Swim Test

 C077/K051 Feb 21 - Apr 25, 1990

So, you join the Navy. Guess what, you have to know how to swim. That day has come for us to prove we can all swim. The pool in Orlando was outside. We did our swim test in probably early March, so it was a little chilly. We march over to the pool, followed by our Sister Company.

The guys all had Navy issued suits. The girls could bring a “modest” one-piece suit.

We all get changed and head outside to sit in the cold cool air. If I recall, it was a cold day, not a cool day too.

We sit there and are given the rundown of what is going to happen by the instructor. He asks if anyone cannot swim or is bad at it. A few guys and girls raise their hands. Now, as expected, the language is rather rough from the instructors.

“Then, if you can’t swim, get the F over at the shallow end of the pool now!”

He looks around and sees this one kid who is a bean pole. “What the F, you can swim?”

"Yes, sir, I can.”

“BS, you’re gonna sink like a rock, get over to the shallow end.”

“No, sir, I can swim.”

“You Fing better be able to damnit.”

“OK, my instructors in the pool are here to help. If you have a problem, they will get you out. If they touch you stop moving, they will get you.”

We all yell back, “Yes, Sir!”

We had to jump in the pool from a 10-foot platform, tread water, and then swim the length of the pool without touching the bottom.

Groups go jump in and complete the requirements.

That really skinny kid gets up on the platform and, at first, won’t jump, but finally does. Then he starts to flail around because he cannot float.

The instructor in the pool swims to him, “I got ya, son.”

The kid won’t stop, so under the water, he goes. That happens three times. On the third time, we all think the kid drowned. They drag him to the side, and he climbs out. The head instructor comes over and starts to chew that kid a new one. “What the F. You said you can swim. You caused a total shit storm. Get the F to the shallow end now, asshole.”

I get up and take my turn in the pool. Jump in, no issue. Tread water, piece of cake. I start my swim. Things are going good until I hit the shallow end. This one instructor comes over to me and starts yelling.

“Hey, tall man don’t touch the bottom.”

“I’m watching ya, tall guy. Don’t f’ing mess up now.”

“I can see you're gonna touch the bottom.”

He keeps riding me the whole shallow end. I get to the wall and touch with both hands.
“I knew you could do it, good job!”

We also had to put on a pair of oversized pants and float using those. Jump in the pool, take them off, and use them as a float. Trust me, it does work. But, I knew that since doing the same thing was part of the Boy Scouts Swimming merit badge. 

The other benefit we got to sit in closer proximity with the girls than we had previously. A couple of us even got up the nerve to say "Hi." Since the swim test was pretty early on in training we were still a little "scared" to break the rule of not talking to the girls. 
It was a fun day, well part of the day. I am sure we had a class after that. One qualification down, many more to go.
 

The Arrival

                    

                                             

Fed 21-22, 1990 the future C077 and K051

Feb 21-Apr 25, 1990

I seriously could not figure out why we sat at O'hare for so long. I and one other recruit, Paul, were heading to Orlando to start out Naval careers. We arrived early in the afternoon, but our flight was not until closer to 9:00 pm, maybe later.

After our flight, we arrived in Orlando. We had let a cold Northern Illinois for a warm, humid Florida.

Several other recruits were wandering around the airport with us, but we found the bus and after a short ride we were at the base.

I do not recall having CC's yelling at us to get off the bus. Inside the processing center, I remember standing in two rows on "the line." It was probably around 11 or 11:30pm. We had been up since 5:00am.

I do remember one of the Chaplins asking us all if we were doing well. I am sure there was some yelling, it seems out of character for the military for no yelling.

After a while, we all went into one large room, guys on one side, girls on the other. We had our bags gone through for contraband. We had a female workweek checking our bags. Oddly she winked at me when she checked mine. I never saw her again after that either, just odd that stuck in my head.

We got all the instructions and were told what to do. Take a shower. Put on the supplied "bathing suit, and shave. No facial hair in the morning. I had a mustache at the time.

Oh, yeah, we had to take a piss test. They also had us put a strip in our mouths to check for alcohol. I had 2 beers in O'Hare while waiting.

I remember one guy, in particular, he had hair down to his waist. I spoke to him a good deal on the first night. By the time we finally hit our racks that night, it was probably after 2:00 am.

Around 5:00 am, the classic trash can alarm clock hit. This was when the first yelling happened. Our new CC's introduced themselves to us. First, we had Chief Petty Officer MMCMark Engley, who I recently reconnected with. The other was FC1 Adams. That confused the hell out of me at first, I was like, how did that happen already I’ve only been here a few hours. Back into our civilian clothes so we could start the very long day ahead of us. We had close to 90 guys in our company. There were maybe half a dozen who had been there for a day already.

We matched over to the Galley. People kept stepping on one another, and we were all so out of place.

The first time at the Galley was a shock. The workweeks loved yelling at us as we left that morning. I also had my first exposure to fried bologna, not good. Eat was a problem because we were so darn tired. We had ten minutes to “enjoy this fine Navy Chow.” Oh, and no talking.

Going through the line I was really hungry so I got pretty much everything. This is when I learned about fried bologna. I thought it was ham, nope. There was a little shock when I had the first bite. But, I adapted and it became one of my favorite breakfast foods. That and fried spam.  

When I was leaving the galley I had a workweek yell at me for stepping on the bright wark. I remember thinking, "What the hell is brightwork?" I have no clue if I did, but I went back and wiped the footprint off the threshold. It was the first thing that stuck in my head, Do not touch the glass on the door and do not step on the threshold. Strange, I still don't do those things. 

Hair cuts were next. I was already pretty thin up top. The guy with the long hair sat next to me. The barber actually laughed, cutting his hair.

The clothing issue was oh just so much fun. HA! It started out as a cool day but quickly turned into a rather humid one. We stood there in our Navy-supplied bathing suits and began to turn from a civilian rabble into a uniform-looking lot. I will not use the term sailor, because we were far from that. We were all blad, tired, and all had on stinky blue clothing. 

Getting those stencils in the right place was a real bear at times. The underwear was the worst because of the stretchy fabric. Slowly, we got all of our clothing marked and stuff into a sea bag. Our civilian clothes were jammed into a box and mailed home. Some members of the company had to throw away some things, they would not fit in the box we were given. 

In the meantime, we went to the galley for lunch in RIF formation, 5 wide and with that old style cadence. It was a tab bit embarrassing those next few times going to the galley like that. We were new and everyone let us remember it. I recall when we started matching in watch sections we messed up a couple times. Our Chief put us back into RIF formation for the rest of the day. The next day we tried watch sections again. I think the embarrassment of RIF stuck in our heads after that. 

I can say this about my first day of boot camp. I went in all big and bad like I am going to kick ass and take names. Yeah, it knocked that right out of my head. It was obvious from the beginning, teamwork got us through. By the end of the day, the guy behind me marching quit kicking me.

Day one of the future Company C077.