Warrior's Wisdom Presents: Guest Writers and the Untold Stories of the Military**
We're excited to launch a new series that explores untold stories about the military. This series will bring fresh perspectives from veterans and service members, shedding light on lesser-known tales of courage and sacrifice. Expect riveting accounts of unsung heroes and pivotal moments that didn't make the headlines. Through this enlightening series, you will discover the profound impact of these hidden stories and gain a deeper appreciation of military life.
"Bruce Barton, a Republican politician, said, "Sometimes when I consider what tremendous consequences come from little things, I'm tempted to think there are no little things." Now, Mr. Barton would know something about consequences after the trouble he got himself into, but we would all be wise to remember that there is a thing called consequences. And something that may seem small could have larger consequences down the road."
"In the late 80s, I joined the army, went to basic training, and arrived at my first AIT. The school was 50 weeks long. Sometime after arriving, I was given my room assignment. I ended up sharing a room with a very nice young woman who I will call Misty. A lot happened during this first week of sharing a room with her. The first thing that happened was she found herself a boyfriend right off the bat. I came into my room only a few days after sharing this space with her to meet her new boyfriend, who I will call Ottoman. This young man had legally changed his name to this word moniker. I asked him why he changed his name to this, and he said he found it in a dictionary and thought it was cool; I'm not really sure that he knew what it was. He proceeded to tell me some stories about his time in the military and running guns in Nicaragua, as well as many other adventures. He seemed a little young to have done all these things, but being young myself, I just ignored his tales of fancy; a couple of days later, I came into the room, in misty and Ottoman was in the throes of passion. I leave the room, and as I walk down the hallway, I'm amazed that she's doing these things after only a few days of knowing this man."
"Not too long later, I came into my room again, and Ottoman was in my locker. He is moaning and wailing and yelling 'Nam,' 'Nam'! I was thoroughly confused and scared because I knew he was old enough to have been in Vietnam. Why was he in my locker? Misty was trying to calm him down, and up to that point in my life, it was the most confusing thing I've ever seen."
"Sometime later, I vaguely remember them getting married. Once again, this was way too soon after getting to our school. Once they got married, they were able to get an apartment, and so she moved out of my room. There was one thing that stuck with me about this situation that she had gotten herself into. We had come from the same town, and I knew her brother from high school. I overheard a conversation that he and another kid were having, and whatever they were discussing, I began to be afraid of him. Had Misty grown up in a severely dysfunctional home? Had there been some sort of mental abuse going on in her family? I don't know, but I tried to make sense of why she was making these incredibly strange decisions and to be honest, I wasn't making any fabulous decisions myself. But Misty got herself into way more trouble than I could ever imagine."
"Misty and Ottoman invited my boyfriend and me over to their apartment for dinner. We weren't there very long before Ottoman took Misty behind a curtain that separated their dining room from their living room and began an argument with her that ended in him slapping her across the face. My boyfriend and I were so upset that we didn't even think about stopping the situation; we just got up and left. The guy got mad at me and blamed me for taking him over there."
"The situation was obviously bad between them. Looking back on the situation over 30 years later, it didn't help that the people around them who knew what was going on weren't mature enough to do more about it. None of us seemed to know anything about domestic violence or mental illness. Most of us were only 18 years old and fresh out of our parent's house and on our own."
"Ottoman must have felt bad about what he had done in front of us because he came to me and asked if I would take Misty on a road trip. He wanted me to drive because he knew I could drive a manual transmission. So he gave me some money and his car and told me to go have a good time with his wife. We spent the weekend in a beautiful city and had a great time."
"After we got back from this trip, I didn't hear any more about their personal issues. There was an occasion when the Ottoman asked me for some money, and I gave it to him. Sometime after that, he showed me that he had bought a gun. My stupid 18-year-old brain didn't have enough brain cells to process what I was seeing. This was a time before school shootings. I'm not sure if going postal was a thing yet. I don't think the phrase, if you see something, says something had even been invented, but neither I nor any of our friends say anything about the gun. To be honest, there wasn't a lot of thinking going on in our unit. Most of us were drinking and partying. My platoon Sergeant had gotten beaten up on a date and showed up formation with a black eye. One of the nearby barracks was off-limits because almost everybody there had gotten an STD. When I say out of control, I mean it; there was so much chaos going on around us that the craziest guy that we all knew showing up with a gun didn't even register with any of us."
"I kind of lost track after the road trip, but the next time I see Misty, she has a boyfriend. Then, the next time I heard about Misty, she and her boyfriend had gone AWOL. May I pause here and say that, looking back on my childhood, my dad warned me about drinking. He said my family seemed to have a problem, not being able to handle it well, and I should probably avoid it. I did not think that was a big deal at the time since I was not drinking and didn't take him very seriously, like a very small, insignificant thing. But like alcohol and many other issues, the small, insignificant things turned out to be issues of great consequence consequences. I had no idea what I was seeing going on around me. I had no idea that what I personally was involved in was going to be so devastating later on. I should've taken a hint that one of the first people I met when I got to this unit was up on charges of attempted murder. A wireless trial was going on. He was confined to the barracks. I met him in the day room, and he was watching TV. He seemed harmless, and he didn't seem like a big deal, but I know it was."
"Sometime later, Misty and her boyfriend showed back up, and UCMJ action was taken. I didn't really see Ottoman anymore and things with Misty had calm down."
"One morning, we got into the o formation, and the whole company was there. The first Sgt is telling us about the plans for the upcoming week. When, all of a sudden, I saw a motion out of the corner of my left eye. I turned around to look, and I see Ottoman dressed all in black carrying that gun he bought; it seemed like, at the same time, everybody was distracted by the movement and turned around to look at the same time uyy7 qh I did. It took me a moment to realize that it was Ottoman and he had a gun and what was happening. All of a sudden, people started screaming and running, and all my panic brain could do was scream Ottoman, no Ottoman, no! He had run over to the back of the formation, and in the back, we had one special forces soldier and one Delta Force soldier. They wrestled him and got the gun away from him. Everything was just a blur. I don't remember anything that happened that day."
"There was a trial, and Ottoman was charged with attempted murder for everybody in that formation that day. I was called to testify in the trial. At this point, I can't remember what happened to him, but I never saw him again, or Misty for that matter."
"Now, these events happened over 30 years ago, and my memory is not perfectly accurate as to the details. But what's most important as I look back is a few things. There are consequences to all of our actions. At the same time, Misty and Ottoman were going through incredible difficulties, and I was setting up terrible consequences for myself in other ways. I'm sure they were probably people that we could've talked to about the situations and could've gotten help for everyone involved, but honestly, none of us thought we were young, freshly out of the house, and took nothing seriously. I know the army has things in place now to deal with all of this, so use these resources. Some have said that some of these resources aren't very effective, but they're better than nothing. The final thing I learned from all this is this: find someone to talk to. Go talk to the chaplain I trusted NCO or a friend that you think has some sense. It's not to get anybody in trouble but to help if something is going wrong."
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