How do you prepare for an epidemic? Cape Coral has spent $15,000 getting ready for Bird Flu. I was interested to find out what it was they thought would help them. Turns out what they'd purchased was some freeze-dried food, cots for administrators to sleep on, and lots and lots of...masks.
This letter from a doctor present at Fort Devens during the Spanish Flu epidemic brought to mind an odd experience I had when I was there. On one wall of my third-floor room in the barracks were large windows overlooking the brightly-lit quadrangle. I slept at one end of the windows, my roommate at the other. Our room was right across from the dayroom, and because it got pretty loud in there sometimes, I slept wearing the foam earplugs they'd given us for the rifle range.
One night I was awakened by someone roughly shaking my shoulder. I opened my eyes and it was a tall and fair-haired guy in uniform. I could see from the rocker on his collar that he was a sergeant. He was telling me something, but I couldn't hear what it was because of the earplugs. I started trying to get them out, and sat up. I assumed he was there for a Health and Welfare inspection (a middle of night room inspection for contraband and nefarious goings-on.) I got ticked then because it should have been a female sergeant waking me up and not this clown. And why hadn't he flipped the light switch on when he came in? I looked over at my roommate and saw she was still sleeping. What was going on? I started saying "What? What?" Meanwhile I'm still trying to dig the earplugs out and looking up at him while his mouth is going and he's gesturing with his arms emphatically. He's becoming angry at me, and I'm getting louder with my what, what, whats. Finally, he does a big "Bah, forget you" gesture and walks to the other side of the lockers where the door is. Now I stand up, put on some shorts, and at last get one of the earplugs out. I walk around the lockers, but he's already gone from the room. I look at my roommate and she's still sleeping. Why would the CQ (Charge of Quarters) just come in like that and what was he trying to tell me?
I went back to bed and in the morning told my roommate what had happened. She thought maybe it was a Red Cross message that had come for me. I went down to the orderly room, but no message. I checked the CQ roster to get the name of who was on duty the night before, and at formation asked that sergeant (who was tall, fair, and surly -- bingo) what was the deal with the previous night. He answered he'd been on duty, but didn't come to our room. I re-checked the roster for the CQ runner and went and asked him about it, but got the same response. Since only myself, my roommate, and the CQ would have a key, I was at a loss at who'd come in and woken me up. That afternoon as I was telling my roommate of the latest developements, she surprised me by suggesting I'd only dreamt it. What, what, what?
No, it couldn't have been. It was so real. Maybe, I thought, it was the ghost of one of the thousands of soldiers that died suddenly at Devens during the Spanish Flu epidemic. This sergeant had been angry. Maybe he was angry about being dead! Or maybe he'd come back to give a warning. Tied to the earth by some task he needed to perform, he kept running into knuckleheads like me who couldn't hear his message from the beyond because of rifle rangle earplugs, or playing Wilson-Phillips too loud on the Walkman, or something like that.
If one of you secretly planted electrodes on my skull and were monitoring my brainwave patterns that night, tell me what you saw.
Have any of you ever had something strange like that happen?
Posted by floridacracker at July 9, 2006 11:48 AMI heard Wilson-Phillips once and it really creeped me out.
Posted by: tfhr at July 10, 2006 04:37 AMFlashbacks? Sure.
Posted by: carl in Atlanta at July 10, 2006 05:56 AMI saw a girl asleep on her bunk once, with Wilson-Phillips spilling out of her Walkman.
Posted by: Donnah at July 10, 2006 06:57 AMDid you check for a pulse?
Posted by: tfhr at July 10, 2006 07:04 AMObviously, it left quite an impression on me.
I don't know what the ghost soldier would have made of it, but I suspect he'd call in the poltergeists.
That reminds me. I had one of those 'poltergeist' experiences that so often happen to girls who are right in the middle of puberty. Just another blog post for you to look forward to.
I'm beginning to think there must be something a little off with my frontal lobe.
Posted by: Donnah at July 10, 2006 07:10 AMAt Goodfellow, one of my studnuts added this one to our "Big Green Book o' Excuses:"
It was snowing and I must have dreamt they told us there was no class this morning, because when my roomie and I woke up, I told her we could sleep in today because of the snow.
Posted by: Cowboy Blbo at July 10, 2006 08:08 AMWas she Air Force? I think they're allowed to sleep in on snowy days.
When did you teach at Goodfellow? It was very strange when I got to Wiesbaden and heard the voice of my Goodfellow training tapes issuing from the lips of the female warrant across from me.
Posted by: Donnah at July 10, 2006 08:15 AMGoodfellow! That is a big improvement over Devens, though the snow excuse might at least had some context at the latter. She should've said she'd had too much (is that possible?) steak at Zentner's and couldn't make it to class.
Posted by: tfhr at July 10, 2006 08:29 AMI loved Devens. It was a beautiful place with easy duty. I did a lot of weekend trips to Quebec and had a nice summer.
Goodfellow was unpleasant. I had a prick of a drill sergeant who finally succeeded in doing what the drill in Basic couldn't, which was breaking my ass down. I couldn't even think anymore. After being in the Army for over a year, I was at last making those phone calls home where I didn't say a single word, only cried.
He later apologized, the miserable bastard. He's probably running the recreation program at Gitmo now.
I read the letter in the link. I can't imagine a soldier being that aggressive to another during a time like that.
My husband is from NC were it is common to have family graves on the property somewhere....took me awhile to get use to that, but he told me that people who go to heaven don't want to come back, and people who go to hell can't come back.
I think so too.
I think you were having anxiety about using the earplugs.(thus the frustration to remove them in time to hear directions)
...First time I've ever heard of "false awakenings" but,
that explains the time I peed the bed.....
did i just say that?
Supposedly it's a hallmark of false awakenings to not be able to do some simple things like get a doorknob to turn.
I didn't know about them until last night when I looking up 'dreams that seem real.'
I'm not kidding when I say it was as real as if it actually happened. I absolutely could not tell the difference.
Posted by: Donnah at July 10, 2006 09:12 AMwas your dude wearing a 1918 uniform?
If so, that's scarey
remember the time Dad peed in the closet?
I wonder what the clinical term for that is?
Our brother probably thought he was having a dream to open his eyes and see that.
oh my god
He was right next to my bed, so I was looking at him first from waist up, then from mid-thigh up when I sat up. He was inside, so he wasn't wearing headgear, and I just saw an irritated tall, thin, fair-haired guy with a 30-ish face wearing an Army blouse with the sleeves rolled down. No, I didn't look at him and think "1918." I thought about that later when I realized no CQ had come woken me up that night.
I think Dad peed in the closet because he was drunk off his ass. Was Dan in the room?
Posted by: Donnah at July 10, 2006 09:30 AMdrunk..yea, that's the correct term
why try to over analyze something?
yes, he was there...as the story goes...I think the sound awoke him first
Heh.
Posted by: Donnah at July 10, 2006 09:44 AMThat was a transition from "false awakening" to "rude awakening", I believe.
Posted by: tfhr at July 10, 2006 10:56 AMRude awakening indeed.
I seem to recall that for a while after the closet incident, traps of wet sponges were laid across the doorway.
GAFB: 1987-91 We've had this conversation before; you must have tuned it out along with your other unpleasant GAFB memories. :)
Yeah, she was Air Force...Blonde too!
Posted by: Cowboy Blob at July 10, 2006 04:31 PMSorry that I don't remember.
You were there when I was.
Boo....
I've had semi-lucid moments like that, then I woke up in a cold sweat looking around. Not the most pleasant experience I ever had but there weren't any apparitions nearby, just a nagging feeling that things weren't right.
I bought my first 9mm shortly thereafter.
Posted by: Gmac at July 10, 2006 09:26 PMA lucid dream is when you're dreaming and you know you are. These are not the same.
That creepy feeling is the frontal lobe firing away. Another deal is sleep paralysis. Our major muscles are paralysed when we're asleep, but sometimes the system gets a little out of whack and we wake up still paralysed. They say it helps to concentrate on trying to move a finger or toe. I'm usually too busy trying to scream with a mouth that won't open and a throat that won't move.
This is starting to sound like it really does haunt you. My biggest worry before going to sleep is making sure ALL of the alarms clocks are set. Well, there is the drool thing but that will be left unsaid.
Posted by: tfhr at July 11, 2006 03:42 AM
