“For Those Who Missed the Rock” Part 4

By the time I met with the Marine I was supposed to replace as Company Clerk at HQ – I was pretty out of it from hunger and fatigue. The soldier’s name was PFC Sherman. He was assisted by a Private named Sanchez. 

Sanchez had this annoying habit of applying chapstick to lips every five minutes and batting his eyes at me.

Sherman seemed to be oblivious to Sanchez’s “vamping” but I couldn’t stop shaking my head and rolling my eyes whenever he did it.

Sherman was one of those ebullient type of guys who was hard to hate. And before I took over he wanted to teach me his “system” he used to keep Company records before he packed his gear and left.

But first, he said he had a “gift” for me. And with a magician-like flourish, Sherman produced a mimeograph of a map of Okinawa.  On the top of the map was printed “The Rock Calendar” and the island was divided up into three hundred and sixty-five days. I was told each day I could fill in a section until the whole map was colored. By the time the map was filled in – it would be time for me to be rotated back to the states.

Like I said I was tired but I don’t even think Rabbinical Scholars studying for a hundred years would have been able to figure out Sherman’s “system” of keeping records. 

From what I could surmise it involved moving piles of paper across his desk very similar to playing the card game Solitaire. Papers would be shuffled back and forth on his desk into piles before finally being put away in a file cabinet.

Finally, the workday was over and I shuffled off back to the Mess Hall. There I ate a desultory supper of franks n’ beans before getting back to my bunk and passing out.

The next day, feeling better I went back to my clerk job at HQ. As I grabbed a cup of Joe I told Sanchez to stop filing his nails and get ready to go to work.

I then announced to my coworkers that there were a couple of “very important” things that I wanted to do.

First thing – “Drink my damn coffee!”

Second thing – “Get rid of this Bullshit!”  I picked up one side of my desk and all the papers of Sherman’s “system” slid into the waste paper basket by my desk.

And the third and final thing?

Why I colored “Day One” on my map, put my feet on my desk and promptly went to sleep.

Fine