I Had to Walk That Way Anyway

Each day as I walked back from the flight line I would stop in at supply to check and see if what I wanted was in yet. Soon it got to be a fun thing to stop by supply. After about three months into my second tour in Vietnam the unit moved from Bear Cat to Bien Hoa. Bear Cat had been run by the Thailand Army and the only Americans on the place were three helicopter units. When we were leaving Bear Cat we were told not to remove anything from our hooches (living quarters) such as lights, doors, air conditioners or other things many of us had put in at our own expense. Pretty much we did follow those directions but there were some exceptions to our complete compliance. I did take my air conditioner! Two months later when I flew past Bear Cat the only thing left that I saw was the concrete pads the buildings had been on. The entire place had been stripped! We all wished that we had taken the stuff that belonged to us rather than let it go to looters.

Our new home at Bien Hoa wasn’t too bad but we were a long way from the “flight line” where our helicopters were parked. We had to walk about a half a mile to and from the flight line. Soon after arriving at Bien Hoa I needed something from the unit supply. The supply was located almost directly in the path from the flight line. Each time I stopped I not only asked about the item for which I was waiting, but I would ask what their “special of the day” was. I would tell the supply personnel that they needed to start “promoting” things to increase business. Or I would tell them that they needed to have “sales specials”. Of course they weren’t “selling” anything and really didn’t care about increasing business. It was just a fun thing to joke about.

Soon I had a real good relationship with the supply personnel. When I stopped in, the supply folks would tell me what they had just received and then they would offer me some of it. It didn’t matter much to me what it was so I would take it. If I could carry it I took it and carried it back to my room. My room was becoming the second best supply unit.

Modifications had to be made to my room to accommodate my building up of “supplies”. I put shelves on three walls and stacked my supplies on them. Some of the supplies that I had built up were notebooks, notebook paper, document protectors, socks, gloves, soap, all kinds of cleaning supplies, and most important – toilet paper! Everyone carried his own toilet paper to ensure that it was available when needed. Toilet paper always disappeared from the outhouses. Supply would sometimes run out and it was a scramble to find some. Soon people knew who to go to when they were in need. I was always happy to supply “TP” but asked a return of two for every one that they borrowed when they were able to get some from the unit supply. Most folks were happy to repay and so my supply continued to grow! I had the shelves on one entire wall filled with toilet paper!!

As I approached my ninth month in Vietnam I had to either take an “R&R” (Rest and Recuperation) or forget about it. Those that had less than three months in country R&R was not allowed. But if I took the seven day R&R and an additional seven days I could return home to the states, at my own expense from Hawaii, and see my family. I took the extra seven days and went home to see my wife and family.

While sitting at home at the breakfast table just a couple of days before returning to Vietnam the phone rang. The phone call was from the Department of the Army and they were calling me to tell me not to return to Vietnam. Under President Nixon the number of troops in Vietnam were being reduced and in order to stay under the draw down number of troops they were sending some home early. I was told to stay home.

Well, they said I could return to Vietnam but would be turning around two days later and coming home again. They told me the decision was up to me. If I had things in Vietnam that I wanted to go get myself then I could go get them. There wasn’t anything that important to me! If I left everything there the Army would issue new supplies to me. So I did not return. The unit did send me some of my personal items and one special gift. The special gift was a half roll of unused toilet paper that had a note on it saying they were “keeping the rest of my supplies”!!

My great “supply” was built up just because I had to walk past the unit supply every day and decided to build a friendship. Many times we “ walk past” a supply and never notice or rarely take advantage of the resource it is. There are opportunities all around us that could easily supply all we need. We are going to “walk past” things in life so why not build friendships and our own supplies.