Diesel Heart

by Melvin Carter Jr

  The way others acted around me also changed that day. People became more particular about how they treated me. The days of my ever takin’ a “bitch slappin’” from the likes of Schmitty were now unimaginable.

  Still, the USNRST Bouknadel Navy Base remained a lonely miserable place. My time on duty was spent reading and working out. Inflicting my new word for the day on innocent bystanders’ conversation was my main form of interaction.

  Traveling helped; bouncing between Rabat, Casablanca, and Kenitra was interesting. But the thing I missed the most was having meaningful conversations with ladies, and cultural gaps made that impossible. Sometimes me and Schwin would buy a ticket and hop onto a train just to see where it would take us. We’d ride in car a full of people, chickens, goats, and bales of straw, only to wind up in some remote village, way beyond our comprehension, and catch the next thing smokin’ back for the return trip. Schwin must have known that everyone knew he was a compulsive liar. Many hated him for it, but I still loved, admired, and appreciated him.

  But in truth, I was still stuck with being myself.

  Mail came about once a week, sometimes every other week. In the meantime, everyone worried the postmaster to death until the next batch. The postmaster was absolutely the most popular guy on the base. All eyes followed every movement of his arm as he fished around deep into his Santa Claus, weather-beaten, worn-out brown leather sack with the usual pregnant hush. All minds silently screamed, Me! Me! Me! His eyes focused on various-sized envelopes as he struggled to decipher handwriting.

  “Carter!” (As if to holler “bingo!”)

  “Here—right here!” Everyone who got a letter scurried off to his bunk or cubicle like a rat with a piece of cheese, then read and reread every letter at least three times. Even though I wasn’t writing home anymore, I still heard from my folks. Henry was in Vietnam on some warship. Fatso was still in St. Paul, released from the naval reserve and now a computer engineer. Bighead Benny Beebop’s envelope was riddled with artwork and sketches, but his letters continually grew more and more indecipherable. Mom and Dad sent me news and newspaper headlines. John Gee and Arlan were in prison.

  And then there was my dear Sophia, my girlfriend since I was seventeen. I had had relationships with very nice young ladies before her, but her interest, curiosity, and genuine concern about my life took me to a new level. The contrast regarding how we perceived local, historic, and global issues gave me an outside view. We had gone on for hours exchanging and debating ideas, theories, and opinions. Both of us were at fragile and delicate intervals in life. Her big choice seemed to be whether or not to continue on to college after graduation. Either way, she’d remain spoon-fed and hand-burped for life. But I was transitioning from a colored boy into a state of Black manhood. My choices were more like joining the military during the Vietnam War—combat or not; joining the Black Panthers; or just going with the flow (whatever that could be). Nonviolent peace marches were not a consideration.

  In my neighborhood, you chose a direction and hit it, or inner-city circumstances would choose a direction for you. None came with any guarantees. But I knew forward and up from backward and down. And for me, at that time in my life and hers, our relationship was forward and up, a transitional safe haven for both of us. She was of Scottish descent, living in Falcon Heights, a prosperous inner-ring suburb that seemed elite to me. Both of her parents were highly esteemed professors at the University of Minnesota, her father a well-published historian. Her family was intrigued by my inner-city life. Every topic I came up with evolved into family conversations in her home. Her parents and older sister all joined in. The fact that my inner-city life was interesting to them and that they could identify with similar issues and topics gave me a more panoramic overview of where I fit in the world.

  Her family knew that Sophia was safe with me, at least in no physical danger. I’d avoid bad situations when I was with her and protect her with my life.

  Perhaps we both knew all along that the curiosity about each other’s worlds that drew us together would eventually drive us apart. We both sensed the last time we were together that this was about it. But still, she had been talking about coming to Morocco to visit me for quite a while now, and I encouraged her to visit the country as a tourist and a dear friend rather than come just to see me. And now she had purchased an airplane ticket, and I’d be truly glad to see her when she arrived.

  I had issues, though, and I knew it. I had a short fuse, and it didn’t take much to detonate my anger. I tried very hard not to be so angry in the mad mad world. And wished that people would stop pissing me off so I could quit being so mad. But the world kept pissing me off—and blaming me for my anger issues.

  Outside of work, life for me was full of skirmishes, near fights, bar fights in Kenitra, and standoffs.

  One lazy afternoon, a fellow sailor walked right into me, seemingly for a sense of innate superiority, expecting me to step aside. But my hands retaliated without permission from my mind. Next thing we knew, he was on the floor looking up at me. I was as startled as he was. I didn’t regret what had happened to him as much as I was alerted by my involuntary reaction, which had now become more and more a habit.

  Drunken hash-smoking fistfighting rampages became my way of equalizing. Heck, the authorities spoon-fed me all this “I am a US fighting man” stuff during wartime. I was a troop, expendable, with nothing to lose, desperately struggling for some morsel of dignity.

  Late one night, at the Fleet Nightclub in Kenitra, having drunk and smoked myself into a sleepy stupor, I dozed with my head on a tabletop. Suddenly the voice of my mother called urgently to me. My long-deceased grandmother, Mother Reagans, chimed in with Momma. Other ancestor voices called as well, chanting my name louder and louder, commanding me to wake up. Repeatedly they clapped their hands and stomped their feet. Wake up!

  My eyes opened like spring-triggered window shutters. I was surrounded by Eastridge with his goon-ass henchmen, Beau, White, and Reid, threatening me, telling me that crossing them was gonna get me fucked up. My inner beast exploded me to my feet. “You gonna do somethin’, do it now. I’m crossin’ you right now!”

  Before their very eyes, I had gone from deep sleep to explosive volcanic eruption. It wasn’t that they were scared, but they were startled. They left the bar, vowing, “Oh yeah, Black boy, we gonna git you!”

  Another night in a Kenitra casual barroom conversation, I used the term man! to accentuate some insignificant point. A white male sitting at the bar next to me leaped from his stool with a challenge: “You call me man, but to me you are a boy, nig— … Oh!”

  It didn’t make any sense, but he never got to the second syllable of the n-word. A tussle ensued and rolled down the middle of the floor. He and I were locked up exchanging blows and wrestling holds when his girlfriend smashed a wine bottle across the countertop, held it by the neck, and came lunging and slashing at me. I spun him around, slamming his back into the broken glass of the bottle, and he let go of me. He hollered. She screamed. I was out the door before he fell to the floor. I concluded his injuries to have been only superficial.

  Another late night, I was walking down the street in Kenitra. A small group of young Moroccan men was attacking other men in front of the Fleet Nightclub. Having no idea what it was about, I continued walking into the crowd. A couple of attackers surrounded me and began to enclose. I was readying myself, deciding which one to take out first, when a leader shouted to them, “Lah-lah! Mechee haddah!” (No! No! Not that one!) As they suddenly turned and backed off, I recognized the leader as the man I had fought with in front of the music shop.

  Late one night on the navy bus ride back to the Bouk base, I had to rough up Corporal Shaky Bates once and for all. It took little to no effort. In fact, I continued eating popcorn throughout the fight on the moving bus. I needed to rough him up enough to make an impression so he’d leave me alone, while taking care not to hurt him. We were friends from then on, but I knew he was still nuts, fresh f
rom combat, given to flashbacks.

  One day as I was entering the base at the main gate, Bates was the sentry on duty, decked out in full military garb, complete with a US military-issue .45-cal semiautomatic handgun. I grinned and nodded. He waved me through.

  I scurried on past him, then he suddenly yelled “CARTER?” I turned around. He had his gun out and held it at arm’s length, aiming directly in my face. His face quivered; his body trembled. For a long instant he said nothing, pointing the gun directly between my eyes. Then he asked me, “What am I doing wrong?”

  I replied, “… pointing the gun at me?”

  “No! No! No!” he replied. “Wrong eye! Wrong eye!” He was aiming at me with his left eye, but his gun was in his right hand. “You should know that by now!”

  Of course, I could see that! How could I be so dumb? He lowered and holstered the gun, waved me to enter, executed an extreme military about-face maneuver, and returned to his post.

  13

  Internal Combustion

  I was doing time in a desert, waiting for never/forever to come to an end. Now I even felt alienated from my family. My not returning letters didn’t help things. But I was in a stretch of life that I had to venture alone.

  One lazy midday afternoon, I lay sulking across my bunk when the duty officer gently walked to my cubicle and whispered, “Carter, you’ve got a telephone call from the Red Cross in the master at arms shack.” Everyone knew that a notification from the Red Cross meant that a family member had died.

  The MAA shack was only down at the end of the barracks, through the large rec room and just off the hallway. But the stroll was an eternal death march. I could feel all eyes upon me, waiting for me to receive earth-shattering news. Just inside the MAA shack, a group of my least favorite chucks momentarily stalled a poker game in anticipation of my drama about to unfold, watching my face.

  “Hello?” I gasped, bracing myself, only to hear loud roaring static.

  “Hello, this is the Red Cross! Is this Melvin? Melvin Carter? I must verify!” a faint female voice echoed. (Back in them days, the cable connection was literally through cables strung across the Atlantic Ocean floor, and the static made it necessary to yell.)

  “Yes! Yes!” I yelled, bracing myself for the worst.

  “Melvin, your mother, father, and all your sisters and brothers are on the line back in Minnesota. Your mother has contacted us because she has not heard from you in months. Will you take a call from them?”

  The last time I had heard any of their voices had been over a year ago. “Oh hell, yes! Momma! Daddy!” No music, no symphony could ever sound so sweet. But the Red Cross could sponsor only three minutes. “Yeah, Mom! These white chucks …”—the ones sitting right there glaring at me—“… blah, blah, blah.”

  We had to make reservations to use the phone at the naval training center in Kenitra in order to continue talking beyond the allocated three minutes. The subsequent conversation was fulfilling beyond description. I got a chance to hear everyone’s voices. Everyone was doing fine. I promised to write and returned to navy life.

  A few weeks later, I got another telephone call from The World back home. It was Fatso and Jasper. They had been drinking some beverages, felt a little lofty, called my mother, and went through a lot of hoops to figure out how to contact me. It was wonderful to hear their voices.

  The summer of 1969 I went on leave, hopped a medevac flight to Torrejón and Madrid, Spain, and hung out with the air force brothers. The air force had done a much better job integrating than the navy. The Black guys were allowed to bunk together, and all seemed content. They had their issues with the chucks but not the showdowns or standoffs like I was having. Whereas we had cubicles with bunks and a single huge shower room, these guys had apartments with two to a room and private bathrooms. Instead of a mess hall, these guys ate in a cafeteria with fine silverware and china (with designs on the plates and cups). Their chow was a vast improvement over that daily clump of crap I had been gaggin’ on back in Bouk.

  These flyboys were great hosts and tour guides. They showed me some historic sites and took me to a real bullfight. I sat in the bleachers and watched the bull actually run the matador through with his huge horns, pick him up and hurl his limp body several feet across the arena’s dirt floor. But I missed the return flight back to Bouk and went AWOL, which meant a captain’s mast. Going absent without leave is a criminal offense in military life, and I didn’t do myself any favors. But I had resolved not to take no more shit off nobody, that is NO-MORE-SHIT-OFF-OF-NOBODY, especially these chucks. My resolve was not to do the next Black guy like Lyle “Lightning” had done me. Had he commanded any respect, any at all, my life would have been so much easier.

  “Carter, you’ll stand captain’s mast in three weeks. In the meantime, you are restricted to base until further notice. You may not leave this base for any reason! Do I make myself clear?”

  I stood tall at attention and saluted. “Yes, sir!” Lieutenant Johnson returned the salute. “Dismissed!”

  Perhaps just to disobey an order, as soon as I got off work duty or work detail, I’d be on the bus into town, returning in time for my next assignment. But by this time I had been there almost a year and was on the downhill slope, with only about eight months to go. I still had the daunting task of surviving mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and especially physically. I was saturated in my own hostility, irritated just by overhearing conversations that had nothing to do with me. Then I’d get mad at myself for allowing my feelings to be so hurt. (Besides, ain’t nobody never seen no John Wayne with no hurt feelings.) For the first time in my life, I entertained self-destructive thoughts and fantasies.

  One late evening at some routine nonevent in the mess hall, perhaps I had a little too much rum ’n’ Coke. Conversations and laughter filled the dining area echoing with cafeteria sounds. I got my plate, sat down at a table with the guys, and asked, “Pass the salt.” No one seemed to hear me. No salt was passed. I asked again, “Pass the salt, please.” I couldn’t tell if they could hear me or if they were deliberately disregarding me.

  This feeling—of being so insignificant, unworthy of even a fundamental simple courtesy—got to me more than anything, way more than it should have. I had convinced myself that I was used to all the hostilities, threats, fights, and routine disregard. But suddenly it all culminated, swelling up in my throat, bulging in my eyes. I had been used to man-to-man challenges, threats, and confrontations. But the continuous bombardment of all the above with no letup in a foreign land imploded like forced vinegar down my throat, smashing my head between loud clanging cymbals while kicking me in the ass. My bottom lip quivered like a newborn baby infant’s. Tears swelled, pulsated behind my eyes, too much for my eyelids to contain, about to burst.

  Damn shit! I was ambushed, surprised and mad at myself for again letting some insignificant nonexistent bullshit hurt me so bad. Hell fucking piss! This shit got me! A stranglehold around my neck over some fuckin’ damn-ass salt?

  I got up and ran through the hallway, trying not to be seen. Finally I made it outside into the deep darkness of the night, down a nearby pathway, away from the barracks—and snot cried. As my hands desperately tried to plug the gushing flow, snot oozed from my nose, tears dripped down both wrists, trickled to my elbows. Okay, God! my soul screamed. I faced the towering treetops and shouted, “I just wanna know if I’m gonna make it, or not! I can accept whatever you decide, God. Just give me some kind of sign! Am I gonna survive this?”

  Just then, a powerful gust of wind blew. A huge chunk of tree limb, way up high, cracked loudly, then crashed to the walkway directly in front of me. And the wind stopped abruptly. Suddenly, right then and there, even more quickly than they had swelled, my tears and all that snot dried. Pep was restored to my step, glide returned to my stride. Huh? Well, alright then! I marched myself right back in there and got my own damn salt.

  The message from God showed me sparkles of daylight in this long sentence where pag
es in the calendar were stuck. Gradually those pages began to turn. Eventually I’d be leaving this desolate desert, one way or another. Getting out alive, and in one piece, now seemed to be an option.

  Full-dress navy uniform was mandatory when appearing at captain’s mast. My trial had been moved from Bouknadel to NTC Kenitra, a location only fifteen miles away but which seemed more like eighty. Everything glowed and reeked with the stench of some sort of polish—shoe polish, brass polish, and wood polish. Captain Fiester’s high brass, a bunch of porcelain-faced, kiss-ass flunkies, perched around the enormous and ridiculously polished mahogany table, poised like vultures, looming for the kill, waiting for something to die.

  A navy captain is a really big deal; the stale anticipation of his arrival was intense. After everyone waited long enough, the huge finely polished doors exploded open. Before the doors were fully open, everyone had leaped to their feet saluting, awaiting a return salute and permission to be seated.

  Captain Fiester, a towering self-indulgent bulkingly overweight figure, used his blubber as a means of accentuating authority. He was surrounded by high-ranking yes-men waiting for the opportunity to refill his glass of water or coffee cup. Other high-ranking officers were eager to agree with everything he said. When he sneezed, everyone shouted Gesundheit, and a thousand hankies suddenly appeared.