Young and Dumb is No way to Go Through Life.   

But you have to start somewhere

The photo above is me sitting on the balcony railing outside of my 2nd floor room in the hospital in Nürnberg.  I was 19 years old at the time.  Just a young and dumb guy learning about life and the world.  I wasn't totally clueless.  I had been to Europe 3 times already prior to my joining the Army.  I went through Army Basic Training which taught be many things about myself and what I could do.  I had worked in my father's store for some time, I worked in a big factory for a year.  I have always been an avid reader and by the time I was 20 I had read a lot about a lot of things.  But I was still "wet behind the ears" as they say, there's only so much you can experience and learn in life after only 19 years.  This next story happened because I was young and dumb, that's pretty much the reason for it.  It wasn't a lot of fun at the time, but I did learn a lot about human nature and other things, and like many stories, with age it has grown to be quite an amusing tale.  Any story involving drugs, money, stolen cars, shady characters, and the US Military Police and the German polizei has a certain appeal, right?

My story starts out with a friend of a friend.  Sometimes a friend of a friend can become a good friend and a wonderful relationship can begin.  And other times a friend of a friend is no friend indeed.  In this case the friend of a friend was a guy we'll call Olsen (Actually his real name was Olsen, but I am using it for reasons that will become clear later in the story).  Olsen was a former American soldier that had been discharged at the end of his enlistment and chose to stay in Germany because he had a German girlfriend.  This option was called a 'European Out', and was often chosen by soldiers in the same situation as Olsen.  Sometimes they could find jobs working as civilians for the military, sometimes, if they spoke German well enough, they could get jobs with a German employer.  Some of them like Olsen just seemed to survive by their wits ands the support of their girlfriend. 

I was hanging out with a couple of friends at my little cellar apartment one day and a guy I worked with came over with Olsen.  I had never met Olsen before.  My co-worker introduced Olsen to me and we all sat around talking and having a few beers.  Then we decided to smoke a little hash, a pretty common occurrence as you might realize by now if you have read my other blog posts about my life in Nürnberg in the 1970s.  As we were smoking, Olsen mentioned that he "knew people" and if we wanted to buy more than a few grams of hash, he could hook us up.  I should explain something at this point about buying hash back then.  Most often, for casual users such as most of the people I knew, if you needed some hash you asked around.  Everybody knew somebody that seemed to be able to get some hash.  At the time, the standard amount was 10 grams, a little over 1/3 of an ounce.  In other words, not a lot.  The 10 gram chunk cost $20.00, or $2.00 a gram.  We called this a 20 cent piece for obvious reasons.  Hash came in several varieties.  There was Afghan black, brownish-black in color, a very nice mellow high; Tripping green, kind of a light grass green color which as the name implies would make you see things and was quite strong; Chokin' red, which was red in color, of average intensity but it was very harsh and made you cough a lot; And blond, another mellow high without any remarkable qualities, named after its color, a nice light shade of blond.    

Somebody asked Olsen what amounts he was talking about and what the price was.  Olsen said at the time, he could get a 100 gram brick of Gold Seal black for $180.00.  Gold Seal Black was a black Afghan hash that had a small elephant and 3 interlocked rings below it stamped in gold on the brick, a trademark of sorts.  If you do some quick math, if you buy 100 grams for $180.00 and sell nine 20 cent pieces, then you have 10 grams left for personal consumption.  So essentially you had a free piece of hash for yourself.  Of course there was the danger of getting caught with 100 grams of hash.  It was bad enough to get caught with any kind of drug, but in larger quantities the punishment was more severe, possibly even prison time and a dishonorable discharge.  But of course the lure of a free 20 cent piece can cloud a young person's mind.  

It just so happened that on that particular day I was celebrating my 20th birthday.  In addition to that, because we were paid on the last day of the month, I had just gotten paid 3 days earlier.  At the time my net pay was around $350.00, most of which was spending money because food and shelter and most other essential life costs were taken care of by the Army.  So here I was, feeling festive about my birthday, a wallet full of cash and a guy offering me a way to get some free hash.  What's not to like about a situation like that!  What could possibly go wrong?

With the thought of having 10 grams of my favorite variety of hash at my disposal, and enough friends that I knew I easily could sell the other 9 pieces. I told Olsen that I was interested in getting a brick.  I have to admit that the idea of holding an actual brick of Gold Seal Black in my had and admiring it before I cut it up was attractive as well.  Kind of like that thrill you get when you have a large amount of cash in your hand, or some other interesting thing of value.  I asked Olsen just what was involved in making the transaction.  He told me that I could pay him half of the money, $90.00, he would go to his source, get the brick, return in a few hours and I would pay him the other half of the money and I would get my brick.  That sounded pretty simple to me.  But of course nothing is as simple as it first appears.  

The first of what would turn out to be many complications was that Olsen didn't have a car.  He said it would be faster and easier if he could borrow somebody's car to go get the hash.  Well, it just so happened that I had a car!  A couple of months earlier I had bought an old Fiat 131, a 4 door, boxy looking, Fiat sedan, from another soldier at the hospital.  It's a pretty common thing for soldiers to buy and sell old cars to each other. Often when a soldier leaves an overseas duty station it isn't feasible to bring their car with them.  Many of the cars soldiers would buy were old, cheap and not really worth the time and trouble to ship back to the US.  In addition, there were different rules about equipment on European cars vs. American made cars that often made it virtually impossible to ship the car back to the US.  I had paid $400.00 for my Fiat and it ran pretty well.  For a car that price, you weren't going to get something wonderful or beautiful, you got basic transportation.  The main criteria was; did it run OK, did it have a heater that worked, and would it pass a rudimentary safety inspection.  Anything beyond that was a bonus.  My Fiat wasn't pretty but it worked and the body was sound and for what little driving I needed to do, it was just fine.  

I told Olsen that the could borrow my car as long as he would return in a few hours.  He assured me that he would do that.  So I agreed that he could run his errand and I would wait at my apartment for his return.  He said he could go immediately to get the hash for me, I just needed to give him the $90.00.  I pulled out my wallet and as I was counting out the $90.00 and I thought to my self, I'll just give him $180.00 and get it over with.  To this day I wonder if I hadn't done that, maybe this story would be entirely different.  But I did what I did and you can always look back on the past and think, "If only  I would have..."  I gave Olsen the money, my car keys.  He told me he only needed half of the money, but I insisted he take it all (foreshadowing alert).  He said he would be back in about 2 hours at the most.  Off he went to get my hash, and my friends and I sat around drinking and smoking.  I had already gotten promises from a couple of my friends to buy some of the hash from me when Olsen returned.

As you might suspect at this point, a couple of hours passed, it was now about 4 p.m. and Olsen hadn't returned.  I wasn't worried.  I mean things happen right?  Maybe he was running some other errands, maybe his dealer wasn't in, who knows what.  Shit happens.  So we sat around some more, no one in our little group was worried about Olsen either.  Around 5 p.m. the other guys decided to go to the hospital to get some supper.  I stayed at my apartment because I wanted to be there when Olsen returned.  Around 6 p.m., I started to get a little nervous.  But then I thought he was only a couple of hours late and maybe he ran into a problem or something.  I was sure that soon he would appear with my  hash, or worst case, he wouldn't have been able to buy it and he would give me my money and my car keys back.

Around 7 p.m., I was getting more than a bit concerned.  I decided to go over to the hospital to my room in the barracks.  On the ground floor, there was an entrance to the barracks portion of the hospital.  There was an inner door that led to the barracks area and a broad staircase to the 2nd floor where my room was.  Next to the stairway was a little wooden shack with a window opening and a door.  This was the CQ shack.  Every Army barracks has such a little room, or a desk or something where the Charge of Quarters sits.  During off duty hours, this desk needs to manned so that in the event of some kind of emergency or other needs, a soldier is available to find somebody in the barracks or whatever. They are also tasked to ensure no unauthorized people entered the barracks.  For example, at that time women were not allowed in the men's barracks without a very good reason and vice versa. The person,  sometimes there were 2 people, were normal soldiers in the unit that periodically incurred this duty.  They would sit there from the close of duty hours in the afternoon, usually around 4 p.m. until the following morning at 8 a.m.  On weekends, they did a 24 hour shift.  Nobody liked pulling CQ, it's usually very boring, but that's Army life.  The CQ had a phone on the desk, soldiers in the barracks didn't have phones.  

When I went into the barracks, I stopped at the CQ desk and told the CQ that a person named Olsen might come to see me, and I gave him my room number.  I figured when Olsen went to my apartment and saw I wasn't home, he would go to the barracks and try to find me, or our mutual friend that lived in the same room that I did in the barracks.  Even though I had an apartment off post, I was still required to maintain a place in the barracks, as technically I wasn't authorized to live off post although they allowed us to do it unofficially.  I went up to my room and my co-worker was there.  We talked about Olsen, he vouched for him and said that something probably came up and not to worry.  About an hour later, there was a knock on the door.  I was hoping it was Olsen.  I opened the door and the CQ said that Olsen had called and I need to come down to talk to him on the phone.  I was relieved that Olsen called, now at least I could talk to him and see when he would arrive.  I went to the CQ shack and picked up the phone receiver.  Olsen said he was sorry, he had to wait for his dealer, but finally everything was done and he would come to the barracks in about 1 hour.  I said that was great and I would be waiting for him to come around 10 p.m.  

 !0 p.m. came and went and no Olsen.  I went downstairs several times to see if he had called but the answer was negative.  I was quite worried, not about Olsen, but about the fact that he had my car and $180.00 of my money.  I regretted giving him the entire amount, but still held out hope that it would all work out.  Finally about midnight I decided to sleep in my room in the barracks, I needed to be to work the next day on the early shift which meant I had to be in the mess hall at 5 a.m.  I went to sleep hoping that Olsen would be waking me up at some point early in the morning.  My alarm went off at 4:30 a.m., I got into my cook whites and went off to work.  No word from Olsen.  I pondered my situation and thought what a nice birthday I'd had.  I gave some guy I didn't know my car and $180.00 and he never came back.  At this point it was beginning to dawn on me that perhaps I had been ripped off, a common phrase in those days meaning that somebody had taken something from you or did you wrong somehow.  I talked to my friend that had introduced me to Olsen, and he was mystified.  He didn't think that Olsen would do such a thing.  On the other hand, my co-worker friend was from a small town in Michigan and was even more naïve than I was.  After about 4 days, I did believe that Olsen had done such a thing.  I was getting a little pissed off, if there was a problem, he would have contacted my by this time.  So I decided to report the situation the the Military Police, the MPs.

Now of course I wasn't going to tell the MPs that I gave some former soldier $180.00 and my car to buy me some hash and the guy ripped me off.  I might have been a little naïve, but I wasn't that stupid!  So I decided to tell them that Olsen was a friend of a friend, which was true.  I had met Olsen and he told some sad story about having a German woman he was living with and they needed to go shopping for necessities for their love child, so I loaned him some money and my car and he never came back, which was mostly not true!  I went to the MPs and told my story, signed a statement to that effect and never heard another word from them about it.  Ever.  But wait, that's not the end of the story, not at all.

A new soldier had come to the hospital around the time of this incident and we became friends.  He was a new pharmacy tech and he was assigned to the hospital pharmacy for a few months to learn the ropes before he was sent to the medical clinic in Bamberg, not too far from Nürnberg.  Our hospital was responsible for 13 satellite outpatient clinics on Army bases in the Nürnberg area.  I was sad to see my new friend leave when the time came, but that happens in the Army.  By this time it was probably 3 months since I had last seen Olsen.  I had gotten over the experience for the most part, I figured the MPs didn't consider my situation a big crime.  

So one day, I was at work and somebody told me that I had a phone call in the mess hall office.  I thought that was unusual, who would be calling me on the military phone system at work!  When I picked up the phone, it was my friend now in Bamberg.  I asked what was up and he asked me if I had a red Fiat 131.  I said yes, I did.  I told him that it had been stolen from me.  He said he suspected something like that.  My friend told me he bought it from a former soldier by the name of Olsen, and he found out that the motor in the car was ruined and the car was basically worthless.  I told him given that Olsen had stolen the car from me, that news didn't surprise me at all.  I asked my friend how he knew to call me.  He replied that he found papers in the glove box with my name on them.  Then he asked me if I wanted my car back.  I told him I had no use for a junk car and he could do whatever he liked with it.  So now you are probably thinking this long complicated story is over right?  Well you're wrong!  As they say on the infomercials, "But wait, there's more!"  

About a month later I was at work again and I was told the German polizei wanted to talk to me on the phone.  Now, I was nervous, why would the polizei want to talk to me, I didn't remember doing anything to come to their attention.  So I nervously picked up the phone and they asked me if I knew a character named Olsen, and did he steal a car from me.  I replied, yes, those facts were true.  They told me I needed to come to the central police station in Nürnberg to answer questions about the incident.  They said they had arrested Olsen for stealing  a German rental car and then they ran across the stolen car report I had filed with the American MPs.  Of course that made me a little nervous because who knows what Olsen might have told the polizei about why he had my car.  

I practiced my sad story  about milk for the baby and the next day I went downtown to talk to a detective.  I was shown into a small office and there was a German plainclothes detective that could have stepped right out of a TV detective series.  He was middle aged, bags under his eyes, his shirt sleeves on his button down, wrinkled white shirt rolled partly up on his forearms, and of course a cigarette hanging out of the corner of his mouth.  He asked me about Olsen and  I told him the same story I had told the MPs.  He asked my name, birthday, my parent's names, and yes my mother's maiden name again(If you read my last blog, this will make sense, go read it!).  He was smoking and taking notes the entire time, while I tried not to act too nervous.  I must have done well, because after a few more questions, he told me that Olsen was sitting in prison and he was charged with stealing 2 cars.  The polizei told me thank you and I was free to go.  I walked out of the building with a sigh of relief, and happy that justice was finally served.  

Yes, that is finally the end of the story .  I certainly learned a lot from the experience.  The biggest thing probably was that I wasn't cut out for a life of crime, even as a minor criminal.  I just wasn't cut out for that kind of activity. I also learned maybe I shouldn't be so trusting or, yes, I'll say it, so stupid.  There are people everywhere just waiting to take advantage of young innocent rubes like I was at the time.  Not that I haven't been taken advantage of later in my life, but I had a good idea it would happen, and let it happen any way for various reasons.  I have developed a very high tolerance to stress over the years, in part because of experiences like this one, in part because of some of the jobs jobs I've had, and in part because I like a little excitement in my life at times.  Olsen was my first experience with a genuine sociopath, somebody that will jump at the chance to take advantage of others with no remorse whatsoever.  I met many others throughout the course of my life.  

As I mentioned earlier here, I often wonder if I had only given half of the money, maybe he would have returned that day.  Maybe the extra $90.00 was enough to tip him over the edge and he decided it was worth the risk of ripping me off.  $90.00 wasn't a small amount of money back then.  Who knows.  I chalked it up to another life lesson and I've gotten a lot of mileage out of the story over the years.  All this time later it's pretty funny in that 'real life' story kind of way.  Nobody got hurt, the bad guy eventually got caught.  And it was just another step on the path to experience life, do various things, and sometimes pay a price for it.  I will honestly admit that as the years went on, I purposely made questionable decisions because they sounded like fun at the time, even there was a bit of risk involved.  I figured if it went south, I would have a good story to tell years later!  And for the most part It has worked and most of the scars I got in the process aren't too terrible.    

More Memories From Nürnberg

I think the statute of limitations has passed

I certainly had some interesting experiences in my 19 months as a soldier in Nürnberg from January 1975 until August 1976.  Some were very sobering like my last story, this time I want to tell you some humorous stories.  Well, maybe some of them weren't so funny at the time but they are now.  And I can solve an unsolved crime after all of these years that probably drove the Nürnberg police crazy at the time.  They like everything to be in order, it's a German thing. Like many other things during my time there, these incidents left an impression on me, and perhaps was the origin of my desire to collect stories about my sometimes crazy life.

One night I was sound asleep in my room in the barracks at the hospital.  I had to get up at 4:30 a.m. to be to work in the mess hall at 5 a.m.  I was rudely awakened by someone kicking my mattress and yelling my name loudly.  I slowly opened my eyes, and there was my friend Everett, yelling "Lada, wake up goddammit.  You gotta help me!"  Everett always called me Lada, it's an Army thing.  I looked at my watch and I told Everett that it better be important.  It was 12:30 a.m. and I had 4 more hours to sleep.  Everett responded "Goddammit Lada, just get up and get dressed, the taxi is waiting outside!"  Well, that was interesting.  It's 12:30 a.m., Everett needs my help desperately and there's a taxi waiting.  I was intrigued, so I slowly got out of bed, opened my wall locker and started to put some clothes on.  

Now at this point I need to explain some background to Everett's urgent mission.  Around a month earlier, Everett had bought an old, used VW Beetle.  It was a pale blue color and it wasn't a bad little car.  In the 1970s, those little VWs were everywhere in Germany.  Back then cars had these little windows on either door called vent windows or wing windows.  They were right where the door frame met the front windshield of the car, little triangular windows separated from the bigger side window, and there was a little latch on the bottom of the little window.  You would press a little button in the latch, pull the latch up and you could push the window open to let some air into the car without rolling the side window down.  So when Everett first showed me his 'new' car, he told me not to ever lock the vent window because the door locks were broken and you couldn't unlock them with the key.  When you got out of the car, you pushed the door lock button down and shut the door and the car would be locked.  But Everett needed to leave the vent window unlatched, so he could reach through it to open the car door.  It was a law in Germany that you had to lock your car doors when the car was parked.  

One day, Everett and I were out and about in his car.  We got back to his apartment, he parked the car, and I closed and latched the vent window, pressed the lock button down and shut the passenger door.  Everett noticed this after he got out of his side and had locked his door.  For some reason known only to Everett, he always latched his vent window and left the passenger side one unlatched.  Everett looked at me and said "Goddammit Lada, did you latch the vent window?"  I looked in the window and sheepishly told Everett that indeed I had.  It was just a habit, as almost all cars had those little vent windows back then.  So Everett, now a little angry said "Goddammit Lada, now I'm locked out of my car.  I hope you know how to get it open!  You might have noticed that Everett often addressed me as "Goddammit Lada!"  Well, I had no idea how to break in to the car without damaging it.  Then suddenly I remembered seeing someone use a coat hanger to get a vent window open.  So calmly, as though I knew exactly what to do, I asked Everett if he could get me a coat hanger from his apartment.  He came back with the hanger.  I untwisted the hook part of the hanger, straightened the hangar out and fished the hook end through the rubber seal of the window.  I figured I could maneuver the 'U' shaped hook to press the button on the latch, and simultaneously pull the latch up when the little button was depressed.  Much to my and Everett's surprise, it worked exactly as I had planned, although I acted like I knew it would work.  Everett was a big husky guy, and he clapped me hard on the back, almost knocking me over (I was  tall but quite thin when I was young) and congratulated me on my quick work.  

Now, back in my room, at 12.30 a.m., Everett needed my help to break into his car.  I grabbed a coat hanger from my wall locker and we went out front where the taxi was waiting for us.  On the way to his car, Everett explained to me that the had gone to a gasthaus a few miles down the road, and somehow the vent windows both got latched and locked.  A few minutes later the taxi deposited us next to Everett's little blue Beetle, parked on the side of a city street.  In Germany, after 10:00 p.m. it is quiet hours, and usually by 11 p.m., most places are closed, most people are in bed sleeping, and the streets are deserted.  Here I was with a straightened out coat hangar, at 1:00 a.m. on a deserted street in Nürnberg trying to break into my friend's car.  And a very impatient Everett pacing next to me muttering that it was taking me too long to get the car open "Goddammit."  That wasn't making it any easier to do the job, I was already nervous that if the German polizei came by, we would have a lot of explaining to do.  

About that time I heard a car and I said a silent prayer asking that it wasn't the polizei.  It wasn't, it was a US Army Military Police car!  I was relieved, at least they were American, and perhaps they could help us.  The MP car stopped, 2 MPs got out and casually asked what we were doing.  Everett explained our predicament to them.  They looked a little skeptical and they asked for Everett's ID.  "Well" he said, "there's a little problem with that". "Don't tell me" said one of the MPs, "Your ID is in the car."  Everett replied "Exactly!"  So the MPs got on their radio in the car, and decided Everett was the owner, and said they couldn't help us get the car open.  I was hoping they would stay with us in case the polizei came by, but they told us good luck, and drove away.  That didn't make me any more relaxed as I was still fumbling with the coat hanger, and waiting to feel a rubber truncheon that the polizei used to come crashing on to my head.  I could still hear a muttered "goddammit" or 2 from Everett.  Finally, I got the hanger in the right place, and got the vent widow open.  We got in the car, I was relieved, Everett was happy and thanking me profusely. We drove to the hospital and he dropped me off so I could get about 2 hours of sleep before I had to get up for work.  I was tired but I figured it was a good story I could tell years later.

Oddly enough, the next story involved Everett as well, but I didn't know that until some time later.  It was a winter evening, there was a dusting of snow on the ground.  I went out the doors where the emergency room was in the hospital, heading for the little club we had in the adjoining building where the mess hall was.  There was a walkway connecting the 2 buildings.  As I was walking to the other building, some friends of mine stopped me.  They said they were looking for me and asked if I had been at my apartment. I told them no, I hadn't been there all day.  They excitedly told me I better get over there, the landlord and the polizei were there, somebody had tried to break into my little place.  Needless to say, I was a little shocked by this news and I immediately wondered why anyone would want to break into my little basement dwelling.  At this point, I should explain that after my good friend Jimmy had been sent back to the US (see the blog before this one if you haven't already read it).  I had taken over his place.  Cheap apartments near the hospital were hard to find and I jumped at the chance to move out of my room in the barracks and have a place right around the corner form the hospital.  Even the little 2 room place with a shared bathroom was much better than living in the barracks.

As I was hurrying out the front gate of the hospital and going to my apartment, my mind was racing. What would I find when I got there?  Why would somebody go in the building, down the stairs, through a door and then break into my living room/bedroom?  And what was there to steal?  I was a lowly private making $350.00 a month!  When I got to my building, there were no cars around, the front door of the building was closed and locked as usual.  I unlocked the front door, went in and with my heart beating a little quicker than normal, I went down the stairs, opened the door to the hall where my rooms were and went in.  Apparently the polizei and my landlord had left.  The first door was my little kitchen and I never locked it.  The next door was to my living room.  Except the door wasn't there!  Well, it was, but it the entire door, still locked and in the door frame was lying partly in the doorway, partly into my room, leaning at a 45 degree angle.  There was a schrank (wardrobe) a few feet inside on the  wall perpendicular to the hallway wall, and the locked door, frame and all was resting against the schrank.  My first thought was holy shit, who did I piss of enough to want to break my door down looking for me!  My second thought was, what if they are still around!  Needless to say, I was a little nervous about the situation.  So I went out in the hall and went around the cellar to make sure some crazy person wasn't hiding somewhere.    I went back to the hospital and called my landlord, no cell phones back then.  He asked me if I had any idea what had happened and I told him no, I sure didn't  He also informed me that some polizei detectives would come the next morning to question me and that he would send a person to repair my door as well.  Although I still had a room in the barracks, I didn't want to leave my apartment unattended with no door, so I went back to my apartment.  I stood the door and frame up against the wall next to the schrank.  Then I took a blanket and made a makeshift covering over the hole where the door was.  I didn't sleep well, I was hoping whoever had done that wouldn't be back!

The next morning I hurried up and hid my hash pipe elsewhere in the cellar, I had no  idea what the polizei would do, but I didn't need them to find my pipe.  I cleaned up the bits of broken dry wall and dust off of the floor.  About an hour later somebody was knocking on the wall on the other side of the blanket.   I looked out and there were 2 German detectives in suits.  They showed me their ID and I invited them in.  They asked my name, where I worked and they wanted to know my parent's names as well as my mother's maiden name.  I had no idea why they needed to know that.  They asked me if I had any idea who might have broken down my door, or why.  They asked me if anything was missing.  I answered negatively to the questions.  They told me that they found footprints in the back yard of the building leading to a gate to the sidewalk, and that they think the suspect had left that way rather than through the front door.  They said they had made plaster casts of the footprints as evidence of the crime.  Then they left.  Next came a handyman and in short order he restored the door and frame to their rightful place in the door opening, and the broken drywall was patched up.  I felt better that I had my door back, but I was still little nervous and curious as to what had happened.  Well, about a week later I found out.

I had gone to visit my friend Everett.  He lived about a mile from the hospital in an apartment behind a nice little gasthaus run by a Czech man.  I mentioned it in the blog before this one.  Everett knew the owner Ulrich well, and we would go there often to eat or have some beer, or both.  Everett and I were sitting at a table eating our dinner and talking.  Suddenly Everett got very serious.  He looked at me and said "Goddammit Lada, if I tell you something, will you swear you won't tell anyone?  I mean you can't tell anyone or I'll be in big trouble!"  That made me curious and I assured Everett that we were good friends and his secret would be safe with me.  He replied "Goddammit Lada, you swear you won't tell a soul?"  I told him I promised I wouldn't tell a soul.   Everett took a deep drink of his beer, swallowed it and said "I'm the one that broke your door down!"  Well that bit of news surprised me to say the least.  I looked at him and said "Goddammit Everett, why did you do that, and why didn't you tell me sooner!  I was a nervous wreck, wondering if somebody wanted to kill me, or worse!"  Everett said "I know, I know, sorry.  I 'll tell you what happened."  Everett proceeded to tell me that he had come to Ulrich's gasthaus to have some dinner and a beer.  Well one beer led to another and after a bit, he was a little drunk. So he decided to walk to my place and see if I wanted to join him in a few more beers at the gasthaus.  Remember, nobody had little phones in their pocket back then.  Everett said that he rang my bell at the front door and no one answered so he rang another tenants bell and somebody buzzed him in to the building.  Then he went down to the hall where my door was and he was banging on my door.  Everett said he might have been a little drunk, and he fell against the door and the "Goddam door fell out of the wall."  He said he might have panicked a little and ran down the hall, up the back steps, ran through the yard and jumped over the gate in the fence and ran to his place.   After Everett finished his story, all I could do was laugh.   I told you that Everett was a pretty big, solid guy and I could just picture him drunk, and the surprise when he fell on the door and into my little room.  I told Everett that I wish that he had told me sooner, but that it was pretty funny now and everything got fixed and I didn't have to pay for anything, so it was all good.  I also told him to be aware that the polizei in Nurnberg had a plaster cast of his shoe prints in the snow.  We both laughed about it and had a few more beers.

When I returned to Nürnberg 23 years later, I really wanted to go to the main polizei building in town and tell them I could resolve an unsolved crime from 23 years ago.  Knowing the German efficiency and need for order I imagined that in some vast evidence room there was a box on a dusty shelf with a plaster cast of Everett's size 13, black Army dress shoes.  For all I know it might still be there, it wouldn't surprise me.  Next time I go to Nürnberg I should ask.  Those plaster shoe prints would be a wonderful souvenir of one of the funnier (in retrospect), crazier things that happened to me in Germany, all of those years ago.  I don't think I'll get Everett in trouble, the statute of limitations probably expired a long time ago!

In my next blog I'll tell a tale of a memorable birthday.  It involves drug deal, a missing car, and ultimately a former soldier going to a prison in Germany.  In spite of how it sounds, it's  one of those stories that in retrospect is pretty funny.  And I learned some valuable lessons from it.  What's not to like about all of that!  

On a More Serious Note

A life changing experience in Nürnberg

 I took a little break from writing and today I am feeling a little reflective.  While I listen to the Allman Brothers Band seminal 1972 Eat a Peach album I want to tell you about an experience that happened to me when I was a young, impressionable soldier in Nürnberg that made a lasting and profound effect on me and how I viewed the world, life and the human condition.  As we grow up, we have many experiences that influence shape us and prepare us for what's to come.  Some of these things are wonderful and some of them aren't but we learn something from every experience in our lives, and if we take these lessons to heart, they makes us stronger, better people.

After my adventures upon landing in Germany and finally arriving at the hospital in Nürnberg, I started to settle in, do my job, explore the city and make friends with my fellow soldiers at the hospital.  The barracks for male single soldiers were in a wing of the main hospital building.  The women soldiers, known at the time as WACs (Women's Army Corps) had their own barracks in a separate building.  In the wing of the hospital that our rooms were in, on the first floor was a room that every Army barracks had, called the Day Room.  It was a kind of lounge, usually with some comfortable chairs, a pool table, some tables for board games and card playing and if you were lucky, a television.  It was a place to hang out and relax with your buddies, and there were usually a few people in the room doing just that.  

So one day, shortly after my arrival, I went down to the Dayroom from my 2nd floor room to see what was there.  A couple of guys were shooting pool and I asked if I could play the winner.  I wasn't a very good pool player, but I thought it would be a good way to meet some people that I would be living and working with for the next year and a half.  In a few minutes the guys finished their game, and a short, stocky guy with a friendly smile would be my opponent in the pool game.  I introduced myself and the guy told me his name was Jimmy, as he shook my hand.  As we banged the pool balls around the table, we talked, and learned the basic things about each other.  When you are in the Army, you move around a lot and meet new people regularly, so it's just a natural ritual to exchange information with new people all of the time.  Jimmy it turns out was 29 years old, 10 years older than I was.  He was an Italian American from Brooklyn New York.  I told him about my Italian mother and immediately we shared a common bond.  Jimmy was a medic and he worked in the dermatology clinic at the hospital.  After we finished our game, I lost of course, we sat down to talk some more.  I immediately took a liking to Jimmy, he was friendly, cheerful and smiled a lot.  He told me he had been in Vietnam, a draftee when he was younger, and he was an airborne infantry soldier and he had been in combat in the war.  He said after his discharge he had floated around working in various jobs back in Brooklyn, and after a time he decided to go back in the Army.  He had been in Nürnberg for more than a year when I met him and he had been back in the Army for a few years by this time.  His rank was Specialist 5.  The same pay as a sergeant E-5, but without the responsibilities or authority as an NCO .  I told him some things about my life, and after a time we parted ways and went off to do other things. I had made my first friend in my new home.  I felt good about my new friend, an older guy with some life experience, and we had hit it off right away.  Because of the nature of the Army, the need for teamwork in pressure filled situations, and the constant moving from place to place, you tend to make fast friend quickly because you share a unique, common experience.  The only environment that even comes close in the civilian world is working on the police force, fire department or in EMS.  An often high stress, fast paced, stressful environment. These kind of jobs cause the workers to form tight relationships, and you depend on and trust each other completely.

As time went on, I would frequently hang out with Jimmy.  He took me into downtown Nürnberg for my first time and showed me how to use the streetcar to get there and we saw some of the sights in the beautiful walled Altstadt, or 'Old City', full of medieval buildings and a large, imposing castle on the northwest corner of the high wall that protected the city centuries ago.  After a time, Jimmy found a little basement apartment right around the corner from the hospital and he moved out of the barracks.  We were allowed to live 'off post', an Army term for living 'on the economy' as long as we maintained a room in the barracks, and appeared for inspections and such.  This was a luxury that isn't allowed on too many Army bases.  Because it was unofficial and only married enlisted people received money to pay rent, the soldier had to pay rent out of their pocket.  Jimmy's apartment was quite small.  It was in the basement of a 2 story building that had about 8 regular apartments on the normal floors.  You went in the front door of the building, went down ta flight of stairs and through a door into a short hallway.  In the hallway were 2 doors on the left and one on the right.  The first door on the left was a very small narrow kitchen with a stove, refrigerator, a sink and a couple of cabinets.  There was just enough room left for a small table and 2 chairs.  The 2nd door on the left led into a small room with a single bed, a 2 door wardrobe called a schrank in German, a comfortable chair, a set of bookshelves, and a small oil fired heater in a corner. A sort of living room/bedroom There was a good sized window in the opposite wall, and there were small steps in the outside window well that led to the front yard of the building.  The bathroom was down another hall in the basement. The opposite door from Jimmy's rooms were for another larger apartment which shared the common bathroom.  At the end of the hall where the bathroom was, there was a door that opened on to a staircase into the back yard of the building.  It was a small cozy apartment, for one person, and the freedom and peace and quiet out of the barracks, and the proximity to the hospital made the little apartment very attractive in spite of it's small size.  The monthly rent was quite low.  In time it would become my living quarters, but we'll get there in a bit

In time my friendship with Jimmy grew, he was an intelligent guy, he had a lot of stories about his life and he had a great sense of humor.  However he never said much about his experience in Vietnam.  Because he was 10 years older than me, and I was a young guy far from home, Jimmy became a kind of mentor and role model to me.  He introduced me to his friends, other medics in the hospital and all older than me.  There was John, he worked in the OR as a tech. Joe worked in the urology clinic and we called him pee pee Joe for obvious reasons.  Everett was a big burly guy from Arizona, a respiratory tech, he would become another good friend of mine.  Everett was a little younger than Jimmy.  We would hang out as a group or with 1 or 2 others.  We went into town often, hung out at Jimmy's little apartment and other activities.  Everett had an apartment about a half mile from the hospital behind a nice little gasthaus that was run by a Czech guy named Ulrich that had escaped from the communist country and made a new life in Germany. We would often go to the gasthaus to have a beer or two and have some well prepared, basic German and Czech food.  

Now I need to explain something about the environment of the Army in Germany at the time.  The draft ended in 1973 and the Army had become all volunteer.  The Vietnam war was unpopular as was military service at the time.  Because of the need to fill the ranks, the Army would take almost anybody that wanted to enlist.  A high school diploma wasn't needed, the minimum IQ score to join the military was quite low, and at the time some judges offered lawbreakers the choice of going to prison or joining the military.  In other words, although there were many good soldiers, they weren't attracting the best and the brightest at the time.  There were lingering problems from the Civil Rights battles of the 1960s, and often there were clashes between black and white soldiers.  Drug use was rampant, everything from smoking marijuana and hashish to users of intravenous methamphetamine and heroin.  A strong sedative and hypnotic drug, methaqualone, marketed under the name Quaalude was very popular.  Inn Germany it was sold on the street and known as Mandrax otr 'Mandrakes'. There were many soldiers that either casually used drugs or were addicted to the stronger dugs.  Hepatitis B, a viral infection of the liver which can be transmitted by sharing needles used to inject drugs was a big problem in the military at the time.  It was a wild and crazy time to be in the Army.  The problems were particularly prevalent in the combat units in Germany.  Their obvious mission was to protect Western Europe from a Soviet invasion so they trained a lot but they also had a lot of down time to get in all kinds of trouble.  Because we had a real world 24/7 mission at the hospital we were quite busy and didn't have as much trouble as some units, but we also had a lot of young soldiers that liked to have some fun when they weren't working, and they also needed some stress relief from a difficult job.  My friends and I were no exception.  After a couple of months, my 2 baker classmates and I were pulled out of the bake shop and we became cooks.   They put some more senior cooks in the bake shop to replace us and enjoy the easier schedule.  We had an exhausting schedule.  We had 2 shifts and worked 12 days in a row and then had every other weekend off.  On the weekend we worked we put in 14-15 hour days and worked about 120-130 hours in our 12 day workweek. 

Some of my little group weren't into using any drugs.  I had other friends that used many dugs, one friend of mine was a pretty heavy heroin user.  The most popular substance with the casual drug users was hashish.   I knew far more people that smoked hash then the ones that didn't.  It was easy to get and came in several varieties.  I had smoked an occasional joint before I joined the Army, it was the 1960s and 1970s after all.  I think I was around 16 years old the first time I tried 'pot' as it was called back then.  I liked to get high on occasion but I also wasn't stupid and I stayed away from hard drugs.  When I first came to Germany I wasn't interested in smoking hash, it was much stronger than pot at the time.  But after a few months, I decided when in Rome, do as the Romans, and I started to smoke hash.  We would smoke in the barracks, we would smoke in parks, and we would smoke it in people's apartments off post.  It was just a normal thing.  We would have occasional 'Health and Welfare' inspections in the barracks but it wasn't hard to hide whatever drugs you might have had.  Occasionally somebody would get caught with something, but if it wasn't heroin or a large amount of hash, the punishment was light.  Jimmy liked to smoke hash and he and I and other friends would sit in his little room and listen to music, talk and smoke.  It was a good time!   I had some other friends, and as a group we would go to an apartment one of them had, on a Friday night after work.  We would all have a '20 cent piece' a 10 gram piece of hash that cost $20.00 at the time hence the name.  I would bring bread, lunch meat, and cheese from the hospital kitchen, my friend Rick would buy a bottle of an over the counter stimulant, and there was always a case or 2 of bottles of good beer.  We would sit around the kitchen table, put our chunks of hash in front of us, Rick was in charge of the liquid speed.  We would all have a beer and somebody would pull out the board and game pieces for the game 'Risk', the 'Parker Brothers game of world conquest.'  The board was a map of the world and the object was to roll the dice, move your armies and the winner was the person who had defeated everybody else's armies and took over the world.  It was a fun game involving strategy, making and breaking alliances and generally having fun.  We would start around 7 or 8 p.m. and play successive games until 6 or 7 a.m.  The entire time we would smoke cigarettes and pass around the hash pipe or bong, eat baloney and cheese sandwiches washed down with beer as Rick would judiciously add drops of the liquid speed to our beer glasses.  In the meantime there were non stop records playing from Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Cream and all of the great rock music from that era. It was a great time.  Sometimes I had to work on Saturday and I needed to be there at 5 a.m.  I had worked a ten hour shit on Friday prior to going to the party, I would be smoking hash and drinking speed laced beer all night and then get up from the table at around 4:30 a.m., go change my clothes and work a 14 hour shift. When I got off of work I would go to my room in the barracks and crash after working a long day, partying all night and working an even longer day with no sleep in between.  Oh too be young and dumb again!  

When I wasn't engaged in the all night Risk parties, I would go to Jimmy's place for a more sedate experience.  Just Jimmy and I, we would talk about life and other things, get mellow with some black hash (my favorite!) and have some beer and just chill out.  We would go to jimmy's little kitchen and cook something to eat at the little table there.  Jimmy had a great collection of record albums and we would listen to music.  Sometimes I hear a classic rock song nowadays and in an instant I am transported back to Jimmy's little living room sitting in the chair and Jimmy stretched out on the bed, stoned out of our minds, and enjoying life. Jimmy also had used LSD or 'acid' many times in his life.  He enjoyed the intense experience.  He asked me several times if I wanted to try it and eventually after a lot of thought, I decided I would.  Jimmy gave me some insight as to what I might experience, and said it was good to have a guide who had experience with acid to help on the 1st trip.  So one evening, Jimmy had some tiny black micro dot acid, and we each washed down a miniscule tablet with some beer.  It takes some time for the acid to work it's magic.  We sat there talking for a while as I patiently waited for the acid take effect.  After about an hour I started to feel something and about an hour later I was having a full blown acid trip. I've done a lot of things in my life, dabbled in a number of drugs, and I have to say there is nothing quite like an acid trip.  Your entire reality is completely topsy turvy, your mind goes in strange places and for a visual thinker like me, you see some incredible things.  For example,  the wood grain on Jimmy's little schrank became magnified and looked like rivers flowing down the surface of the wood.  Yeah, things like that.  Your thought are going a mile a minute and time dilates so minute can feel like an hour.  This is not a sport for amateurs.  Everything was going fine that night, I was hanging on for the ride and Jimmy was my stabilizing influence.  Then some people we knew, unexpectedly came over, 2 or 3 of them.  We all smoked some hash together and drank some beers.  In retrospect, smoking hash and drinking alcohol while on my 1st acid trip probably wasn't the best decision I've ever made.  At some point I found myself on the floor huddled in a corner and getting a bit paranoid.  I felt that the others were staring at me and talking about me.  I felt the need to get out of the crowded room and get some air.  So I asked Jimmy for his keys so I could get back in the building and went upstairs and out to the street, taking deep breaths of the clean night air.  I started to walk down the little quiet street.  I knew the street well, a few months earlier, I had shared an apartment further down the street for a couple of months with a coworker that was waiting for his wife to join him in Germany.  The street was only a couple of hundred yards from the hospital.  After walking about 20 yards, suddenly I had no idea where I was.  With my heart pounding, I quickly turned around, recognized Jimmy' building and ran back as fast as I could, unlocked the front door with a trembling hand, and ran down the stairs and into Jimmy's living room.  I went back to my corner and huddled there in a fetal position and tried to be invisible.  After a short time the other people left and Jimmy noticed my obvious distress.  He calmly offered me a big glass 1 liter beer mug full of water and said that I should have some.  My spinning brain told me that Jimmy wanted to help me.  I took the water and it was amazing.  As I swallowed the water I was back in the real world.  The minute it had gone down my throat I was back in wonderland.  But I started to feel better.  Then Jimmy started telling me about green monsters.  He said that everyone is afraid of green monsters and the worse thing to do is to try to fight them or run away from them.  He told me the best thing to do when a green monster knocked on the door to your brain, was to open the door, say hello and invite them in. Tell them to take a seat and talk to them and make friends with them.  In my drug addled brain I took this to mean that I should just relax and everything would be fine.  So I let the green monster in for a nice chat, and I slowly calmed down and just enjoyed the trip.  By now we were about 5 or 6 hours into the trip and it had felt like an eternity.  We had hit the peak and now we were slowly coming down.  We went to the kitchen and made some food.  we talked for a few more hours and at some point near dawn, I started to feel somewhat normal, and completely exhausted.  It was an incredible experience, wonderful, crazy, enlightening and terribly frightening all mixed into an experience that I will never forget.  When you ride a horse for the first time, and you get thrown off, you have to dust yourself off and get back on the horse or you will never ride one again.  You have to overcome the fear.  So I tripped again a few more times, and I knew what to expect and had great trips.  I even went to a movie theater in town and watched the film Tommy, starring the rock band The Who that had recorded the world's first rock opera that was then made into an amazing film.  I had seen the film after it's release and seeing on acid took it to a whole new level.  Especially Tina Turner's amazing performance as the Acid Queen'!  

If you think this experience was the point of this long story, it isn't.  I needed to lay the necessary background to give some context for the events that followed.  But now I need a short break.  I think I might have induced a little flashback relating the story of my first acid trip and some of the other crazy things I did back then.  

Part 2

After a few months I had settled into a routine.  Lots of work, lots of parties, some sightseeing and travelling to some other cities in Germany and other countries in Europe, either on a weekend trip or occasionally taking some leave for a longer trip, and more work.  By now I had made many friends that worked in all different parts of the hospital.  I made a good friend, Woody, who was a licensed practical nurse (LPN), an enlisted job.  He worked on one of the wards.  I knew a female soldier, Patty that worked as an x-ray tech.  Another good friend and eventual neighbor of mine was a mortuary tech, Scotty, I have some stories about that for another time.  There were many other wonderful people.  In short I had friends all over the hospital.  In the Army, it's good to have a friend that works in the mess hall!  I was interested and fascinated by the workings of the hospital.  Sometimes in my off duty hours I would go to where my friends worked and hang out and learn things.  I watched my friend Everett run emergency arterial blood gas tests, a complicated procedure in those days that required drawing a blood sample from a major artery, usually in the wrist and then taking the sample on ice to the lab in his office and calibrating a machine and working out math on a slide rule to get the critical result! Nowadays it's a simple procedure that involves a tiny amount of blood from a small prick on the ear lobe that can be processed in a modern machine in a couple of minutes.  One time I helped my friend up in the x-ray department.  She had to hold a little baby still and she showed me which button to push to take the x-ray when she gave me the word.  Occasionally I would help carry a litter off off of a Medevac helicopter that would land on the helipad on the large lawn in front of the hospital, with an injured soldier.  Now and then I would help load an aluminum transfer case holding the body of a deceased soldier into a van for transport to Frankfurt, to be flown back to the US.  It was all interesting and started my interest in the medical business which influenced my job decision when I went back in the Army 12 years after my first enlistment.  As a result I eventually became a certified Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) and worked in medical clinics, emergency rooms and a couple of trauma centers and on an ambulance, in addition to my primary job in the mental health clinic.  In the 19 months I spent in Nürnberg, I crammed in a few years worth of experiences, good and bad.

Jimmy and I would often meet at his place or go downtown and other activities.  Of course we smoked hash often and I tripped with him a few more times.  I worked hard, played hard and got in a little trouble here and there.  I didn't get along with some of my shift leaders and others in the kitchen, I didn't like authority figures telling me what to do and occasionally I could get a little mouthy.  I had to be escorted to the barber shop on the floor above the mess hall on more than one occasion.  We can talk about all of that another time.  

After I had been at the hospital for almost a year,  Jimmy's behavior started to change.  He was using more drugs and he wasn't his usual cheerful self.  One night we were sitting at his place and he started to talk about Vietnam, the first time he ever said more than a passing mention about the experience.  He described a fight with Viet Cong soldiers attacking the firebase where he was.  He became very agitated and emotional as he described a brutal firefight which culminated with him killing a young enemy soldier at close quarters.  He described the incident in detail, it was fascinating and chilling at the same time.  He ended the story, sobbing uncontrollably.  I was now 20 years old, and here was my mentor, my older friend, my rock breaking down in front of me.  It was a something I had never experienced before and it shook me up seeing Jimmy like that.  

This was in the 1970s and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) hadn't been identified yet.  When I went back in the Army years later I worked in mental health.  We spent time learning about combat stress which would be a large part of our job if we went to war.  In my 5 months of training we learned about various psychological disorders and about human behavior among many other things, including PTSD.  But back then I knew very little about these things.  As the days went on, Jimmy's behavior became more erratic.  Jimmy liked to play the drums  and he didn't have a drum kit so often when we listened to music, he would beat a tambourine in time to the music.  Now he was saying he wanted to sell an expensive 35 mm camera that he had for just a little bit of money, and buy a drum kit so he could practice the drums.  He spoke of some other unrealistic fantasies as well.  I was young, concerned and frightened by Jimmy's ever increasing  strange behavior.  A short time later, pee pee Joe saw me and said Jimmy hadn't reported to work for a couple of days so he went to Jimmy's place to see what was up.  He said when he went in to Jimmy's living room, Jimmy had punched a hole in the schrank door, circled the hole with a brown crayon and had scrawled the word 'feces' next to the hole.  Joe said that  Jimmy hadn't shaved or showered for some time and appeared to be confused and disoriented.  He convinced Jimmy to come to the hospital with him.  Jimmy was examined in the ER and was admitted to the psychiatric ward on the 4th floor of the hospital.  The preliminary diagnosis was schizophrenia, a severe mental disorder.  In retrospect, Jimmy's schizophrenia probably stimulated his PTSD from his experience in Vietnam  Of course I was devastated by the news.  As soon as I able I wanted to see my good friend Jimmy.     

The next day I went to the 4th floor.  Jimmy was in a 2 man room, obviously on medication and lying in bed.  He recognized me and we chatted briefly.  He made sense at times and other things he said were incomprehensible babble. One of the nurses on the ward told me he was being given Thorazine, an anti psychotic drug commonly used at the time, that had many bad side effects.  It was known as a 'chemical straight jacket' and it basically turned the person into zombie.  While it controlled potentially dangerous behaviors, a person taking Thorazine speaks slowly, they show no emotion and they have a flat affect.  The drug causes the person to walk with a slow, shuffling gait, much like the movie zombies, known as the Thorazine shuffle.  While this person looked like the Jimmy I knew, I couldn't see any of his old personality.  I wondered where Jimmy had gone.  Needless to say, I was very upset and hated to see my good friend this way.  I went to visit him as often as I could.  One day I went into his room and he brightened up when he saw me.  Then he started to giggle and told name he had been bad.  I asked what happened and he told me another friend had brought him a few grams of hash, and he had eaten it.  Here was my friend drugged up on Thorazine and now on hash as well. He continued to giggle.  At least he appeared to be happy.  A couple of days later I saw him a gain and this time he appeared to be agitated and angry.  I asked him what was wrong.  Jimmy told me that he had trouble with his roommate.  He said the night before he had turned out the light in the room because 10:00 p.m. was lights out time and bedtime.  He said his roommate got out of bed and turned the lights back on.  Jimmy told him he shouldn't do that and got out of bed and turned the lights off again.  His roommate turned them on yet again.  I told jimmy I could see why he was upset and asked what happened next.  Jimmy said that his roommate turned the lights back on for the 3rd time.  "So I punched him in the face, what else could I do, he wouldn't listen!"  Jimmy said angrily.

A couple of days later it was Thanksgiving. I had just turned 20 years old at the beginning of the month.  I had been working in the hospital for almost a year.  It was the 1st holiday since I had been there that I had the day off.  For all of the prior holidays that I had to work, I asked why I had to work, that maybe I would like to have a holiday off as well.  I was told they wanted to give the married cooks the day off to spend with their families.  While I understood that to a point, I wasn't happy about it.  I was told that after Thanksgiving weekend, Jimmy was going to be medevaced back to the US for further treatment.  They said that for the patients that were able, they would escort them to the mess hall to take part in the traditional Thanksgiving turkey dinner.  The Army always goes all out on Thanksgiving day to provide a traditional sumptuous holiday dinner to soldiers far from home, even in wartime, out in the field.  I asked the head nurse if I could go with them and have dinner with my friend.  She said sure, no problem. So on Thanksgiving day I put on the only suit that I had brought with me, I fastened a bowtie around my neck and I went up to the 4th floor.  In a group, several nurses and medics, about a dozen psych patients in their pajamas and standard Army hospital blue bathrobes, and me, went down to the mess hall.  We got our trays and went through the chow line.  We got our shrimp cocktails, plates full of turkey and all of the trimmings and the traditional pumpkin pie as well as other desserts.  We all sat at one long table, most of the patients were well medicated to control their behavior.  It was a scene straight out of the novel and film One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.  Actually Jimmy bore a strong resemblance to the star of the film Jack Nicolson.  I sat next to my friend, it was a bittersweet moment.  Jimmy docilely ate his dinner and I tried to control my emotions, knowing I would probably never see my good friend again.  In the Army you get used to saying goodbye to close friends but not under these circumstances usually.  It was probably the saddest moment in my young life up to that point in time.  I'm not ashamed to admit that tears are rolling down my cheeks as I type this more than 45 years later, the memory is etched into my brain.  It was the first really difficult thing I had experienced in my life, thousands of miles from home, my family and my close friends.  I spent many more Thanksgiving holidays in the Army years later but under much better circumstances. 

The experience I had with Jimmy really shook me up at the time.  Of course I got over it, I dealt with the loss.  I dealt with the experience of watching somebody that I knew, my mentor that I respected, that I looked up to; go from a great guy, always cheerful  smiling and laughing about everything and having a lot of good times, to a shuffling drugged out human being.  In the months that passed after that Thanksgiving and to this day, I've often thought that I would have rather he had died then to have succumbed to a serious psychiatric illness.  Schizophrenia is incurable.  Today there are better drugs and therapies available.  People with schizophrenia can live near normal live in many cases.  Back then Jimmy probably lived in an institution for the rest of his life, drugged to the point that he was merely a shell of a person.  I often wonder where he went and what happened to him.  I imagine given his age he might have passed away by now, it would probably be the best that could happen.  I have fond memories of our too brief friendship and our many adventures.  I hope you found peace Jimmy, wherever you are my good friend.

I learned a lot from my experience with Jimmy.  I learned that things can change in life quickly.  Up until that point in life I was lucky.  I hadn't lost anybody close to me to accident or illness.  I had a fun, mostly happy childhood and a great safe and secure family environment.  I knew how lucky I was for that, and my experience with Jimmy woke my up to the ugly side of life.  I learned how to deal with and overcome a traumatic experience, pain is a good teacher.  Of course later on in life through my jobs and other things, I experienced many ugly things.  Between my work in mental health and in the medical experience I had, I have seen, heard and dealt with absolutely horrific things.  I've lost family and friends and all of the usual things that happen in life.  I drew on and built from this first real life trauma that I had and it started me on the road to become the strong and resilient, self reliant person that I am now, and it allowed me to live the life I've lived.  Nobody gets the ideal life they would like, everybody has to deal with painful events.  We can succumb to the vicissitudes of live, give in to the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune" and become angry, bitter and depressed, or we can try to learn from these experiences and do the best we can with what we have and try our best to make the most of whatever life throws our way.  We won't always succeed and we all have our limits, but we can try hard. That's been the driving principle in my life that has gotten me through some very tough times and led to many wonderful adventures.  It all started when I was a young soldier in Nürnberg, Germany with my friend Jimmy.   

Here is a photo of Jimmy on one of our outings 

   

 A German Imperial City With a 1,000 Year History

How I fell in love with Nürnberg

I'm back, I took a break yesterday, writing is hard work!  Today I would like to talk about another experience when I was young that was a major influence in shaping my world view and the future of my life, my passion for travel, my passion for new experiences, and my desire to live in other countries and cultures.  I talked about going to Europe several times when I was young and how that opened my eyes to the big world we live in, this was the next vital and informative step in my life that got me where I am today.  And it led to the discovery of another one of my favorite cities in the world, Nürnberg.

I graduated from high school in 1973.  I knew the summer after my graduation would probably my last chance for a carefree, good time summer vacation, so I didn't do anything but go to the beach, hang out with friends, and generally have fun all summer.  I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life yet, but I knew that I didn't want to head straight off to college like my brother did, and my sister did earlier.  I was tired of school.  So I went to the Pennsylvania State Employment Office and applied for a job at GE.  At that time the GE plant employed nearly 14,000 people.  The state office said there was an opening for a job making copper parts.  It wasn't the most desirable job, but is was a job at GE with good pay and benefits.  So I took the paper from the employment office and went to the GE employment office.  The person there told me the copper parts job had been filled but they had an opening in a new program to train machine operators.  I said sure, I'll take it and they told me I would be trained to operate a turret lathe, a traditional manually operated metal turning lathe with some additional parts to enable the efficient turning of the same part repeatedly.  The following Monday, I reported to building 13, part of the DC Motor and Generator Division (DCM&G), a big part of the manufacturing at the Erie plant at that time.  They produced DC motors from about 200 hp up to 10,000 hp as well as DC motor-generator sets for use in giant strip mining shovels, elevator motors, other industrial motors and even motors for nuclear submarines.   

There were about 12 young guys like me and we were to be trained to operate various various machines; lathes, milling machines, drill presses, etc.  We spent some time in a class room and a lot of time turning round pieces of metal into metal chips.  I had never been in a large factory building before and it was interesting.  Machines of all kinds working every where, the smell of cutting oil and hot metal and a smoky haze hanging high above, near the roof.  I learned the basics of operating a regular lathe, how to use tools like indicators and micrometers, and how to cut metal to exacting tolerances down to a few 10,000ths of an inch.  To a point it was interesting and challenging.  After a couple of months I was sent over to building 17 next door, and paired with an experienced turret lathe operator to learn the intricacies of that machine.  It was far more complicated than a regular lathe.  I grew a little frustrated and I figured out that being a machinist was not the life for me.  I saw a lot of older men standing in front of the same machine they had been working on for 20 or 30 years and they had that blank '1,000 yard stare'.  They worked hard, they made a good living, they were every skilled and took care of their families but the dull repetition of the work, and coming home every day covered with grit and cutting oil had taken its toll on them.  I quickly realized I didn't want to be that guy in 30 or 40 years.  So I talked to my instructor and he agreed that my heart wasn't in this kind of work, and I got an open transfer which meant I had one week to find another job at the plant, or I would be out on the street looking for another place to work.  

I went back to the plant employment office and they had an opening in building 12, to be an assembler, putting together electric commuter train car sets that were used in the New York City, New Jersey, Connecticut, Philadelphia metro area.  I had a brief interview with the foreman at station 4.  Luckily for me, an older guy I had known in high school worked at station 4 saw me, and put in a good word to the foreman about me.  The next week I started a new job in building 12.  I have always loved trains and I was happy to get a job building them.  It was cleaner than the machine shop, and because it was a relatively new operation at the plant, most of the workers there were young.  I enjoyed the work for the most part. We had a certain amount of tasks to perform at our workstation, putting in insulation and floors in the cars, adding parts of all kinds here and there and everywhere, inside, underneath and on the roof of the cars.  It wasn't too boring as we all did many different tasks individually or in teams, before the car would move to the next workstation and a new one would come to ours.  The building was massive, there were 4 parallel assembly lines with 9 workstations on each line.  Each car was about 70 feet long, and at any given time there were 36 cars in various stages of assembly at any given time, so you can imagine the size of the building.  Because we were mostly young men, you can imagine there was a lot of playing around.  The car shells were stainless steel and there were a lot of sharp metal edges everywhere.  I think I left some of my blood in ever car I worked on!  One day I tore a chunk out of my finger and had to go to the infirmary on the grounds of the factory for a repair job. I left a lot of blood in the car that time.  I still have the scar.  

During the year that i worked at GE, a good friend of mine was talking to an Army recruiter and I went with  him a few times.  The recruiter was a cool, funny sergeant, an infantryman Vietnam veteran from Brooklyn, NY, and our visits became more frequent.  My friend enlisted and off he went.  I stopped by the recruiting office a few more times.  I thought seriously about enlisting.  It was 1974, the Vietnam draft had ended the year before, luckily about 7 months before my 18th birthday.  Now with the threat of being sent to Vietnam being over, the recruiter offered "Fun, travel and adventure"  which sounded interesting to me.  I went to Buffalo, NY to take the exams and physical.  I scored very well in the exams, in the top few percent.  The recruiter offered me a job in electronics repair as a part of the Army Security Agency (ASA), the folks that gather intelligence on the enemy by various means.  It all sounded very interesting and exciting but it required a 4 year commitment.  I wasn't ready to make kind of commitment, what if I didn't like the Army?  So the recruiter offered me a 2 year enlistment with a guarantee to go to Germany, and the Army would chose my job.  I thought that was a fine plan.  When I told my parents about it, they were not at all happy.  My father had been a soldier in WW II, actually in the forerunner to the ASA, he worked with radios intercepting the German radio frequencies and things like that.  My mother lived in Rome, Italy during the war and endured the German occupation of Rome and occasional bombing raids, so I understood their reluctance to see me go in the Army.  But I was stubborn and I told them I was going to do it.  So in the middle of August in 1974, I raised my right hand, swore an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, and off I went off to Basic Training at Fort Know, Kentucky.  That was an experience I will cover another time in more detail. It was 2 months of exhausting, intense, physical and mental hell.  But at the end I learned a lot about my limits, learned something about discipline, the power of teamwork, and how to shoot an M 16 rifle and I was proud of myself for surviving it all when I graduated.  On the day of my graduation, I got my orders for my school and I found out the Army decided I should be a baker!  I went to Fort Lee, Virginia and spent 2 months in baking school, 5 days a week, 8 hours a day of learning how to bake anything and everything in quantities large and small.  It was more relaxed than Basic Training, we had weekends off and I enjoyed it.  I graduated number 2 in my class of future Army bakers. 

Me at age 19 in baking school. I turned 19 when I was there.
 

I graduated from baking school right before Christmas so the Army allowed me to take some leave and I needed to report to McGuire Air Force Base in New Jersey for my flight to Germany about a week after the New Year holiday.  I would receive my duty station assignment in Germany once I was there.  I relaxed at home, regaled my friends with tales about Basic Training, proudly wore my combat boots with blue jeans and prepared for my trip to Germany. On the appointed day, I said my goodbyes to family and friends, maybe wiped a tear or 2 out of my eyes and my father drove me to the airport in Erie for a flight to New Jersey.  I got to McGuire Air Force Base, signed in at the terminal and late that night along with a couple of hundred other soldiers I boarded a chartered Overseas National Airlines Boeing 707 for the 8 hour flight to Germany.  Since I had flown across the ocean to Europe a couple of times already, I knew what to expect on the flight, most of my fellow passengers had never made such a long fight before.  The next morning we arrived a bit sleepy, wrinkled and jet lagged at Rhine Main Air Force Base outside of Frankfurt, Germany.  The air base shared the runways with the civilian Frankfurt airport.  The air base was one one side and the civilian terminal was on the other side.  We were processed through the military customs and immigration formalities and we were loaded on a bus with the 2 duffle bags that we were authorized to bring, with all of our military and civilian clothes in them, among other things.  It was already shaping up to be an adventure.  The bus took us into the middle of Frankfurt to a large, old red brick building.  We drove through a guarded entry arch and into a large cobblestone square formed by the 4 story building's walls.  It was a rather foreboding looking place, and later I found out why.  What a welcome to beautiful Germany!

They herded us off of the bus, we found are bags in the mountain of identical bags in the courtyard and were ushered into a gym inside of the building.  We sat in some bleachers and they gave us a little orientation as to where we were and what would happen there.  As we sat there sleepy eyed, hungry and desperately in need of a shower and some rest after our flight, we were told that were the guests of the 21st Replacement Station, and welcome to the Federal Republic of Germany, the formal name of West Germany at the time.  We were told that we would receive our duty station assignment here and then we would be bussed to the location.  They informed us that we could be there a few hours, up to a few days.  This was before computers were used for everything, so there was a lot of paperwork, typing, and phone calls involved in finding us a place to go.  They informed us that the Army base we are at was a Gestapo prison during WW II.  I couldn't help but think that that was one hell of an introduction to life in Germany for the next 19 months!  I would soon learn that virtually all of the US military installations in Germany were former German military bases built for world wars 1 and 2.  At this time the Cold War was at it's peak and there were about 300,000 US military people in Germany to keep the Soviets at bay and protect Western Europe from the Red hordes.  We were told we were on the front lines of freedom and the enemy wasn't far from us.  As they say "Shit was about to get real."  Next they proceeded to call some names from a list and some lucky soldiers grabbed their bags and headed out for their bus.  Then they proceeded to assign us to large bays with about 60 soldiers in big rooms full of bunks.  Lastly they read off names for a duty roster for the new arrivals to perform necessary, menial tasks.  I heard my name, and I was assigned to be the baggage room guard from 2 a.m. until 6 a.m.  Oh, lucky me!  Then they released us to get some chow, get cleaned up and told us we were not to leave the compound, that we were in a bad part of town and danger awaited new arrivals to the country.  So I got clean, got some food and then tried to get a little rest until my guard duty at 2 a.m.  At the appointed hour, I went to the cellar to the baggage storage area, a hallway lined on either side with rooms with iron barred doors where our duffle bags were kept.  At the head of the hall was a folding metal chair for my comfort.  The hallway had a brick arched ceiling, the light was dim and near my chair was a fuse box, with old Gothic lettering that said "Prison Fuses."  I have to tell you, that for a 19 year old, tired kid, with an active imagination, it wasn't the most pleasant 4 hours I've ever spent.  I think the only thing that kept me from falling asleep on the job was the sound of the prisoners anguished cries while the Gestapo did whatever they did to them echoing in my fevered brain.  I was quite happy when my relief arrived at 6 a.m.  I wished him luck and got out of there quickly.  I was at the 21st about 3 more days, I got to pick up litter and other simple tasks, but no more guard duty luckily.  They finally called my name at the daily formation in the gym and I found out that I was assigned to the 33rd Field Hospital in Würzburg, Germany, about 75 miles (120 km) east of Frankfurt in the German sate of Bavaria.   

I boarded a green Army bus with other soldiers and we made our way east stopping to drop soldiers off at other Army bases on the way to Würzburg.  After a few hours the bus dropped me off at the entrance to the hospital in Würzburg, on top of a hill overlooking the city, with a nice view of vineyard covered hills across the Main river.  The 33rd Field Hospital, in spite of it's name, wasn't going anywhere.  It was composed a large, solid,  white building and several smaller buildings.  I went inside and found the Orderly Room the nerve center of any Army unit.  The Orderly Room is where the soldiers of their unit tracked, administrative matters dealt with,  and is the home of the company commander, usually a captain in charge of the soldiers for administrative purposes.  To explain briefly, in the Army you have 2 chains of command in a non combat unit.  You belong to a company, in the case of the hospital all of the soldiers belong to the medical company, they are responsible for your care and feeding and the endless paperwork and record keeping.  Then you have your work chain of command, your immediate supervisor, usually an NCO (noncommissioned officer, a sergeant) and then the higher bosses, at some point usually an officer.  They are the folks that you work for.  I went into the orderly room, told them I was assigned to the hospital, gave them my records and did everything I needed to join the unit.  Then somebody took me to the dining facility where I would be working.  I met some folks, greetings all around, welcome aboard etc., and I found out that two of my fellow baking school graduates had already been assigned there so it was nice to see some familiar faces.  Then somebody took me to my room in the hospital where I would live.  It was a nice airy room with large, tall windows,  4 beds and wall lockers, and some desks and a sink but no shower or toilet, those were don the hall.  The soldier showing me around pointed to one of the beds and said it would be mine.  I pointed to the bed next to mine where some boots and shoes were lined up under it in good military fashion, and asked who my neighbor was.  The soldier said, "Oh, that's private Jones, but he's gone.  He jumped out of the window yesterday."  I glanced at the large window nearby and thought wow, first I spend 4 days in a former Gestapo prison, now I come to a beautiful little city and a nice hospital, and I find out one of my roommates jumped out of a window.  Then I realized we were on the ground floor and the window sill was about 2 feet above the grass outside.   Somewhat relieved, I shared my observation with the soldier.  He told me that Pvt. Jones was a little strange and that he hadn't been seen since his flight out of the window, and that when he showed up he would be evaluated by the psych people.  I couldn't help but think that my first week in Germany was certainly shaping up to be a very interesting experience, and I wondered what else would happen. I didn't have to wait long.

After about 3 days of getting settled in and generally relaxing, I was told because they already had 2 new bakers, I wasn't need in Würzburg.  They were calling around Germany to find out who might want a new baker.  It turns out that at the time the only place bakers were authorized, was in fixed hospital facilities, which meant I would go to another hospital in Germany.  The next day they told me that the 130th General Hospital in Nürnberg said they would take me off of their hands.  So once again, I packed my bags, and I was driven to the Würzburg bahnhof (train station) in an ambulance, the only vehicle available, and dropped me off at the main entrance and drove away. I stood there on the sidewalk with new orders for Nürnberg, a voucher for a train ticket, and 2 heavy duffle bags.  I hadn't been in country for even 2 weeks, I didn't speak any German, and I had no idea what to do and I was on my own!  As Alice in Wonderland said, and whom I started to feel some kinship to, "Curioser and curioser."  So Like Alice, I bravely forged on and went into the station. 

Würzburg is a fairly small city so the bahnhof wasn't too big.  I saw a row of ticket windows, went to one and shoved my voucher under the glass window to the ticket clerk.  He said something in German and pointed down the row of windows.  After a couple of more tries with the same result, I got to a window where the clerk looked my paper, stamped it, typed on some keys and handed me a small cardboard rectangle with Würzburg printed at the top and an arrow pointing down to Nürnberg on the bottom.   The ticket also had a number 2 printed on it and the date.  Being a clever guy and having made some train trips in Italy, I recognized that I now had a 2nd class, one way train ticket to Nürnberg.  Then I found the timetable on a nearby wall, figured out how to read it and found the departure time and track number for my train, which left in about 45 minutes.  I went to the correct track, and at the appointed time a train arrived and I boarded a 2nd class car, found a seat and settled in.  Nürnberg was also about 75 miles (120 km) from Würzburg, so I had some idea how long the trip would take.  As we passed through the beautiful, green, hilly Bavarian countryside dotted with little villages and farms just like a picture post card, I started to wonder if I would spend my 19 months in Germany shuffling from Army hospital to Army Hospital, 75 miles at a time.  I was 19 years old with a healthy sense of adventure and I was ready for anything.  When I left Würzburg, they told me that they had told the hospital in Nürnberg to expect me in the early evening at the bahnhof.  I was told the folks in Nürnberg would collect me at the bahnhof and take me to my new duty station.

After a few hours on the train, my pleasant journey ended at the Nürnberg bahnhof.  I got off of the train with my 2 heavy duffle bags and made my way into the station.  Nürnberg is a city of half a million people and is quite a bit larger than Würzburg.  The station was bustling with activity with people going all directions, a few American soldiers mixed in with the crowd.  I made my way to the main doors of the station and looked eagerly for a soldier to find me.  It was a long wait.  After a few hours, being a clever guy, I figured either somebody lied to me or that the hospital in Nürnberg forgot about me.  I flagged down a passing soldier and asked him if he knew how I could contact the hospital.  He told me my best bet was to go to a US military hotel across the street cleverly named the Bavarian American hotel where I could call the hospital on the military phone system.  He took me to the doors and pointed it out to me.  I dragged my bags across the busy square in front of the bahnhof, dodging cars, buses and street cars and went into the hotel. There was an old man at the desk and I asked him if he had a phone so I could call the hospital.  He glared at me and suspiciously asked me in heavily German accented English if I was sure it was to the hospital.  I told him indeed,, that was where I wanted to call.  He reluctantly shoved a phone over the counter to me.  Then I asked him if he had a phone number to the hospital orderly room.  Once again he glared at me and muttered something under his breath in German as he dragged out a Nürnberg Military Community phone book and looked up the number, muttering darkly the whole time.  He gave me the number and I dialed and a soldier answered.  I explained who I was, where I was and said that they received word to expect my arrival and I need a ride to the hospital.  The soldier said they were on night duty in the office, that nobody told them about me when they came on duty and that there was nobody available to come and get me.  He suggested I stay at the hotel and I could get a ride the next morning.  One little problem was that I only had a few dollars in my pocket, I had spent what little money I had brought with me and I hadn't gotten any pay yet because I wasn't in one place long enough to do that.  I explained this to the soldier on the other end of the phone and I heard him softly muttering some bad words.  I wasn't making too many friends in Nürnberg that night. The soldier said to hang on, and I heard a muffled conversation.  He came back on the line and told me to tell the desk clerk to give me a room and they would bring the money in the morning when they picked me up.  I said hang on, and I turned to my good friend the angry old desk clerk.  I made the request, the clerk really glared at me this time and said no way, he did that in the past and he never got the money and basically said "tough shit."  So I put the phone receiver back to my ear and gave the news to the soldier on the other end.  He sighed heavily, told me to hold on again, and I heard another muffled conversation.  Finally he came back on the line and told me to wait outside the front doors of the bahnhof and somebody would come to get me.  I said thank you. I'll be waiting and I hung up the phone.  The friendly desk clerk snatched the phone back to safety probably fearing I would steal it.  I mumbled my sincere and profuse thanks for the wonderful help to the old, grouchy desk clerk who glared at me one last time and as I left the hotel, I pondered what he had done during WW II.  He was the right age to have been a soldier on the wrong side in the war.  Maybe that was why he was so crabby, I don't know.  I made the dangerous trip across the busy square once more, made it safely to the other side with my heavy bags, and about 45 minutes later a fast approaching Army jeep came to a screeching halt in front of me and a very big,  burly sergeant with a bushy mustached hopped out of the jeep amazingly agilely for his size, grabbed my 2 duffle bags as though they were nothing and threw them in the back of the jeep.  He motioned me into the passenger seat and off we went, driving very fast.  On the way he pointed out the famous Palace of Justice where the famous Nürnberg War Trials were conducted between 1945 and 1942.  A few minutes later we made a screeching, high speed turn off the main road and through through the front gate of the 130th General Hospital.  I caught a fleeting glimpse of a 5' tall concrete Nazi eagle statue on the wall next to the entry gate.  I had arrived at my home for the next 19 months, and the remainder of my 2 year enlistment.  When I left in August of 1976, I would be a different person than the one that arrived there in January of 1975.   But we'll talk about that in the next blog.  

I know the subtitle of today's blog said "How I fell in love with Nürnberg, and we finally just arrived there.  You probably feel at this point that it took you almost as long as it took me to get there.  Well, if you remember, I said in my first blog that I like to explain things in detail to paint a clear picture of the events, so I figure you had a fair warning, so don't blame me.  Maybe now you will know that I mean what i say!  I hope you enjoyed the story and tomorrow I will describe my time in Nürnberg and why I love the city so much.