Lowering The Draft Age

The rumors spread fast and swift around the fifth grade playground.  Someone heard it on the news so it must be true.  They were lowering the draft age to twelve.  They needed more soldiers for the escalation in Vietnam, and that would mean we were only a year or two from being shipped out!  Some of us were very excited.  War couldn’t be much different than the reenactments of World War II we did in the neighborhood, could it?  Reenactments where I always played the Nazi, by the way.  Part of it was because, well, kids just loved ganging up on me and letting me be the loser.  But also because I could fake a German accent and was the only one who could act his way out of a paper bag.

The thing that struck me about Vietnam, even as a kid, were the war reports, particularly about casualties.  I couldn’t help but notice that the casualties were always in a ten to one ratio.  If there were five Americans killed, there was fifty reported Viet Cong killed.  Seven Americans?  Seventy Viet Cong!  It seemed odd to me that it always worked that way.

My fervent imagination, although somewhat more quietly channeled, still existed.  I loved Get Smart, and would run around the playground as Maxwell Smart, sometimes talking into my shoe.  Even though I was discreet as I could be, I still was picked on and not very popular.  Although I did have one, brief shining moment.

Some kid wouldn’t leave me alone.  Kept nattering at me, wouldn’t leave me alone, bullying me, even starting to get physical.  My usual humor was not working. Finally I snapped.  Somehow I turned on him, knocked him to the ground, put my foot on his back in such a way that he could not get up, and said, “Will you just leave me alone?”

The other kids were awed.  How did weasely, clumsy Tom Strait pin down and get the big bully to cry uncle.  Kids were practically applauding my victory.  I was on the verge of restoring the popularity I had lost in fourth grade.

But in my mind, it was just a meaningless fluke.  I had no idea how I did it.  I had no martial training, no concept of physical self-defense.  It was just luck.  It could have easily gone the other way.  The bully could have decided to take revenge on me later, although he never did.  I still to this day don’t understand the bullying instinct, or why kids only respect those who are physical in return.