Wednesday, February 21, 2007

i'm a bull your mind is just a china shop

mood: bored music: golden-fall out boy hi, well i'm updating kind of late. ok well a hell of a lot later then usual for me. usually i update after midnight but lastnight my mom banned me from the computer because she had to use the phone and by the time she got off the phone i was already asleep. in cases like that i usually update in my first hour at school but i didn't go to school today so meh i'm updating now. i'm not really suppose to be on the internet right now i'm suppose to be writing my world war two diary but i hate history it's so boring! i'm going to have so much trouble finishing it! i'm not really expecting too many comments though. but big thanks to all tweleve people who commented yesterday! ok so in my post i said i wouldn't mention a certain band but gah! i have to! i put a fall out boy video on my site it's the video for their older song "dance,dance" but you should all check it out! it's so funny and i even got fall out boy hating danny to watch it with me yesterday! *points to video in profile* go watch! i command you! XD (obviously i'm not forcing you) me: ha ha ha it's only a matter of time before i have a legion of loyal fall out boy fans! crap i shouldn't have said that out loud! XD ok so what else? hmmmm oh i just found out that next year my school is cancelling yearbook! that is so stupid and it makes me so mad! now i go to a small school and not to many people care enough to buy a yearbook so mr. principal said it was too expensive and now it's cancelled! which means that i'm not going to get a senior year book! ah the next part of this post is more for people who read the story i post here but i wanted to ask you guys. due to me accidently posting the first half of chapter five last week instead of chapter four. do you guys want me to repost the first half of chapter five again? or do you want me to just go ahead and post the second half of chapter five? i'm not sure which i should do so i'm going to leave it up to you all. of course if i don't get any comments i'll have to decide. anyway if any one has missed any of my story and is interested in catching up. it's archived at the myo site redmoonchick2 if anyone is interested. alright usually i post a manga review on wednesdays but i really have to write that stupid diary so no can do this week! ~redmoonchick~ january 3rd, 1942 so it finally happened after weeks of waiting. after weeks of walking or driving by that by now old and worn uncle sam poster it finally happened. an enlistment camp opened up this morning bright and early five a.m was my guess. the enlistment booth was set up near the local high school and the center of town. it had been quite a surprise to me to see the enlisters here in our town. after all the "coming soon!"promise of the enlisters had taken three weeks to get here and i guess i fooled myself into thinking that they wouldn't show up at all. i had taken my normal route to work that morning at six a.m. driving in the chilly silent darkness of the morning. it was when i had driven down main street was when i first saw them. it was still dark and hard to see but my headlights mangaged to illuminate them enough for me to properly see them. there had to be at least twenty men decked out in our nations uniform bustling around the once empty spot of land. the once empty land now held a large wooden framed booth and the men were currently working on putting some sort of sign up. i was tempted to stop and talk to them for a moment, just to make sure they were the enlisters, but i didn't stop i slowed for a moment just long enough to make the army men take notice before i quickened my pace and drove away. i wasn't sure why i was so disgruntled at the thought of the men being here. it wasn't that i was un-american, no it wasn't that. i was damn proud to be american but i wasn't so sure i wanted to die because i was one. i knew it was wrong what had happened when the japanese bombed us at pearl harbor. but even this unthinkable tragidy wasn't enough to convince me to go and i wasn't sure why. a distressed feeling of doom slipped into my belly and my heart sank a bit. a terrified feeling that maybe i was un-american filled me. so far i hadn't voiced my opinon to anyone, not my family or any of my friends. i just couldn't say anything to them, they had all been so proud of charlie when he declared that he was going to enlist in the army. how could i say that i didn't want to do the same thing? but it didn't matter because in the end it was a choice. i had the choice not to enlist in the army. it's not like they were forcing people or anything. i wasn't sure why but at those thoughts a chill ran down my spine. yes i might've been surprised to see the enlisters that morning but the real surprise came much later. i was driving home from work that evening and again i had to drive by the enlistment booth. as i drove i thought that maybe i should take a new route to and from work so i wouldn't have to see the army men anymore. because after all if i couldn't see them then they weren't real. i turned a corner and saw the booth far away in the distance and as i got closer i also saw the incredibly long line of young men waiting at the booth. the booth itself was considerably different looking from the one i had seen earlier that morning, this was the product of the men i had seen that morning's labor. it wasn't the now drastictly different booth that surprised me or the long line of young men, no it was who was standing in that line that surprised me. "patrick?" i said and nearly caused a collision with the vechical behind me as i craned my neck to try and see the line. i could've waited and called patrick later, that would've been the sensible thing to do but i guess i never really was a senisble person. i didn't want to cause a accident so i proceeded to pull the beat up old pick up truck over to the side of the road, hop out and run over to the enlistment line. an army man stopped me before i could reach who i thought was patrick. "hold it there young fella. the line starts way back there" the army man said pointing a gloved finger towards the end of the line. "but we appreciate your enthusiam." he added . "no-no i don't wanna enlist my friend patrick is here and i just want to talk to him, sir." the man who had to have only been a couple of years younger then my father looked at me wairly for a moment before he nodded "fine just don't be disruptive" i nodded and strode down the line looking at each young face as i passed. some of the men in the line were younger then me and had probably just graduated from high school. after about a minute i finally spotted patrick standing in the line. "patrick!" i called and jogged over to him. patricks eyes widened for a moment "jimmy? what are you doing here?" he asked "are you enlisting too?" he asked me. i came to a stop next to him the man infront of and behind patrick gave me hard looks. "n-no" i panted as i caught my breath "i'm not enlisting but that's not important. why are you enlisting patrick?" i asked finally catching my breath. patrick's eyes darted a bit and he wouldn't look me in the eye. he reached up a hand and smoothed his reddish hair. "well my pop heard on the radio that they were enlisting guys down here and well he told me that i should be down here so uh here i am" he muttered clearly uneasy about the whole situation. that was typical of patrick, he always listened to authority figures ecspecially his father. "but pat do you want to be here? do you even want to enlist?" i dropped my voice down to a whisper so that the men in line around patrick wouldn't hear my question. patrick gave me something of a strange look as he pushed his glasses up. "well of course why wouldn't i?" patrick asked. "well i mean you never mentione wanting to before" "maybe i changed my mind jimmy" patrick said to me. "or maybe your just scared to say no to your dad" i said louder then i meant to earning me odd looks from the others in the crowd. "i'm not afraid of pop!" patrick sorta yelled at me "well you don't want to enlist but here you are right?" i yelled right back at him. he gave me a angry look , pulled his fist back and punched me in the jaw. it was around this time that i wish i would've noticed the police officer at the front of the booth and that patrick hadn't just punched me. we were fighting for a good minute and a half and had most of the enlistment line watching us before the cop pulled us apart and dragged me off to spend two hours in jail. january 6th 1942 it's been three days since i got in a fight with patrick at the enlistment site and spent my two hours in jail with the town drunk. i was sitting at the kitchen table listening to the radio about the war and what was happening. i had heard alot about the german nazi's taking jewish people and putting them into these things called concentration camps. i listened to the horrible new for a few moments longer before i could take no more and turned off the radio. i peeked my head into the living room where my mother had been cleaning moments before. the same news i had heard on the radio i was seeing and hearing on the TV. i decided not to watch and instead i grabbed my jacket off the coat rack and was about to head out the door when the phone rang. "i'll get it" i yelled to my mother whever she may be in the house. i strode over to the olive green phone and answered it. "hello?" "jimmy?" i heard a familar voice ask. "yeah" "oh hey jimmy it's patrick" patrick said in an all too casual voice. i was taken aback by patrick's call i mean i mere three days ago he had sucker punched me for all to see. "hey patrick. what's going on?" i asked the surprise still clear in my voice. "oh well yeah i wanted to call and apologize to you about the fight and to tell you that i didn't enlist". patrick and i continued talking for a few moments each of us apologizing to the other. when we hung up patrick had invited me to come to the local diner where the rest of our friends were meeting for lunch. i informed my mother i was leaving and headed down the sidewalk toward "sparky's diner". normally i would've driven to the diner but after my arrest my father forbade me from using the pick up truck and he said i couldn't work for a week. needless to say after my arrest neither of my parents were too proud of me and my brother was infuriated that i would cause such a spectle infront of the respected men of the military. it felt good to have my friends backing me once again so at least i wasn't completely alone. i arrived at the diner a mere five minutes later noting that all they guys were already there. i gave them a greeting and took a seat at the booth. it was one of those half circle booths equipped to seat all five of us. i sat between patrick and peter while andy and joe sat on the ends. we all managed to talk and laugh just like the old times before the war. after all the five of us had been doing this since we were in junior high. we talked of normal everyday things but i knew it was just a matter of time before someone brought up the war. "did ya have fun in the pokey?" peter asked me. "zip it pete" i said in a still friendly manner. "but seriously none of you guys are enlisting are you?" patrick asked as he took a bite of his hamburger. the other four boys all shook there heads "no i was going to" joe began "but i'm the only man in the family so no can do" "yeah same for me" andy added "what about you pete?" i asked him as he was suppsicously absent from the conversation. "well jimmy" he began lifting his head to look at me, his brown eyes uncharistically serious. "i heard from my father that the army is thinking about drafting people!" he whispered to us. peter's father was a high ranking goverment official so his word was usually correct. "what's a draft exactly?" joe asked. "it's when the army forces men over the age of eighteen to join the army and they guys have no say in wheter or not they want to go." pete told him. "what? that can't be legal!" joe protested "sorry it is, but there is a catch the army is going to randomly draw a month and whoever was born in that month will be drafted." pete said solomenly. we all exchanged looks each thinking of the person next to them's birthday. "are there other rules pete?" andy asked "yeah i heard they can't draft you if your the only male in the family. instantly all eyes were on patrick, pete, and i, while andy and joe let out relived sighs. i knew why it was because andy was a only child and joe only had an older sister. while patrick, pete, and i all had brothers. "what about families with only male children?" i asked thinking of charlie. "well i heard that they take the oldest sibling" pete said. this time was patrick who earned all the stares. as he was the only one amoung the five who was an older brother. pete himself had an older and younger brother and a sister, while i had charlie, but it was patrick who had the younger brother. "you don't happen to have any rule that can save me do you pete?" patrick asked somewhere between desperation and only kidding. no one laughed and we continued the meal in almost silence. march 11th 1941 it's been a little over a month and so far pete's premintion of a draft had yet to come true. the reasoning for this we all assumed was because the army had so many willing volunteers. in the past month things had been somewhat normal, as normal as a nation in war can be. everyone in my life tried their bests to go on living. i continued working at my fathers gas station and as he wished it charlie enlisted into the military...he ships out in a month.

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