Another Smoke

"Hey, man, how you doin'?"

I attempt to whisper as softly as possible, unwilling to break the spell of fearful introspection which has enveloped the plane's gloomy occupants. Bill Bleeker, the friend who joined me in a drunken enlistment spree, sits across the aisle, three rows up. He turns and squints the two bloodshot slits above his nose.

"Forget it, man," he replies. " We'll be there soon, and you look like shit. Get some sleep."

Yeah. Feel like shit too. Shit. That's the organic matter I most closely identify with at the moment. An unwanted substance about to be recycled, that's me. All of us. Flotsam, the stuff we have become over the last few weeks of combat training. Join the Army. See the world. Be human, get trained to become shit.

Close your eyes, Private. This is getting you nowhere. I drift away, vague images of Carol the Screamer filling the void. There is often no sense of self when we dream, but when Carol is there, wailing in ecstasy, clawing the skin away in furrows along my back, there is a most definite subject/object reality about the vision. Jolting awake, banging my head on the seat in front of me, I thank Carol for providing stimulation strong enough to reach out beyond its originating space and time. Any kind of company, even the phantom of past pleasures, is welcome at 38,000 feet above a blackened expanse of endless ocean. Where is the real Carol at this moment? I wonder. No matter. I have the Carol I need, now and forever safely tucked into the dark corners of my libido, ready to come alive at the firing of a few neurons. Jesus, maybe I really am crazy. Well, fuck it. What are they gonna do, send me to 'Nam?

There is suddenly a stomach wrenching blast of turbulence, like hitting a pot hole in the sky. The seat belt sign goes on, an insistent beep also announcing that it's time to cinch one's anatomy firmly into the saddle. After all, who wants to die on the way to such a fascinating tour? Miss all the fun? Not on your life! Join the Army. See the world. Murder people from a backwards culture. There you go again, head. Shut up, listen up; el captain has got some important intelligence.

"Yeah, you boys need to fasten yer seat belts; we're hittin' a little bad air on our approach to Ton Son Nhut. Good news is, though, shouldn't delay us much; we'll still be on the ground in about 25 minutes."

I don't want to hear the bad news, if there is any. There is.

"We got reports of enemy activity in the vicinity of the landing field tonight, gentlemen, so this is gonna be an interesting introduction for ya to lovely Southeast Asia. Hang in there, guys; I've done these night landings before under fire. It'll be fine. Light up, if you got 'em."

Under fire? I hold my breath, waiting for him to whistle a chorus or two from "Twelve O'clock High", but there is only the sound of the jet engines again, eating oxygen in their mindless effort to propel us into the vacuum of a tropical night. Although meant to encourage the legal type of smoky inhalation, I take the captain at his word and, bumpy ride or not, unbuckle my seat belt and wobble back towards the head. Bill, with whom I enlisted three months ago after watching too many Audey Murphy movies, had suggested the perfect addict's strategy for handling the endless hours of boredom and fear that lay ahead. Both of us secreted a small bag of marijuana on board. He now turns and offers a wry smile of conspiratorial camaraderie as I head to the back of the aircraft.

Once locked in its tiny confines, I fumble with the cigarette papers, fish the pouch of illicit plant life from inside my shirt, and begin to carefully spread it evenly over the inner surface of the single exposed smoking paper. Another thermal and, as the plane drops a few feet, the pot on its way down to the paper stays where it was, momentarily suspended in mid-air, until it falls and scatters along the floor.

Goddamn it, captain, keep this thing bee-lined 'till I lick this baby shut. Don't want to waste any, even though I've heard some of the best boo in the world is cultivated in the jungles of Nam and Cambodia.

The plane settles down a bit, I slurp the paper's thin sheen of glue, roll it into a cylinder, close and secure the bag of weed, and light up. After taking the first shallow hit or two, designed to get the joint going, I commence the serious business of atmospheric ingestion. Sucking in two lungs full, I hold it, hold it, hold it. Cough, sputter, sputter, as the lung's alveolus try to reject the latest coating of toxic tars. Immediately, I feel the unmistakable alterations, as cannabis sativa begins to circulate from lungs to brain, transforming the plexus taking place between countless nerves throughout my perceptual system. Eyes closed, drifting, drifting away, as light as the cloud of smoke now hanging in the cubicle's air.

Bang! Bang! The pounding on the door's exterior causes the THC to be supplemented by an enormous spurt of adrenaline.

"Soldier, what the hell you doin' in there? Yer supposed to be in yer seat!"

It's the ape-man, Sergeant Major Bobby Lee Baker, escapee from 18th century Alabama, a throwback no matter what the method of measurement.

"Yeah, uh, have'n a little trouble with my stomach, Sarge; be out in justa minute."

This is closer to the truth that I would like. The combination of erratic motion, drug, and fear has spawned spasms of nausea. I fight back my gorge, and take another long drag on the tube of THC. Ahh, that's better. Dousing the lighted end, I carefully store the roach in the open pack of straights in my fatigue shirt pocket. After all, who knows how long it'll take to find a new supply in-country? As I stand, drug drenched blood seeps from my fetid brain, and I nearly loose consciousness. Steadying myself with both hands, I look in the mirror. After the tiny snakes of light cease their writhing, I focus on the image staring back at me. How is it possible to look this worn out at age 19? What will I look like in another year? If I'm still breathing, that is. Fuck it, there goes the head again. Shut up, head again. Thinking leads only to more fear, and I'm already treading in a sea of dread; no need to channel into another tributary.

Straighten up the fatigues, wet down the hair, and hope that peckerwood Baker is already back in his seat. Otherwise, he's in for a free high when I open the door and he gets a face full of smoke, undoubtedly the first induced exhilaration of his life not associated with berating others or swilling corn squeezings. I inch the door open and peek around its edge. Good. The leather-hearted bastard has returned to the front of the plane, probably as frightened as the rest of us by the jarring ride.

Staggering along the aisle, I try to balance myself with handholds along the tops of the seats. Another unevenly heated pocket of upper atmosphere causes the aircraft to lurch up and to the right, and I loose my balance. Reaching for a piece of plane, I instead end up with a handful of sweating skull.

"Hey, watch it, asshole".

The voice belongs to the skull, and I pull back my paw as if it's touched a bed of burning coals.

"Sorry, man".

"Fuck you!"

"Fuck you, too!"

Confrontation completed with the usual verbal debasements, I drag myself forward, finally reaching my seat. Stanley McGill from Sweetwater, Rhode Island, who has been coma-like the entire trip, except when I waken him up to let me in and out of my window seat, stirs as I tap his shoulder.

"Lemme in, Stan."

"Goddamn it,, how many times you gonna wake me up? You got a bladder problem or somethin'? Piss in a cup next time, will ya?"

"Just let me by and do us all a favor and pass out again, will you McG?"

The closer we get to hell, the more strident the communications, if such exchanges can correctly be considered real interaction. More like the energy passed between two hundred shaven cats in a bag, about to be dropped into the river.

Peering out the window provides the same black canvass for the imagination that has been there for many hours. As I stare, I see bodies with protruding bones, pools of blood, swarms of flies, villages on fire. Please head, please. Stop. I don't want to go through this before I have to go through this. Eyelids heavy, I drift, then drop into the nothingness, where there is no war, no you, no me...

"...and no smoking, as we make our final approach to beautiful, tropical Ton Son Nhut airbase, gentlemen. We're on our final approach."

Groggily, I recognize the captain's voice. Oh God, this is it. No time left, not even enough to make another perception shifting trip to the bathroom. Gripping both armrests, I unconsciously sink my fingers, claw-like, deep into the fabric. McGill's face is pale, almost luminous. Angelic in its other worldliness, I think, except for the tiny telltale dots of perspiration forming on his upper lip. This is the human face of terror, not likely to be much different than what I'll see again and again over the next twelve months. Our eyes meet. We are looking into a mirror, my face a simulacrum of his. My death grip loosens long enough for me to self-consciously wipe away the beads of sweat under my nose.

"Gentlemen, it shouldn't be too hard to locate the airstrip. Those of you on the right side of the aircraft will notice the flashes of light."

Lucky me, to have been assigned a window seat on the plane's right side. Indeed, I see the bursts of explosive light, as the Chinese made Rocket Propelled Grenades impact the ground. Their randomness, intermingled with the symmetry of the air field's landing lights, create an abstract pattern that gives me something to observe besides the mounting feelings of heart-pounding, gut-wrenching alarm that's welling into my throat.

"Okay, boys, hang on. I'm gonna bring us in on a combat landing maneuver. Keeps us from being too handy a target. Just relax."

He's got to be kidding. No, he's insane. Yes, that's it; we're all insane, madmen, landing in a giant asylum of death. Fuck you, head, fuck you. Oh Jesus, I feel sick again. Please head, do something constructive for a change, and don't let me vomit until we land.

The explosions on the ground are now accompanied by air bursts. Even looking at the field lights, it's difficult to gauge where the sky stops and the earth begins. Without warning, the giant jet arches its tail, and we are headed straight down, nose first. Sweet Mary Mother of God, a combat landing. Memory kicks in. We were told about these. Instead of a steady descent, the aircraft positions itself almost directly above the field, drops nose first, pulling up at the last possible moment for a landing. A maneuver that sounds, looks, and feels aerodynamically improbable. What else to expect from a mad man, piloting an airborne loony bin of other mad men?

The flashes of combustive light are on a vertical axis. A warmth and calmness seeps through my body. These are the final moments of my life; I have crossed the threshold, from an unbearable, vibrant and life-confirming fear, to the irresistible serenity and surrender of the embrace of death.

As violently as it nosed down, the aircraft rights itself, and we feel the wheels impact the macadam. Explosions can be heard and felt, as well as seen, all around the plane. The engines reverse throttle; I cannot comprehend how we are not being hit by the countless explosions, no more than a second or two apart. The plane is taxiing off the main runway. Again, the incongruity, the contrast of the bellicose with the benign, further loosens our grip on reality. How can we be slowly taxiing, as if about to disembark at some familiar state-side airport terminal, while all around us, the world is being shattered by pieces of hot metal meant to tear us apart? We brake to a stop. Leather-heart is on his feet, bellowing.

"All right, ladies. We're under fire, in case you hadn't noticed. Grab yer gear and get ready to de-part this aircraft, in an orderly, single line!"

Doors burst open at the front and rear of the plane. I'm on my feet, still choking back the nausea. Like a link in an inanimate chain, I am propelled toward the door by the motion of the men on both sides of me along the aisle. At the door, every sense organ comes under assault. Humid, putrid air envelopes the skin; the stench of composting jungle and spent mortars crawl up the nostrils; the concussions of in-coming rounds mix with the Sergeant's urgent commands reverberating in the ears, as flashes of light sear the eyes.

Somewhere in the rice paddies, no more than a few hundred yards away, the thoughts of the Viet Cong who have arranged this reception, emanate through the ether. "Welcome to Southeast Asia, you dumb, ugly bastards! ", the thought forms seem to say. "We have one full year to kill you, and we're sure going to give it the old college try!" Or clichés equivalent to that idea in Vietnamese.

Buses appear from the darkness like black whales with wheels. The windows are covered with wire mesh. Are these designed to keep bullets out or inmates in? We scurry aboard, voluntarily compressing ourselves into seats measurably smaller and more uncomfortable than the one's just abandoned.

"Move it! Move it! Move it! Unless yer lookin' to get an ass full of shrapnel, let's go, let's go!"

Shakespeare he is not, but leather-face always has a succinct way of bringing to bear a point of information. We are rolling across the tarmac again, inside the bellies of the diesel beasts that are taking us we know not where, somewhere, we hope, away from the living ordinance.

"There are flack jackets and helmets under yer seats, ladies. Now'd be a good time to put 'em on."

Who can quarrel with such sound logic? Within moments, we are encased in the gear designed to protect our heads and upper torsos from near misses of detonated bits of metal. Lifting the lip of my helmet enough to glance around, I see faces sculpted in facades of what might be permanent trepidation. If we don't find refuge soon, someone is sure to die of fright. The bus slams to a halt. Before anyone could possibly have moved, leather-heart is screaming again.

"Don't just sit there! Get off the bus and into the bunker. Move, move, move!"

For an instant, all our recently instilled military reactions are forgotten, and the scramble for the door is like the flight of a frightened crowd headed for the exit of a burning building.

"Single file, you men, or you'll answer to me in the morning, in which case, you'll wish the VC took you out tonight!"

Right on target again. Having received leather-heart's version of disciplinary action on two prior occasions, I appraised his contention as less than far-fetched. Sergeant Major Baker had made a career out of professional cruelty. He had found his true place in the scheme of things. We make an orderly, albeit terrified, exit of the buss into a nearby bunker. When the last man has entered the damp darkness of the sandbagged cave, the shelling stops, as if on cue. A blanket of moist silence rings in my ears. The stench of defecation floats through the blackness. Someone has soiled themselves. I marvel that there are no attempts to verbally segregate and castigate the offender. We are, to a man, still too breathless with fear to speak.

Hours are passing. I look at my watch. The plane landed only fifteen minutes earlier. I find myself remembering the summer of my eleventh year. Then too, time had dilated, and it seemed that I would forever ride my bike to the swimming pool, one day of sunshine filled bliss following another into an eternity of youth-filled fun and irresponsibility. If time expands during such times of joy, how can it be that this agony is having the same effect on its passage? Perhaps it is the intensity of any extreme experience, good or ill, that creates this illusion.

"Ah-right, listen up. Looks like Charlie's finished with his little welcoming party. I want you men to file outta here, quietly, and follow me to your temporary billets. Each of you will receive your separate assignments and travel orders tomorrow morning after formation at 0800 hours."

With the sudden release of tension comes the overwhelming urge for a smoke. Tobacco will be a poor substitute for that substance which my nervous system craves. Frantically, I try and devise a strategy for sneaking away to light up a joint. As we move across open ground towards the barracks, I notice a small rise to my right. Offering just enough of a hill to hide a man sitting in a crouch on its opposite side, the hill appears as a divinely offered apparition. Will I be able to muster the courage needed to steal into the night of an unknown and decidedly hostile place? The urgings of habituated synapses tell me "yes!".

The barracks are dark and dank, not much different than the bunker. The spectral outlines of the room's layout reveal the standard design which has characterized every US Army barracks since World War II. I find a bunk, crawl in and begin the wait. From all around me come the sounds of nervous coughing, bodies restlessly twisting and turning. I decide to make my move. No one will know that instead of heading into the latrine to empty my bladder, I'm aimed for the hill to fill my lungs with smoke that will replenish my bloodstream with the soothing balm of drug induced relaxation.

At the crest of the hill, I stop and turn towards the barracks. The issuance of no movement or sound convince me that my first night's foray in-country will go unobserved. The ground is as damp as the air as I settle into a posture sure to help me blend into the contours of the landscape. Everything is readied. A single paper, the bag of depleted weed, a pack of matches. Slowly, lovingly, I lace the paper with pot, a farmer about to seed the field of his consciousness with a potent seed. Joint prepared, I lift a lighted match to its tip, trying to cover its light as much as possible, remembering the stories of men taken out by a single bullet as they announced their exact location to the enemy by means of a tiny pinpoint of light. It was in World War II that the idea of "three on a match" became a very bad idea. With a single, masterful inhalation, the deed is done, match quickly extinguished, and I settle back for my reward.

If I too strenuously force a stream of smoke into my lungs here, I'll cough and sputter unwanted attentions my way, so I gingerly suck a modest amount of smoke into the deepest chambers of my lungs. Just as the load arrives at its subterranean destination, headlights leap across the crest of the hill, and I emit an involuntary puff of smoke accompanied by a small scream, the sound of prey cornered by the hunter. The jeep screeches to within a few feet and abruptly stops in a cloud of dust. On its side, I read the large lettering: Military Police, it announces ominously. For the second time in as many hours, I dissolve into the hapless lack or resistance of one who is about to die. One thought rattles back and forth, from one side of my head to the other.

"Your first night in Vietnam, and your going to be arrested."

The jeep disgorges four of the largest men I have ever seen, each sporting the unmistakable "MP" armbands and helmets. Inspired by the sudden and irrevocable certainty of my demise, I raise the joint to my lips for one last drag in hopes of being as medicated as possible against the terrible moments that lie just ahead, the nightmare of incarceration in a military prison in the middle of a war zone, the asylum within the asylum.

"Hey, buddy, don't Bogart that joint! We'd like to have a smoke, if you don't mind fronting us a few hits."

This must be a special kind of torment cultivated by the tedium and boredom of too much time spent enforcing arbitrary laws in a place where law and order have obviously broken down long ago, if ever they were in force. Have a few laughs watching the poor newly arrived bastard relax as he thinks he's not going to jail after all, then beating him into submission with wooden batons before hauling him off to a tin can somewhere in the nearby jungle.

The ranking NCO senses my confusion, evidenced by my exhibition of total paralysis. A three-up, one-down stripped Sergeant, he smiles the first grin I have ever received from a non-com.

"So-K, buddy. We ain't gonna bust ya fer smokin' a little weed in the Nam. Hell, man, just about everybody smokes the shit over here; we just wanna share what ya got there. We ran out earlier tonight, and can't get off base to buy more till tomorrow..."

No words will come, but I manage to extend my arm, joint in hand, towards the Sarge. He takes the doobie, and there is glad-handing and back slapping all around. It's all hail-fellow-well-met as the sacred weed is passed in the usual informal ritual. We introduce ourselves, and I am promised that the favor will be returned before I'm shipped out for permanent assignment, somewhere in the land of Ho Chi Minh. Oh, sure, you'll pay me back. I'm satisfied not to be busted. I don't care if I see any of you again. At this moment, I am unaware that indeed, in the middle of the following night, my four new-found friends will return and slip an inaugural bag of powerful Cambodian pot into my hands, with a whispered, "Thanks for taking care of us last night. Good luck. Stay low and alive, man," before disappearing again in their jeep. The surreal will become the norm, the unusual an every moment occurrence in the weeks and months to come. In fact, in ways that will never come fully into focus even decades later, all of life will be different from this night onwards.

On this night, I grope my way back to the barracks, listening to the satisfied laughter of the four MP's above the roar of their jeep. Once the shock and fear finally abate a bit, I may get three or four hours rest. Who can sleep, though, after the startling events of the past few hours? What if the VC come back and lob a few more rounds, this time into the barracks, just to make their earlier welcome complete? In fact, this place is famous for uneasy nights. The 90th Replacement Battalion it's called, the place many of us spend our first and last nights in Vietnam. One building over, there is a barracks full of soldiers who will be hopping aboard a Freedom Bird, heading home tomorrow morning, if they live until then. Charley not only likes to scare the hell out of new arrivals; it's great sport to kill a few of us on our last evening before returning home. A jaded sense of humor with a well-honed sense of irony, this enemy of ours.

I sink into a restless sleep peopled by vague and unfamiliar shapes, sounds and odors. At sunrise, I realize I'm right; sleep offers no true rest here. For the next year, the slightest shifting of the wind will awaken each of us. For some, the full respite of sleep will never return. Pulling on my fatigues, I think the thought that will be the first to cross my mind each morning in the endless months to come.

"What the hell; guess I'll have another smoke."