The Tattoo

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Sometimes we temporarily lose control of our senses and do something we regret the rest of our lives. Here’s my story.

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The Tattoo

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When I was in the Army going to avionics school at Fort Gordon, Georgia, near Augusta in 1969, I got a leave one weekend and went into town with the boys to have a good time. We went to a bunch of bars and we all got pretty soused. We decided to go to the tattoo parlor and get us a tattoo. One of the guys with me got Casper the friendly ghost, another got Baby Huey. I decided to get a playboy bunny high on the shoulder of my left arm.

 

I think it should be illegal to give soldiers tattoos when they are inebriated and not in control of there senses. 

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After we got our tattoos, we went back to the bars and met with some girls. We were in pretty bad shape so we kind of dosed off. When we were aroused, the girls were gone, and all of our billfolds were gone. So we called it a night and headed back to Fort Gordon on the bus. I woke up the next morning in the barracks with a new tattoo and no identification, so I spent all morning getting new ID documents. That afternoon, I got a call from the USO in town telling me they had my billfold, so I caught the bus and picked up my billfold. All my identification was there, but all my money was gone. So I had double IDs the rest of the time I was there.

 

 

Fort Gordon was the training center for the Army Signal Corp. They schooled me for 19 weeks and I still slipped up and got a tat. 

 

 

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I worked in the Company office on Monday morning and the Master Sargent gave me a hard time about the tattoo all morning. I had to show it to all the staff and endure the harassment all morning. I knew I had made a big mistake as I would have the thing the rest of my life. Yes, it is still there to remind me of that terrible night that I lost control of my senses and had it put on and then was later robbed. It’s a night I would like to forget, but l have that bunny to constantly remind me.

 

If you look closely at my left shoulder, you can see the tattoo in this picture of me in Vietnam.

 

 

 

Thanks for reading The Tattoo,
Bill