20150528 Dream of Joining the Army Again

Author receiving medal circa 1988

Over the years since I got out of the U.S. Army back in 1988, I have had occasional dreams about being in the army again, that I join again voluntarily. I have not had a dream of this type in a number of years but I had one this morning.

I dream I am arriving back at my old unit in Germany. It is modern times and I am being driven by a female soldier whom I know, that we have served together before and although there were female soldiers I served with, this one is completely made up by the dream.

She is explaining to me that I security as been vastly upgraded since the last time I joined. I check into the company, get assigned a room in the barracks. I take my gear to a bunk that is only partly made and I stow it. I am not sure why I think the unmade bunk is mine but I stow my gear anyway.

My first assignment is to get drugs from a local bar. I don't know why. The female soldier who drove me from the airport takes me to a residential place and we pick up two wives of other soldiers. They are partly cover and partly operatives. It isn't clear to me how much they know.

The place we go to acquire the drugs is a strip bar and the three women I am with are dressed very well compared to both the girls who work there as well as the clientele. I notice they seem out of place and that makes me worried about completing my mission. I fear that the patrons will notice how different they are and our cover will be blown. I also notice how the faces of the three women are brighter and more alive than anyone else in the club. The three women take up three different positions in the club and I see one who has dark hair and is wearing a blue dress. I feel embarrassed that she is in this place because of my mission. I tell her she and the other woman should go home, I can handle whatever I am there to handle but she politely refuses. I still notice how no other woman in the club is as well dressed as the three I cam in with. I see another young woman who is obviously the girlfriend or wife of another patron and she is wearing kind of capri pants and a shirt and flip-flops and looks rather shabby, like everything else in the club.

The woman who drove us motions me to the bar in the back. When I get there the bartender is Anita! She reaches over the bar, cups my face and kisses me straight on the lips. She greets me in a think German accent. In all my dreams of rejoining the U.S. Army, I don't recall ever meeting a civilian I knew in real life. Anita was a short, plump, middle-aged German woman who worked as a waitress at one of the Guest Houses right outside the depot. We talk for a bit and then, finally, she passes me a small packet. It is supposed to be pot but it looks more like a packet I've seen on a TV show I've been watching. In the TV show it is heroin.

At any rate, I put the pot in my pocket and me and the driver exit. We are walking in an underground parking ramp discussing the small amount of pot which I am to deliver to someone inside the barracks. Somehow, as we round a corner where the car is parked, the small bag falls out of my pocket. I quickly pick it up feeling relieved this mishap happened just out of view of a security camera.  The driver takes me back to the base she says, “Now you'll see exactly how much security has been beefed up.” I think of where I should hide the small bag and have visions of all my pockets being turned out by the gate guards but then I think, it shouldn't be any big deal as the small amount couldn't be anything other than personal use. But when get get to the front gate, nobody searches me. Nothing happens.

I go back to my barracks room and look for a place to hide the small packet of pot. While there I notice how big the barracks room is and I see some other soldiers there. At this point I go back the the bunk that I selected as mine and realize that it might already belong to somebody else.

I remember when I checked into the company I only talked to one person who did some very limited paperwork. I wasn't even issued any linen.

Everything in the barracks seems degraded. The other soldier in the room seems like he is on drugs. While I am putting stuff into a locker another old familiar face turns up as two soldiers enter the barracks room. I look at him for a few minutes trying to place the face and then I call him by name, which I no longer remember in real life but he recognizes me and we chat briefly about our old times back in AIT.

I think how everything is actually so degraded here. I'm sent on a mission to get drugs, everything in the barracks is lethargic, nobody seems motivated. I think about how it was when I was younger and first went into the military and how now it was barely a whisper.