because I didn’t have any advanced math other than algebra in high school.  I also signed up for radio broadcasting, and art. It didn't take too long to realize he math was hard and boring.  I also realized I didn't have the voice, witty repartee or musical acumen to be a radio DJ.  And I knew that I'd never make any money throwing clay pots or sketching nudes, though I enjoyed the latter immensely.  My concentration wasn't really on school, however, mainly because living with Fred, my new roommate, was a constant party. 

Doug Murphy was friend from high school that was also attending Flo Valley that semester.  We both decided to join a Jr. College fraternity, something that probably only existed for a short period of time before people realized how stupid it was. I think there were two fraternities at Flo Valley at the time.

So we pledged Delta Xi Kappa with about 6 other guys.  They had a frat house in an area of town near the airport that was a dump.  There must have been about 8 guys living there, mainly graduates who worked during the day, partied every night and generally acted like assholes.  But we thought it was cool and the other pledges elected me as the President of pledge class.  The “brothers” abused the shit out of us. We were just pledges after all. 

One night three of us were kidnapped by our soon to be brothers, and thrown into the trunk of a car, then driven from North to South County.  When the car stopped they stripped us down to our underwear in about 40 degree weather and left us on the side of the road in a rural area.  A cop noticed three almost naked guys walking down the road and stopped.  After an embarrassing explanation he picked us up and gave us a ride back to the north side.  

To get back at our new found brothers we then kidnapped the President of the fraternity soon thereafter.  Boy was he pissed!  It took 6 of us to drag him out of a 7 Eleven and tie him up as the store manager called the cops.  Luckily we convinced the manager that it was a fraternity prank and then got out of there quickly before the police arrived.  We treated him to the same fun that we had been through, though we left him with shoes on a dirt road out in the country.  Payback was a bitch, however.

Hell night, the week before we were to be inducted into this auspicious group, was just stupid.  The brothers just got drunk and started wailing on us with paddles.  They made us chew tobacco, made us eat all kinds of sick shit, stripped us down and made us do stupid stuff.  When it was over and they accepted us into their club I convinced all of the others to quit with me.  We all thought "Fuck those assholes".  The fraternity disbanded two years later when they didn’t have any new members.  

The job at Steak n' Shake was going nowhere even though the store manager asked me to go into management.  College was no challenge and I was just floundering around, partying too much: just marking time.  

Toward the end of the semester at Junior College I joined the Army again; this time to be Airborne Military Police. I thought jumping out of airplanes would be a kick.  I thought being a cop would be a great career.  That was how it was sold to me by the recruiter.  

The night before I left for Basic Training we were having a going away party at our apartment.  That day, knowing that the Army was planning a haircut for me, I shaved my head all the way down to the skin. I had been dating a girl for only a short time and remember her arriving for the party and she didn’t recognize me when I opened the door. I thought I might get lucky; going away to fight the war, and all.  But it was not to be.  Women preferred men with long hair back then not skinheads.  I left for boot camp at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri the following morning on January 3rd, 1972.