Serving With Honor: Under a Cloak of Silence - Softcover

Mcfarland, Dr. Lorenzo L.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1468507575 ISBN 13: 9781468507577

Publisher: AuthorHouse, 2012

Synopsis

We all wanted to change our lives and sought a way out of our current situations so we joined the military during a time when gays were not welcomed. While joining the military was the start of a new and wonderful life, it was also the beginning of a difficult journey. A journey we were able to navigate, but others, some friends, were not so fortunate. Serving with Honor: Under a Cloak of Silence depicts the lives of four close friends who served before and during the time of Don't Ask Don't Tell (DADT). This book answers that most interesting question of what it was like for gays and lesbians in the military under DADT. In their own words the writers bare their souls and answer some of the tough questions not asked or answered before now. Questions like: Why join in the first place? What was basic training like? How did you protect your career? Would you serve again? The writers talk about their exhausting efforts of creating elaborate webs of lies to protect their secret. This book also depicts their patriotism and commitment to the military mission and this great country. Despite DADT, these four Veterans served with honor and found great success.

About this title

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Serving with Honor

UNDER A CLOAK OF SILENCEBy Lorenzo L. McFarland Brian E. Markowski T. David Gilmer Kenneth N. Brooks

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2012 Dr. Lorenzo L. McFarland with Brian E. Markowski, T. David Gilmer, and Kenneth N. Brooks
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4685-0757-7

Chapter One

Interview with Kenneth N. (Kenny) Brooks

Kenny is one of my oldest gay friends in the military. I met him in the summer of 1990 at a gay club in Italy. I walked into the club and noticed an American guy dancing—it was a sight to behold. Dressed in jeans and cowboy boots, Kenny would "drop it like it's hot" and then go down into the splits. (Anyone who knows Kenny knows I'm telling the truth. A mutual friend introduced us, and we've been lifelong friends ever since. Our careers have moved us all over the world, but we've always been able to reconnect. An interesting coincidence: Kenny and I were promoted to technical sergeant and master sergeant during the same promotion cycles.

In 1994, Kenny told me he wanted to separate from the Air Force and move to Washington DC. When I asked him if he had finished his four-year degree or saved enough money to pay his bills, his answer was no—and he stayed in. The rest is history.

Kenny was my road buddy; he and I use to go clubbing together in Italy. Kenny often worked weekend shifts, so whenever he told me he had a free weekend, I would say, "It sounds like an Alcazar night." (Alcazar was one of the Italian gay night clubs we frequented.) Kenny and I were young, alive, and living in Italy, and our time there served as a coming-of-age experience for me. I learned about love, relationships, loyalty, and manhood, and I knew Kenny and I would be lifelong friends.

I have a deep admiration for Kenny and how he served his military career. Kenny was a straight-shooter; you always knew where you stood with him. People liked that about Kenny and found it easy to be around him. He also was very comfortable just being himself. Remember how I first saw Kenny dancing at the gay club? Well, he would dance the same way at the base club. I would be shocked, but other people loved it. All the female airmen would join him on the dance floor and have a ball. I wouldn't have gotten away with half the things that Kenny did. In a way, Kenny was able to hide in plain sight because of his personality and the effect he had on people. He hasn't changed in the twenty-plus years I've known him. Here is my interview with Kenny.

Why did you join the military?

Before I joined the military I attended Winston-Salem State University for one year and then transferred to East Carolina University during my second year. I was a computer science major with significant student loans, and I started getting bored and frustrated. I had relatives who were in the Air Force, which gave me the idea that joining would allow me to make money and finish school. So I went to a recruiter and signed up.

The first thing my father said when I joined was that the military would make a man out of me. Ignoring his ignorance, I decided that this was what I had to do if I wanted to go somewhere. I had spent every summer since ninth grade working with my uncle, who restored wood floors in New York. I would look around these private homes and see the material things the homeowners had worked hard for—their business clothes in their freshly finished closets—and I decided I had to do something to attain this life style. Growing up in rural eastern North Carolina, I would stare up into the night sky and watch the aircraft flying overhead with their red and green lights (identifying the right and left sides, although I didn't know that at the time), and I remember thinking, "Wow, they must be important people going to important places to do important things."

I was young and naïve, but I knew that I had to get out of that village. When you know you're different—when you think differently than everyone else, when you want to do things differently than everyone else, when you behave differently than everyone else—you know that you need to leave and find people like you. The world is a big place, and I needed to see more of it.

Why did you choose the Air Force?

I originally thought about joining the army, because I had family serving in the army, but I changed my mind and joined the Air Force. I didn't want to join the marines or the navy; being out to sea never crossed my mind. I figured the Air Force operated more like a corporation, and once I saw a lot of cadets walking around, I decided I would give it a try.

Tell me about your Military Entrance Processing Station (MEPS) experience.

My experience was a normal one. I "walked like a duck," underwent all the tests, and did what I was supposed to do. I remember someone looking over my records and telling me that I should have joined the army, but I said I had already made my choice. Maybe my experience wasn't so normal, I recall a recruiter talking about his body parts and sexual experiences. I glanced over to see what he was talking about, and he asked if I was gay. I just stared at him. Once I had my hand up and was sworn in, I felt like I was a man and this was how it was supposed to be.

Tell me about your basic training experience.

The final night before basic training, my cousin Vanessa, with whom I grew up, buried her mother. I drove up to Raleigh, North Carolina, that evening and flew out the next day. My mother had wanted me to finish college first, but because I didn't want more student loans, I knew I was doing the right thing.

When I started basic training at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, I wasn't anxious or sad, mainly because I knew what I had to do: follow the mandatory instructions of the training instructors. But if you had grown up with my mother, you'd realize that the orders they barked out were a rehash of what my mother would tell my siblings and me. Mere child's play! I also remember being happy while driving to the base because I was looking forward to shopping on the weekends. There I was on the bus, picking out which stores in the mall I would visit during my days off. Now you know why they say ignorance is bliss.

After I arrived at the basic training site I had to deal with the "pick-'em-up, put-'em-down" of my bags, which I thought was asinine. Then, for some reason, the training instructor started walking towards me. I wondered what he was going to do; I had been following his simple instruction. My saving grace was a fair-complexioned African-American guy whose purple and hot-pink plaid pants completely diverted the TI's attention away from me. To quote Miss Sofia from The Color Purple, "There is a God!"

I never cried, but I watched everyone else cry. I had already experienced being on my own from living five hours from home in college. This is likely why it was fairly easy for me to be away from home.

My basic training lasted from November 1986 to January 1987. The holidays are when the majority of these "macho" men would cry and pine for home. Hmmmm ... imagine being in combat with that crew during a holiday! My gaydar wasn't as fine-tuned then as it is now, but in retrospect, I'm pretty sure I wasn't the only gay one in the bunch.

I flew under the radar at basic training. I followed instructions and stayed out of the line of fire. Besides, the residential "house mouse," the TI's assistant, was a lot more effeminate than I was. If he wasn't a gay suspect, then I couldn't be. Also during basic, one of the guys I had arrived with claimed to have three testicles, and I witnessed another guy drop to his knees to count them personally. Yep, the guy on his knees said to our flight, it was true: Airman Basic "Snuffy" did indeed have three testicles. And they were gonna pick me out of the bunch for being gay?

I was selected for a top-secret clearance, so there were quite a few events and activities that I didn't participate in because I was busy filling out paperwork. I even missed marching in my graduation because there was more paper to fill out. I didn't mind at the time; it was too costly for my family to drive from North Carolina to Texas, anyway.

I do remember a few funny incidents from basic training. They didn't have my tennis shoe size, so I was given shoes one size too small, but I never complained; I didn't want to draw attention. Once when I was standing in formation, a song popped into my head, and I forgot where I was for a moment and started dancing in place before quickly regaining my military composure and falling back into formation. Another morning I ran downstairs without my glasses and ended up getting into the wrong formation. (It was pitch-black outside.) All of a sudden, the formation started to do a side-step maneuver that I had never done before with my formation, but since the step had a rhythm, and I have rhythm, I was able to follow along. After we stopped doing the step, and since it was still dark outside, I quickly tip-toed over to my own flight. Luckily, we were side-by-side that morning. Other than those few little things, I steered clear of trouble and went about the routine of taking basic training one day at a time.

Tell me about your first duty station.

My first duty station was Aviano Air Base, Italy, where I spent three of my most glorious Air Force years. In basic training I was able to create a wish list of places I would like to be stationed. Aviano was my first choice. My time away from home when I was in college or living with relatives in New York City helped prepare me for being on my own in Italy, but I still had a lot to learn about other cultures. I really grew up at my first duty station, and being in Italy gave me a worldly perspective on things.

When I first arrived there, I just tried to fit in like everyone else. On my first foray into the village of Aviano, I went with our admin troop, Emerald. She took me to a club called Etta's. That was the place where the black folk liked to hang out, so that's where we went. Afterwards, we went up to a club called Quarterway (a quarter of the way up the mountain). While observing the scene there, I was approached by a woman who told me that she wanted to have my baby. I thought it was hilarious, but I ignored her.

I didn't attend a gay club in Italy until I had been in country for six or seven months. My initial year or so in Italy—around 1988 or 1989—we in the Weather Station were having a discussion about gays in the military, and one of my senior bosses looked me directly in the eyes and said that he had no problem working with gay people, that some of his best workers were gay. I knew that he knew. But I only responded, "Well, that's good to know," and kept moving forward. After all that, my life on base went on without too much drama; I continued to do my job to the best of my ability.

Really, the only problem I ever had while stationed in Italy involved a base security policeman who would harass me whenever I came through the gate. He had to check my ID card, but he acted as though he didn't want to touch it. I reported him to the Social Actions Office, but he ended up being kicked out of the Air Force for fraudulently enlisting in the military. The ironic thing is that he was friends with a friend of mine who was clearly, recognizably gay. Oh well, life goes on—and so did I.

I met some of my best Italian and American friends, both straight and gay, while stationed in Italy. My straight friends wanted me to hang out with them so they could have a good time, as well. I loved to dance and had no problem getting everyone on the dance floor. I wasn't a party animal, but I knew how to have a good time.

What did you learn from your first supervisor?

I do not recall learning much of anything from my first supervisor; I remember a lot of joking around. I was self-motivated, so the lack of guidance from my supervisor was not a problem. Completing my career development courses was all about learning the most that I could, and I saw it as a competition with other airmen. Everyone wanted to outdo everyone else, and your supervisor expected you to outscore your peers.

Something I learned from experience was always to watch my back. I had noticed that some of my accomplishments were recorded on a roommate's or coworker's performance report instead of mine. (I knew this because I was shown their performance reports.) When I asked how this happened, I was told that that's how things were done. In short, I learned to watch my back and always document my work.

Tell me about military women.

At my first base in Italy, one female in particular kept telling me that she wanted me to be the father of her kids, but obviously nothing ever came of it. I would keep people at a distance, which I considered to be a gift to them. I would never let a woman get close enough to want to be with me. I was more about just having a good time.

Let me point out that I did not cut female airmen any slack—not because I was gay, but because they all wear a uniform. I would help lift something heavy, but I felt that we are all the same and we were all there together. Females had to be proficient in all job-related tasks, just like their male counterparts. I surely wasn't going to fail an inspection because of someone else. If the men were going to get sweaty, so should the women.

Tell me about your first time going to a gay bar while in the military.

I started venturing out to gay bars at my first duty station. I was in Italy for six months when a friend took me to a bar called Edle's. I remember seeing my friend Stephan there, although we weren't friends at the time. A short time later I was formally introduced to Stephan, and we've stay friends to this day. The first gay bar I went to in Italy was called Alcazar—only the second gay club I had ever visited. As the oldest sibling in my family and having come from a small town, I had never really gotten to venture out before.

Tell me about your experience with HIV/ AIDS in the military.

Hmmmmm ... HIV/AIDS in the military. Those were the words no one ever wanted to hear while serving on active duty. Every year, depending upon your time on station or whether you were due to move to another base or go on a deployment, you were tested for HIV. Some unfortunate souls would discover at this crucial time that they indeed were HIV-positive. And as if contracting the disease weren't bad enough, as an active duty member you were required to let your commander know about your HIV status when you got to any new base. Your commander was the only one who needed to know; it was no one else's place to know. In the base hospital, your medical records were filed along with everyone else's, with no special markings to indicate your HIV status. One of the worst things you had to endure was the verification that your HIV status was up to date whenever you made a medical appointment. So those people working in the clinic who didn't know your status? Well, now they did. According to HIPAA, this information was to remain private, but we all know human nature. Rumors do spread beneath the radar.

During my tenure in the Air Force, which began in the mid-eighties as the HIV/AIDS epidemic was really taking off, those letters were like a death sentence to your military career. And if you happened to be stationed overseas at the time, well, once your diagnosis was determined, the military did not give you time to pack up your household goods or say good-bye to anyone. You were hurriedly flown back to the States, to Wilford Hall Medical Center in San Antonio, the Air Force's main hospital for treating HIV/AIDS. This left friends to pack your household goods. (Normally, it was your first sergeant who got to go through your personal effects, although most likely, he or she didn't volunteer for the job.) Such a hurried move back to the States always caused whispering on base; when you're stationed overseas, you tend to be closer to your military brothers and sisters than when you are stationed stateside.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Serving with Honorby Lorenzo L. McFarland Brian E. Markowski T. David Gilmer Kenneth N. Brooks Copyright © 2012 by Dr. Lorenzo L. McFarland with Brian E. Markowski, T. David Gilmer, and Kenneth N. Brooks. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Edition details

• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Publication date: 2012
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1468507575
• ISBN 13: 9781468507577
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 120