I wonder if anyone can find a more self-entitled without-merit hive of snobs anywhere in the world or in any history book than in the officer wife. The other day at the New River gate after I gave a lady back her dependent ID and told her to have a good day she sat there with the patience of a statue and then pointed at the Coast Guard decal on her windshield without taking her eyes off me and said, “It’s an officer’s sticker.” The whole world seemed to go silent at those words and the flow of time seemed to slow down to a near standstill. From an abyss within myself that was deeper than I knew, a great but controlled rage arose and lodged itself in my throat before it came out my mouth in the form of loud-spoken and very unprofessional words. Without a speaking, I leaned over her windshield very close to the sticker, saluted it and went back to staring her down. I wonder if we both had not had our sunglasses on, then would we have seen the hate in each other’s eyes? She drove away eventually, and I’m still here waiting to see if my actions evoked an ICE report. Now, here’s where my anger multiplies. Not long before that incident, I had the privilege to be in the presence of possible true greatness. I’ll explain the “possible” part later. A Master Guns in his chucks came to my lane and I have to admit, I barely looked at his ID. My eyes were magnified to his enormous ribbon stack. He had ribbons upon ribbons, so much so that it must have made his stature lopsided and pull him to the left whenever he tried walking. And it was not just ribbons, he numerous stars all over his stack as numerous as a cloudless night sky. Then I saw something that nearly gave me a stroke, heart attack, and a kidney stone all at once…a CAR with three gold stars. I had never seen that, nor did I think it was possible. I always thought it just stopped at one gold star on the CAR. This Master Guns seemed to be the most content and relaxed man in the world. With that cigarette lazily hanging from his lips, his calm demeanor reminded me of Clint Eastwood as The Man with No Name, Robert De Niro from The Godfather Part II, or any Steve McQueen photo. I wish I had paid better attention to his ID so that I could have remembered his name and researched him to know his story. Yes, I’m aware that New River is mostly made up of POGs so this Master Guns could have merely been Admin who manipulated the system to get his ribbons, hence why I said “possible true greatness.” Before I FAPed over to PMO, I was infantry. I was trained and mentored by infantry Marines who were in Fallujah, Ramadi, Sangin, etc some of which had Purple Hearts. What I’m trying to get at here by mentioning this Master Guns and my mentors is how in the hell did it get decided that great men like these, regardless of being enlisted, don’t rate a salute but a green lieutenant fresh out of OCS with one or two ribbons and officer wives everywhere do? Keep in mind that dependents are not the ones being saluted, it is the BLUE STICKER THAT IS BEING RENDERED THE SALUTE, but it is a loophole that most (not all) officer wives willingly exploit due to some delusion that they serve too. If that’s true then so do the wives of enlisted who put up with arguably more tribulation than an officer wife: less income, privileges, and time with their husbands (I still remember officers coming in late, leaving early, and leaving field ops at night and then coming back showered the next morning). It also blows my mind that a Sergeant Major and Master Guns have to salute a 2nd Lieutenant. I do not hate officer wives, nor is this directed to all of them. At the gates they are the friendliest, most polite, and always smiling and inquiring as to how your day is going. It’s safe to say that they are my favorite lot to interact with at the gates. Despite all that, they have an ugly sickness inside of them that they may never know exists or fathom how ugly it makes them. I don’t know who failed them, but the way the Marine Corps works nowadays is that the person at faults closest link in their chain of command is blamed, so I blame their husbands. I blame them for not teaching them humility. I blame them for not explaining the bigger problems that Marine Corps is going through so that officer wives will not worry about a petty salute. I blame them for not enlightening them of and introducing them to enlisted service members, Junior Enlisted included, who served in combat and performed truly heroic deeds and suffered true hardship so that they will know who really serves and that respect goes both ways. If there ever was a time when officer wives were willingly given respect (symbolized by the salute) by the enlisted then that time is gone. If you ever find yourself demanding or waiting or feeling like you deserve respect then you did not earn it. Epilogue: For the record, that was probably the second or third time I had seen a Coast Guard decal. They look different from the typical DOD decal so I missed the blue on this one.
Posted on: Sat, 28 Sep 2013 16:12:50 +0000
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