What is a fatigue shirt?
The grandkids went to the Renaissance Festival, which they have every year near Castle Rock, Colorado, which I would've gone to, but I couldn't find a suit of armor that would fit me, and I never got used to dealing with a codpiece.
And speaking of fitting me, while I was rooting around in my storage room in Divide, I came across one of my original fatigue shirts from Air Force basic training… For those that don't know, the Air Force has three different uniforms: dress blues, which are the Air Force's idea of a dress suit and tie. Khakis, which office workers wear, and fatigues, which working folks wear and tend to get dirty. I loaded airplanes wearing this shirt every day, so needless to say, it's somewhat worse for wear with frayed sleeves and missing buttons, but for some unknown reason, I kept this one shirt and left all my other military clothes in Japan when I got my discharge orders.
I gave away and threw away all my khakis, having never worn any of them. I also threw away most of my dress blues, having worn those maybe two or three times for a military parade or some other ceremonial function. But I needed one set of blues to wear for my discharge ceremony, and to travel back to Miami, so I returned to Miami, Florida, with one set of dress blues, one fatigue shirt, and my Air Force field jacket, just so folks in Miami could see what a coat looked like.
I never imagined that raggedy fatigue shirt would have any meaning to me; in fact, I don't know why I even kept it. My full set of blues disappeared somewhere along the line, many years ago, but since I seldom wore them, I had no attachment to my dress blues.
But maybe I kept my old fatigue shirt, because it was the only thing I had left that had been with me my entire four years in the Air Force. And no, I can't find my dog tags. I kept them, but somehow they got lost in one of my moves, and I haven't seen them for years.
So my old fatigue shirt is lying in the camper now, taking up space, for what reason I don't know, but it holds a lot of memories for me. Long ago, I removed the stripes and my name tag, but you can still see where they were on my now-faded shirt.
Way back then, and far, far away.... Before I was theboondork I was Sgt. Hudson, just as my dad had been as a lifer in the Air Force.
Theboondork
Usually, when I go for a walk, I walk around the neighborhood, taking pictures of random things, but this morning I just walked on the street where I spend my summers and took pictures of the houses where my tiny home is parked.
The end of the street where I stay. The street is kind of hilly, so I'm always walking up or down.