Since I took all of these pictures, I'm not in any of them. Here Dennis and his Marine buddy stand beneath the inspirational sign at the Marine Recruit Depot in San Diego, during the summer of 1973.
Sometime in the spring of 1973, I got help from a former co-worker at A.U. Morse in getting a job as a security guard. Since AF OTS wasn't going to start for me until August, I needed to work. I suspect that my unemployment insurance was running out. In addition, with my search for a future in the armed forces now settled, I no longer needed to spend time getting ready or applying. I had plenty of time on my hands.
My friend Darryl Butler was attending the University of Califronia at Riverside. I visited him after my Air Force physical since they had dilated my pupils during the physical so that I could not see details. I had Darryl's room number written down, though I had to ask at the front desk because I could not read my own note.
I visited Darryl at the university several times. We sometimes ate at a new, local submarine shop where I first learned about sub sandwiches. Since I also had so much time on my hands because I generally worked the swing shift as a security guard, I would often drive to a mall to watch movies cheaply in the first matinee before heading to work in a few locations before finally settling in at a German-owned manufacturing plant of drawer parts called Accuride.
The company had been on strike, so I had to look for nails near the entrance and only let someone in when they had an appointment. One evening, I was stuck between a forman at the plant and the head of the labor union as they argued on either side of the closed front gate.
One afternoon, less than a block from the main gate, I noticed something moving on the white dividing line of the two-lane road. I instantly realized that it was a little gray kitten, not more than a few weeks old. How he had gotten there was impossible to know. But I knew that if I did not rescue him, he would get run over eventually. I slowed to a stop, opened the driver's door, scooped him up, and set him on the passenger seat of my Camaro.
Even though my three parakeets had either died or flown out the door, and I had given away to my sister Lorri my gerbil, I certainly could not keep a pet with my Air Force enlistment looming (mom was not a pet person), so I called the local animal shelter and they came to pick up the kitten. I hope the cute little guy found a good home and lived a long life because he would certainly have died on that busy road.
Later at the plant, I even got a summer job there for Darryl. He watched the back parking lot while I guarded the front lot. Soon, the strike was over, the mostly Hispanic workers gaining nothing. Most returned to their jobs since they seemed to have few other alternatives for work.
During this time, I continued to write and polish my poems, eventually publishing them using the velobind technique that I had learned about from one of those morning LA shows, that one featuring Ralph Story and Stephanie Edwards.
BTW, the placard reads: "To Be A Marine You Have To Believe In Yourself ..Your Fellow Marine..Your Corps..Your Country..Your God. Semper Fidelis."
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