Buses: An Essay (Long)
I have a long history with buses. Love-Hate, which has been in the Hate mode for about 90% of that history.
I used to live in Auburn, Alabama, when I was a tyke. Went to the first grade in Auburn. We lived in Hare Apartments .. married student housing .. while my dad finished his PhD. I would frequently see the old bus of the Auburn Knights, a “big band,” or “swing band,” around the small town of Auburn. My parents loved that orchestra, as they called it. They raved about the Knights. I had lust for the bus.
Out west, in a town called Turkey, Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys had a band bus very much like the Auburn Knights. It was a 1948 Flxible Clipper - no "e" in Flxible. The Flxible Clipper was the quintessential band bus of the ‘50s and early ‘60s. Look at a Flxible Clipper with a notable band’s name on the outside and you could expect to smell ganja. Maybe not the gospel singers’ buses .. but maybe so.
Ironically, I guess, I ended up playing string bass for the Auburn Knights a decade or so later. My parents approved 100%. Not like my flying, which had a very low approval rating. However, by 1966, when I “got on” the band, the bus was long gone.
My first and by far most joyous ride in a bus was in Montgomery, Alabama. My childless aunt and uncle lived in Montgomery, so I often spent part of the summer with them. She made me drink a glass of hot water every morning at breakfast (“it makes you regular, Bo-Bo”) and she made me eat whole kernel hominy (gag!). But she cooked a wicked beef roast with fresh rosemary, which made the visit worth it.
I nagged my aunt persistently about riding in a city bus. I wanted nothing but to ride in a city bus. Strange, eh? Then one morning she took me downtown, paid the fare, and rode with me on a city bus route that went out and returned to city center. Aunt June moved to the #1 position above my many, well-loved aunts. This was probably in 1954, a year before Rosa Parks made history riding a Montgomery city bus, maybe the very same bus, on December 1, 1955.
Out of the blue, during one of my summer visits, Aunt June took me out to Maxwell Air Force base. I was always looking up at the T-33 jet trainers that flew over their house, and maybe I said something about them. I remember walking with her out on the ramp at Maxwell, where a Lockheed T-33 sat, canopy opened. I was helped up the ladder and into the cockpit .. the front seat. It was the first time I had ever been in an airplane .. but certainly not the last. It was just a sitting visit, no flying .. yet. Maybe it was an open house, I don’t remember. But Aunt Juney was now solidly #1.
In the sixth grade, a school trip to Washington DC started a turn in my attitude toward buses. Citywide sixth graders took the trip. Or, at least select citywide sixth graders. And the filter seemed to me, even then, to be more economic and racial than academic. It was 1960 and all public schools in Georgia were segregated. If there were any sixth grade students from black schools on the trip, I don’t remember. But they would have been on separate buses. There were ten or twelve Greyhound buses in our convoy from central Georgia to Washington D.C., and we were often intercepted by police or highway patrol cars or motorcycles for impressive siren-and-lights-on escorts through their jurisdictions (red lights back then, not blue). Well, the Third Ward school boys’ bus was very impressed.
On my bus were most of my childhood friends .. boys. There were, understandably, boys’ buses and girls’ buses. One of the chaperones on my bus was the Spalding County High Sheriff, Dwayne Gilbert. He was well respected by everyone, both the town-folks and us-on-the-bus. We called him Sheriff Gilbert, sir. Behind his back we called him Dwayne-pipe. That wasn’t meant to be derogatory .. just funny to the avid Mad Magazine readers. When strange fumes entered the bus, and in retrospect I think it might have been hot hydraulic fluid, Sheriff Gilbert would go up and down the aisle of the bus saying, “Shake your pants legs! Shake your pants legs!” .. which I finally found out was a euphemism for “Who farted?”.
In junior high, which was actually Dante’s Tenth Circle of Hell, I rode bus #42 with Old Man Gresham driving. He hated children, and it showed. “Hood” Fisher rode my bus, and when he got off at his stop after school, he would turn around and aggressively shoot birds at the bus. Well, again to modify an old airline axiom: Was it us, or the bus? ‘Course our hands were out the bus window, returning fire with a fusillade of two-handed fuck-offs .. weapons-grade bird shooting. The bird fire-fight was punctuated with loud shouts. “Meet me in the graveyard, pussy. I’ll whip your ass.” And now, as a 73 year old I have neighbors, my age, who pack heat and talk like that.
As an aside, “Hood” Fisher was the quintessential hood, with a duck tail, black leathers, and a well-cultivated sneer (he claimed that he carried a switchblade, but I never saw it). The Hood turned sixteen before he ever finished junior high. He quit school and went to work in the Lowell Bleachery #2. A couple of years later, an aviation and general-life mentor loaned me a shortwave radio to hone my Morse code skills for my Ham Radio license. Tuning through the 10 and 11 meter frequencies one night I found a very strong signal on 11 meters, the Citizens Band channels. The dominant bully on the main CB channel was “Hood” Fisher. I recognized his voice, plus he identified by name and “handle,” and it wasn’t “Hood.” He was profane and, it sounded, often drunk. A few years later I heard that Hood got drafted and was KIA in the A Shau Valley of Vietnam.
There were band buses in high school. Those were co-ed buses. And on the trips back to Griffin after a Friday night away-game, the back seats on the band bus were much in demand. By couples. Now that was fun, and you know who you are. But what happened on the band bus, stayed on the band bus. Know what I mean, Vern?
I’ll jump ahead to my post-Vietnam return to normalcy, then I’ll get back to Army life. In 1974 I got married and got down to finishing my education .. at Georgia Tech. We lived on a little farmette just south of Griffin, Georgia. Griffin, to borrow a line from a Tom Sharpe novel (either “Riotous Assembly” or “Indecent Exposure”), was half as big as a New York cemetery and twice as dead. That’s not fair. Maybe next I’ll do an essay on Griffin, which was the birthplace of John Henry “Doc” Holliday on August 14, 1851. August 14 was also my dad’s birthday .. 1920 in Franklin, Louisiana (on the Bayou Teche).
Our little “farm” was forty miles from the Georgia Tech campus. I had a $500 Simca and my new wife had a slightly better Oldsmobile. So I bought bus tickets - books of commuter tickets - on Trailways. I think it was $7 round trip from Griffin to Atlanta. Nancy would take me to the bus station in Griffin at about 4:45 am, and I’d catch the 5:00 am bus to Atlanta. That would take me to downtown Atlanta, where I’d catch a MARTA bus to the Tech campus.
I’d attend classes: organic chemistry, bio-chem, p-chem, calculus, differential equations, engineering statics and dynamics, just to name a few from the Chem-E curriculum. Then I’d repeat the bus trip in reverse. Nancy would pick me up at the bus station in Griffin. The next day, ditto. Rinse and repeat. Out and back. Load and return. Charge and retreat. Whew!
Sometimes, in the morning we’d get to the bus station in Griffin, and I’d complain about how tired I was. She would occasionally drive me on up to Georgia Tech, drop me off at the student center, and then drive back to Griffin and go to work. Once or three times, I met friends at bars in downtown Atlanta after classes, where we would have a few martinis, and then I’d ride the Trailways bus back to Griffin as drunk as a lord.
But all that came to a screeching halt when Nancy’s job funding in Griffin dried up. About the same time, she was accepted into a PhD program at Georgia Tech and we moved to Atlanta. Some aspects of our life became much easier for us, with only the occasional MARTA bus ride between the Tech campus and the bus stop at North Peachtree and Colonial Homes Drive.
But back to the Army Life. Before I went in the US Army, I’d see soldiers in bus/train/plane stations sleeping sitting up, or sleeping leaning on a duffel bag. How on earth do they sleep like that, I wondered. I found out quickly. In basic training at Ft. Polk, Louisiana, we were driven .. like steers to slaughter .. in 18-wheel cattle trucks, from our North Fort barracks to the South Fort rifle ranges. We were packed into the open cattle trailers like kippers in a tin, standing, with our M-14 held close to our bodies. I would go to sleep standing up. You couldn’t fall, because we were packed too tight. Everyone slept on that short ride. Kind of like the surgery residents’ dictum: eat when you can, sleep when you can, and don’t fuck with the pancreas. Two of three, anyway.
We took a Greyhound to New Orleans on a weekend pass .. fourth of July, I think. Severely hungover, we barely made the last bus back to post. My first, but not my last, brush with AWOL status.
When we (me and about fifty others headed for Army flight training) finished basic training, the Army produced two Greyhound buses - gleaming silver outside and cool as Iceland inside - to take us halfway across Texas to Ft. Wolters. Amazingly, everything was on time and there was no SNAFU .. which is to say, basically, our transportation was arranged by civilians.
Of course, there was the obligatory cheer as we cleared the front gate of Ft. Polk. But what a great feeling. Finished with basic. Got a ribbon already on my khaki uniform. No more drill sergeants. No more harassment. No more sweltering Louisiana heat (it was mid-July). Nice big windows to watch the amazing changes of scenery crossing Texas. “Leave the Driving to Us” was the Greyhound slogan. Yes, yes .. I think I will.
As we drove through the main gate of Ft. Wolters another cheer went up. There were helicopters on static display at the main gate - a TH-55 and a TH-23 if I remember correctly - and we were there to learn to fly helicopters. I must admit, pulling through that front gate put a lump in my throat. Maybe I was going to do something special with my life. But it would be harder than I ever imagined. That will be another chapter .. er, essay.
As the Greyhound drivers parked the buses .. and how could I have imagined, in my wildest dreams, that in a little over a year I would be flying combat missions in Cambodia with an ex-Greyhound bus driver as co-pilot? But as they parked in the parking lot of the Snowbird barracks, the holding company, the casual company, our limbo .. we saw a group of strack soldiers (impeccably dressed in tropical-weight khakis, spit-polished boots, gleaming brass, buzz haircuts, black-lacquered swagger sticks, and all-around tight-shit) .. Army TAC officers and senior WOCs (Warrant Officer Candidates). A welcoming committee! How cool is that?
The bus doors opened, and we all got up to get our carry-on gear (the duffel bags were in the cargo bins below). The TAC officers and senior classmen streamed into the buses. “Get your asses back into those seats, you filthy maggots! When we come on board someone calls BRACE, and you sub-humans WILL snap to attention. So BRACE dumb-dumbs! Now! You sorry ass people! Not one of you will make it through this program if I can help it!” That was how Army warrant officer flight training began. For everybody.
The low point in my life came a few weeks later. I was held in the Snowbird company (those waiting to be assigned to a class). I wanted helicopter training, but the powers-that-be in the Army wanted me to go fixed-wing. I already had 400 hours of civilian fixed-wing flying, and that was very high-time in their eyes. They were holding me out of rotary wing training until I broke down and accepted an assignment to a fixed-wing class (which I ultimately did).
We did a lot of military funerals in the Snowbird company. Full honors for scruffy boots, moldy brass, unauthorized clothing accessories, and forbidden “pogey bait” (candy and the like). There were several inspections a day, Therefore, there were several military funerals a day.
A TAC officer called me to the office one day and said, “Zarts, do you read the newspapers? Do you know how many helicopters are getting shot down? Do you have any clue as to why you are learning about military funerals?”
“Yes Sir, sir”
“Well, fixed-wing is a whole lot safer. We are offering you fixed-wing on a silver platter. You’ll fly Mohawks, I guarantee.” And he was a Chief Warrant Officer - CWO-2, with a year in Vietnam flying Hueys, and chest full of medals to show for it. So whenever I said “sir” it was with genuine respect and awe.
“Sir, I already know how to fly airplanes. I want to fly helicopters, sir.”
“Jesus, you are crazy. Zarts, take a one week leave. Go home. Think about it. Here, I’ve signed the paperwork. Now get your maggot ass out of my office!”
“Sir, thank you sir.” as I snap him a spiffy salute.
So I caught a bus to Dallas, and Delta from Love Field to Atlanta. I had a good week in Griffin, but on my last night there I had an unnecessary argument with my parents (and now that they are gone, I realize that all arguments with them were unnecessary, and I am overwhelmed with regret). They could not believe that I had turned down fixed-wing training. Obviously, they read the newspapers. They did not want me in helicopters, especially in Vietnam. Wise as a tree full of owls, my parents.
So I left early the next morning for Atlanta, on the Greydog, without borrowing some much-needed travel money from my dad. I flew Delta from Atlanta back to Love Field and caught a city bus from the airport to the bus station in downtown Dallas. I went to the ticket counter at the Greyhound station, now without a penny in my pocket, planning on putting the bus ticket on my Master Charge card (as Master Card was called then). My card was turned down .. over the limit. The argument with my parents seemed even more pointless now.
I think my credit card limit was $300. But - truth to tell - I had gone to the photo shop in Griffin - Jim & Joe’s - and bought an SLR camera, a Yashika TL-ELECTRO-X. I think that was $250. (In a camera store, or nowadays it’s B&H online, I am a very weak person.) Also, I had bought beers for buds, on my credit card, at Jimmy’s Lounge after the wedding of a dear friend. So I was, sadly, dog-ass broke. Maybe $15 in my pocket when I left Griffin, which was all gone by the time I got to the Dallas bus station.
Once again, I was looking at an AWOL status. I felt, to use Robin William’s line (in his Walter Cronkite voice) in the movie “Good Morning, Vietnam!” .. lower than a snake’s belly in a wagon rut. That low. My world suddenly got very small.
I saw a pay phone and thought maybe I should call the duty officer at Ft. Wolters (it was late Sunday afternoon). I went through the operator and made a collect call to the duty officer. Take your long shots first. Damn if he didn’t accept the charges! He said: “1. Don’t worry; 2. Go to the USO, next to the bus station in Dallas. They will give you a bus ticket to Mineral Wells, something to eat, and a little pocket money; 3. Call this office when you get to Mineral Wells and we’ll arrange transportation to get you on post.” Bless him, and bless the USO. I signed back on post at Ft. Wolters at 23:55 .. five minutes to spare before being AWOL!
There were many more bus rides in flight school. At Ft. Stewart, in the south Georgia swamplands, big olive-drab buses would fetch us to go to class, or the flight line. At Ft. Rucker, in lower Alabama (“LA”), Army buses would take a few of us to remote stage fields in the sandy wire grass and scrub pine regions along the frontier with the Florida panhandle. The buses would wait, idling with the A/C on, while we watched our fellow students make take-offs and landings over 50-foot high cord barriers, with day-glow orange pennant flags attached for visibility, strung between poles. The target was an incredibly short landing strip, and to snag the barrier was a “pink slip” for the day. We sat in the cool bus and critiqued each approach and made wagers on who might snag a barrier in the single-engine O-1 Birddog airplanes.
At some point, the students flying would land and taxi in, parking near the buses. They would get out, the fuel truck would pull up, and we would be out of the bus with our parachutes and flight paraphernalia .. ready to strap-in and do some barrier work in the Birddogs. The students who had been flying would get on the buses and head back to Ft. Rucker. We would fly the barrier training mission, and then fly the Birddogs back to Cairns Army Airfield at Ft. Rucker. BTW: I never snagged the barriers in that phase of flight training, and I found, later, that because I always cut it so close, the highest wagers on a barrier snag were made on me. And I never got a pink slip in flight school.
There are two things that are indelible in the memories of most who went to Vietnam during the war. Number one is the sound of the Huey helicopters’ retreating blade slap. Nowadays, I cannot hear that sound without looking up, with a pang of ‘Namstalgia hitting me. Number two, appropriately, was the smell of shit burning in JP-4 (jet fuel). There were seldom sewer systems in military facilities close to the actual war. Under the seats in the outhouses were 50 gallon barrels, cut in half. Quite possibly barrels that had contained Agent Orange. Lower ranking enlisted soldiers would get the detail to pull those excrement-filled containers out from under the outhouse seats, douse them with jet fuel, and light it off. It was called the "shit detail." Think Chris in “Platoon.”
When I stepped off the United Airlines DC-8-61 at Saigon’s Tan Son Nhut airbase, the heat, the humidity, and - oh my God! - the smell hit me. The overwhelming smells of latrine burns, fish sauce, charcoal cooking, jet exhaust, JP-4, and cordite from friendly and hostile explosives was a total, unexpected sensory overload. Bomb carts with 500 pounders, bomb carts with body bags, ratty old Air America C-46s and Pilatus Porters, a flight of three F-100s on takeoff roll with afterburners glowing .. an artillery battery on the airfield perimeter firing 105s .. a hot wind almost blew off my cover, an overseas cap (alternate name for overseas cap ..well, can’t use that anymore).
They hustled us to the terminal. Something about a VC mortar platoon spotted near the airport’s northwest perimeter. Yikes! Our gear (luggage, duffels, sea bags) came on bomb carts. I spotted mine and wondered if that was the same bomb cart that just carried body bags off an Air Force C-7. Finally inside the terminal I spotted a bar, and several of us headed over for a beer. But we were intercepted by a young lieutenant wearing Signal Corps brass. “Are you guys going to the 509th?” No beers for us now. The eltee said that there was an Air Force bus waiting for us in front of the terminal. Hurry, it will be dark soon.
So off I went for yet anther bus ride. In a strange far-away land, in a place that smelled like shit, with a mortar attack seemingly imminent. The bus was a grey USAF Blue Bird school bus. We got on, with our gear. A deuce-and-a-half with a 50-cal pulled up in front of the terminal. A flight of four F-4s was on the overhead break. Smokin’ Fours. Wings clean. Everyone had a weapon. Sidearms, M-16s, M-14s, machine guns, Uzis. Everyone except us. The Signal Corps eltee, who was our escort to Davis Station in the MACV compound, had a .45 holstered .. but he wasn’t really Signal Corps and we knew it. He was a spook, like we were soon to be, and cover stories (like the Signal Corps ruse) were the coin of the realm in the world we were about to enter.
The bus was unbearably hot, but but I had plenty of experience lowering the windows on Blue Bird school buses. Bus #42, old man Gresham’s bus, was a Blue Bird bus, built in Ft. Valley, Georgia. We had to get those windows lowered to shoot birds back at Hood Fisher. On that hot boulevard in Tan Son Nhut I needed to get a window open before I suffocated. Then I realized that the window nearest me was already open.
Something wasn’t right. It seemed closed. I looked over at the window, more closely, and saw that there was rabbit wire fencing over the window opening. Just like on TV. That’s when it hit me. Hit me hard. I had arrived at the Vietnam War. This wasn’t Kansas anymore.
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