A few of my favorite.... um... films.

For those of you who don’t know, I am what the media would call a cinephile. Get your minds out of the gutter… it means I love movies. Dirty. I can tell you an actors name and at least five movies he has been in. In fact one of my favorite things to do to pass the time is play six degree’s of separation.

I’m good too… I can go from Sir Lawrence Oliver (greatest actor in history) to Haley Joel Osment (the kid from the Sixth Sense) using only two other actors. Oliver was in “Clash of the Titans” as Zeus with Maggie Smith as Hera. Maggie Smith was in both the “Sister Act” movies with Whoopie Goldberg (also known as Caren Johnson… seriously, that’s her birth name). Whoopie was in a movie called “Bogus” with Haley Joel Osment and Gerard Depardieu. See, told you I was good… They used to try to stump me in the navy, but never did.

So I have compiled a list of movies here that I would recommend to pretty much everyone. I like to think during my movies, so if you are a blow-em-up, shoot-em-dead movie lover, this probably won’t be the list for you… Dad!!

My Top 10:

1. “All About My Mother”: This movie is from acclaimed Spanish director Pedro Almodovar. While I would recommend all of his movies because he makes his actors real living people, this movie takes the cake in story line, plot, acting and script. Trust me when I say that you will never find more realistic characters than the ones in this movie. Not to mention that it won best foreign film in 2000. And by the way... that girl in the beige dress is Penelope Cruz and needless to say she absolutely can act in her own language.

2. “Contact”: This movie is long and arduous and really requires that you follow every plot point. The acting is supurb even from Matthew McConaughey. It was written by Carl Sagan who is no doubt one of the smartest rocket scientists of the last century. The plot is fantastical and completely out of this world, aliens send us a message with instructions to build a space travel machine, while still remaining truthful to the human race. With the politics and betrayal in this movie it makes it all the more realistic when I could easily see our current administration pulling some of the cover up tactics detailed in this movie.

A lot of people didn’t like the ending with the father… and I understand them, but I think you should look at the overall movie and the need to make the alien familiar and it makes sense. While watching this movie you begin to feed on the panic and tension and want to know who is out there, as does everyone on the planet. People can be disappointed if you don’t give them what they want, and what they don’t give you in this movie is an easy answer.

3. “Muriel’s Wedding”: This Australian import made me feel so good that I saw it seven times… in the theater. It was one of those movies that I had to take everyone I know to. I don’t know if it was because I saw so much of myself in Muriel or because it was such an outstanding movie. This is the first time I met two of the best actresses alive today: Toni Collette and Rachel Griffiths. Toni went on to be nominated for an Oscar for playing the Jersey mother in “The Sixth Sense” and Rachel went on to star in two very successful tv shows: “Six Feet Under” and “Brothers and Sisters”. It is one of those coming to terms with the life you built yourself and changing it movies. You will laugh through tears.

4. “October Sky”: This was the first time I saw Jake Gyllenhaal. Yeah, ok… total hottie. I didn’t choose this movie, my mom did. I just went along because it had a hot guy on the poster. It is the true story of four boys from a coal mining town in West Virginia in the fifties that single handedly invented a rocket part that got the American Space program off the ground. If you ever get depressed about the state of our world today, I recommend you watch this movie. It is a testament to the everyman and what you can do with support. All in all this and the next movie are on my list because they make me feel good about the human condition. They give the one greatest thing a movie can give you: hope.

5. “Gattaca”: This movie, much like “October Sky” is a movie about the human condition. While October Sky shows us where we have been this movie serves more as a warning for where we will end up if we aren’t more careful. This movie takes place in the not so distant future. It still looks much like the Earth we know today, they have advanced space travel to include manned missions to other planets and they have mapped the entire human genome. Which leads to a question that no human has yet been able to answer properly: If we have the technology and know how to do a thing, does that mean we should do that thing?

The thing in this movie is alter human DNA to make sure that people don’t get diseases, fix bad eyes, know the date, time and cause of your death the moment you are born. It creates a new lower class of people, those with perfect DNA and those who were born “out of love” ( the love children become the new poor class). But human kindness and hope do show their heads before the end of the movie, I promise.

6. “Talk to Her”: Almodovar’s follow up to All About My Mother broke two Oscar records. Almodovar was nominated for Best Director without his movie being nominated for best picture, and for the first time in history a foreign language film won the award for best original screenplay. This is the story of two men that form a friendship while their respective ladies are in a coma together in the same hospital. Some of the things that these men go through and some of the things they put each other through defy description. You probably won’t cry in this movie, but if you are not moved or filled with some emotion at the end of it, I would be greatly surprised.

7. “Hero”: The Jet Li movie, not the Dustin Hoffman/Geena Davis movie. While that one is very good and entertaining the Jet Li movie is remarkable in a couple other ways. First it is by far the most stunningly beautiful movie I have ever seen. At points it transcends martial arts and borders on ballet. The choreography is amazing and the cinematography holds some of the most beautiful images I have ever seen. The way the director uses color to tell the story is also quite unique. The same story is told three times, the first time is a lie and everyone in the flashbacks is wearing red. The second time it is a supposition and everyone is wearing greens and blues. The final time is the truth of the story and everyone is wearing white.

But I have one rule for watching this movie. It is a very important rule. Do NOT rent the American version. That is the version you will find in Blockbuster. Find the original Chinese version, the studio that released it stateside changed the translations and almost ruined the movie. You will know you have the good version if all of the characters at one point say “How Swift Thy Sword”. If you can only find the bad version let me know, I will tell you what the most important line of the movie is. They changed it to the opposite of what it really means in the American version.

8. “V for Vendetta”: This movie surprised the hell out of me. I went into it expecting just your run of the mill comic book movie. I didn’t expect it to hit me so hard. It wasn’t just that out of nowhere there was a small gay storyline that spoke volumes, but it was how real it all seemed. How close to that the world we live in has become. It took bits of actual history and meshed it beautifully into a statement movie. Hitler is there burning down his own building so that they can declare not war, but martial law. Bush is there controlling what we need to know. There is the church telling us not only what to believe, but whom to believe and who to condemn. Cheney is there pulling all the strings. It is at once terrifying and completely unsurprising. And then there is the idea of a man that is all of us, that brings them all to justice.

9. “Reefer Madness”: No, I’m not talking about the 1936 shockumentary here. I am talking about the 2005 movie musical made by Showtime. The cast is outstanding, Alan Cumming, Christian and Neve Campbell, Steven Weber, SNL’s Ana Gasteyer and Veronica Mars herself Kristen Bell. It is a parody not only of the original film, but of the things that followed it in real life, McCarthyism, fundamentalism, racism and various other ethical pathologies. The film does not promote marijuana use, but does play up the absurdity of the arguments that make it appear to be more harmful than, for example, cigarettes, alcohol, heroin. The songs are painfully funny with titles like: Romeo & Juliet, The Stuff, Jimmy Takes a Hit, Lonely Pew, Listen to Jesus Jimmy, The Brownie Song, Little Mary Sunshine, and Tell ‘em the Truth. If you have a free night and need to laugh… rent this.

10. “Yankee Doodle Dandy”: This movie is about my hero. A man that is all but forgotten in today’s entertainment industry. It is about the life of the renowned musical composer, playwright, actor, dancer and singer George M. Cohan. He remains the only actor in history to receive the Congressional Gold Medal for singing and dancing. To this day a statue of him can still be found in Times Square, in fact the only statue of any actor in all of New York. This movie won James Cagney his only Oscar.

It is one scene that never leaves my mind from this movie. I see it every time I walk down a flight of stairs. Near the end of the movie, Cagney is leaving the white house after receiving his award from Roosevelt; he comes to the top of the stairs and starts walking down. Somewhere around halfway down he starts doing this little tap dance. His feet are like butterflies, barely skimming each stair as he descends, somehow tapping his feet somewhere in the vicinity of eight times on each stair. In the making of documentary we learn that this amazing moment was completely improvised by Cagney. It is one of the most amazing pieces of footwork I have ever seen. And some of the other most impressive dances are also in this movie.

10 Movies that didn’t make the cut…Barely:
Last of the Mohicans
Blood in Blood out
Children of Men
Courage Under Fire
Shaun of the Dead
Kung Fu Hustle
Sleepers
Love Actually
Dirty Love
In the Name of the Father

3 Movies every gay man should watch:
And the band played on
Longtime Companion
Beautiful Thing

3 Movies that consistently make me cry:
Running on Empty
Without a Trace
The Color Purple

3 Movies that gave me nightmares:
Legend
It
Grizzly Man

3 Movie Classics everyone should watch:
Captains Courageous
East of Eden
Citizen Cane

Beautiful Boys #04

This is my beautiful friend Gary from Pittsburgh.

Exercises in Folding and Stowage 1

Exercise 1: The T-Shirt fold

In boot camp we used to have these folding and stowing exercises all the time. Each recruit got one third of one stand up locker. In the color portion of the picture below you can see the amount of space that we were supposed to fit all of our uniforms into. For you who think it is no biggie… remember that we were issued 5 pairs of jeans, 5 work shirts, 4 dress uniform tops, 4 dress uniform bottoms, 10 t-shirts, 1 sweater, 2 towels, 10 pairs socks, 5 pairs underwear, 4 pairs of shoes, 1 sweat suit, 2 pair workout shorts, and a canteen, bringing it all up to a grand total of fifty four articles of clothing. Now, if you can see half that in the picture than you are good.

They spent literally three weeks of boot camp teaching us how to fold our clothes and how to stow it so that it took up the least amount of room. What you don’t see in the pictures are the 3 jackets we had, and the socks. We put the socks in net bags and hung them on our racks. There are 2 pairs of shoes in the shot, the dress black shoes and the shower shoes. The other two pairs were kept on top of the locker and on our feet.

They would play some games with us during folding and stowing time. One instructor would be pleasant and tell everyone how good a job they were doing while the other was wreaking havoc on piles of clothes he came across. It got to a point where you would have to get your t-shirt pile checked by both of them and one would say “Outstanding, Excellent fold”… and then you take the exact same stack over to the other DI and he would take it in his hands and scream “What the fuck is this shit??? This is the worst fold job I have ever seen!!! This is what you brought me to be checked??? Go long… Go really long…” And with that he would throw the pile of t-shirts as far as he could… scaring everyone around him.

I found this absolutely hilarious! He and I, of course, felt an immediate kinship. His “job” was to break us down and retrain us. I just needed to be told what to do. So yeah, we got on famously. In fact one of the first things he taught me was how to forge his signature so that I could run to the commissary any time I needed. The most useful thing I learned in boot camp was how to fold a shirt. It is the one thing I still do to this very day. I am going to teach you how to do it.

Folding a shirt in this fashion is an amazing way to save space and to pack. As you can see from the picture below, a shirt folds up very small. I have used a dollar bill to show you a size scale, and remember this is my shirt, so yours will fold up even smaller.

Step 1: Lay the shirt flat out with the front down

Step 2: Fold the sleeves into the body of the shirt, fold in from the arm seam

Step 3: Fold the bottom of the shirt up to the top

Step 4: Fold up from the bottom three times

Step 5: Fold in half

As you can see from the first picture I fold all my shirts this way. I can usually fit 40 t-shirts per drawer by doing it this way. If you are like me and most of your shirts have designs or logo's on them. This is still a great way to fold your shirt because, as you can see in the picture below, you can see the logo of the shirt by looking down at it when it is stacked up-right. Let me know if this helps you at all…

Porn Stars at the watering hole...

As some of you know I am good friends with a guy named Jason. The color of his eyes and the timber of his voice decides whether I am hanging out with Jason or with uber porn star Derrick Hanson. I can always rely on Jason to be the life of the party. He knows everyone... or at least everyone knows him. So anytime I am feeling social but don't want to put work into meeting people I go and hang out with Jason and somehow everyone seems to come to us.


Jason and I met at the famed Eagle Beer Bust several years ago. I think I was the one person in the bar that wasn't trying to molest or sleep with him, so naturally he clung to me. We both like to laugh, and we both love to surround ourselves with a touch of the absurd. In that vein Jason said it would be really funny if we played some drinking games at my place with some friends. I asked what kind of drinking game and this devilish look came over his eyes as he said we should play the porn drinking game.


Now I had never played the porn drinking game before and was not quite sure what was entailed in it. Up to this point in my life porn only had one purpose really. You all know what that is... but to Jason, Porn was a jumping off point and excellent conversation starter. So I called up a couple friends, Kenny and Channing, to come over and play this game with us. Jason brought a 24-pack of beer and a couple of porn's over. I didn't realize until he had loaded the dvd's into the machine that we were about to play drinking games to HIS porn!!!


This was a bit weird at the start for me. We were watching my friend have sex. Once I got over the initial shock of it, Kenny and Channing didn't seem to have any issue with it, I settled back with my beer ready to hear the rules. I am going to tell you the rules now so that should you want to, you can play the game at home whether or not you have your very own porn star to play with. So here goes...

Rule 1: Every time one of the actors gets close to giggling. If you rent some of Jason's earlier work you will get really trashed!!!

Rule 2: Whenever one of the actors looks at the other with the "What the fuck are you doing" look in their eye. My favorite example of this is in "Team Players" when Jason decides that the guy he is with is not as good at topping as he is. So Jason gives him the look and then lays the guy on his back and then Jason proceeds to do all the work.

Rule 3: When body parts fly toward the screen. Sometimes when Jason is the bottom he can lose track of where his toes are. I have seen more toes in his porn than in real life!!!

Rule 4: Pick an actor and figure out what his "Catch-Phrase" is. For Jason it is "Yeah, Fuckin take it". Whenever an actor says his "Catch-Phrase" you drink. An amendment to this rule is, if you cant figure out the catch-phrase you drink whenever the actor repeats the same line more than twice.

Rule 5: Drink whenever you see a loop. What that means is when the director needs to make the screen longer he will take the exact same action from two different camera angles and loop it to make it look like one much longer scene.

Rule 6: Drink whenever one of the actors looks at the camera. Again, Jason's amateur work you get some of this... but once he goes professional that kind of this stopped. But if you like amateur this rule will get you totally plastered.

Rule 7: I know this sounds gross... but drink whenever someone gets spit on. Happens more than you realize!!!

Rule 8: Drink if you recognize the location either from real life or from another movie. The most fun I had with this one was when I realized I was watching a scene filmed in Jason's parents house on their pool table.

Rule 9: At the climax, during the "Money Shot" drink once for every time they show it in repeat or slow motion after the fact. This is the most dangerous rule because some directors will put several repeats. And depending on how many people are in the scene, you could get seriously drunk!

Rule 10: Make sure you play this game with several other people. I have found that it is not quite as fun alone!!! And if at all possible you should try and have a porn star at your party.

Jason said he is more than willing to attend more porn parties!!!! If your lucky he will come dressed like this...

My Disgrace: 168 days in Hell

168 days in Hell

So there I was... after two years on my boat I was sent to a new command and I was not to have any contact with anyone on the boat. TPU is normally a place for sailors to go while waiting to go somewhere else. For example, if a girl that is assigned to a boat gets pregnant she is assigned to TPU until she delivers and then she can be transfered back to the boat. Or if someone gets to San Diego but their assigned boat is underway somewhere, they go to TPU and wait for the boat to get back. It is transient, for people passing through.

TPU Disciplinary isn't much different. We would go work out on the base during the day, doing the odd jobs that didn't exactly belong to anybody, but still needed to be done. And then we would go back to the barracks. The barracks were actually just like boot camp. Two very long wide rooms with about fifty bunk beds and fifty lockers. All privacy goes out the door. They don't want to make it comfortable. They don't want anyone to stay too long. So like the regular TPU, this barracks was also filled with transients... the only difference, really, was destination location. These people were not waiting to get to their ship. They were waiting for punishment of some kind or another. Be it discharge, restriction or brig. Some of them were pretty cool people, but some of them were clearly nuts. I did however meet some quality people. If you remember Caanan from my Beautiful Boys #1. I met him there. That was the only redeeming quality.

Right next door to TPU was NCIS, and my boats MAA informed them of the investigation that I was involved in and so they routinely pulled me in for questioning. Just like with the MAA they asked me questions they had no right to ask me. And I refused completely to help them with their investigation. It was pretty clear that they had already spoken to Greene and that he had told them I had nothing to do with it. They were focusing their attention on this Dustin person that actually committed the crime. I was under investigation for Conspiracy to commit sodomy, accomplice to rape, contributing to the delinquency of a minor and several other things. These charges were what the people on the boat were told I had done.


It took them 3 months to get to it, but when they finally informed me of the date of my captains mast (one step down from court martial) I felt like I was ready to face them. The charges ended up being false official statement, requesting another to commit an offense and leaving place of duty. They had tried to throw the book at me and failed. Although they did charge me with crimes that had been removed from the uniform code of military justice more than twenty five years before.

The day of my captains mast I got dressed in my nicest uniform, my dress whites. They had been cleaned, pressed and my shoes polished. All my medals (more than anyone else of my rank on my ship) were polished and pinned to my lapel. The duty van came and picked me up and brought me to my ship. For the first time since I had been removed from my ship, I was allowed on board, and got to see my shipmates. If you have ever been in trouble with the law you can imagine the feelings I was going through. I was brought downstairs to the library and asked to stand at parade rest outside the door until I was summoned. The MAA approached me and started talking to me. I ignored him completely, which I'm sure angered him to no end, but that guy was not only an unimaginable prick, he was one of those people that once they get the slightest taste of power they become drunk with it.

After about twenty minutes of waiting I was asked to come inside. I was told to stand on a spot about five feet from the captain (his name was Liggett, and he was one of two people that I ever experienced having problems with gays during my service). To my left was the MAA and the executive officer, and to my right was my entire chain of command. BM1 Manns, Chief Damien, LT Keefer, and LTCDR Bastafka. It began with the MAA reading off all the charges. When he was done, I was asked if I understood the charges, and I said yes, with the exception of two. I don't remember exactly what they were, but my lawyer had prepared me well. The two charges I objected to had been removed from the UCMJ and were therefore no longer crimes.

Captain Liggett said "Well, I'm sure he meant this charge and that charge..."

To which I replied "He may have meant this charge and that charge, but that is not what he has charged me with. Last time I checked you cant charge people for committing crimes that are not illegal."

The captain looked at me for a moment in what could only have been amused disbelief and then said "It doesn't matter that you say they have been removed, I am the captain and I am going to charge you with those crimes."

"Captain, should you choose to go ahead and charge me with non-existent crimes, I will have your decision overturned on appeal. Here are the pages of the UCMJ where those crimes used to be and you can clearly see that they were removed." I handed him the photocopies my lawyer had given me, he glanced at them, glanced at the MAA, and said that we were going to move ahead with the proceedings and this would get ironed out after.


He asked me to explain what had happened and I told him about being questioned in the hallway where everyone could hear. I told him about his MAA breaking the don't ask don't tell law. And I told him that what had happened between Greene and Dustin was between them, and that if he had been raped he had one hell of a funny way of showing it. He wanted to know about Dustin, and still I refused to tell him anything. At that he turned to my chain of command and asked them each to give their opinion of me as a sailor and he asked them for a recommendation of what to do.

BM1 Mans went first: "While I haven't been on board very long I have observed Kroll at work and he seems to get the job done." He was the only person that stood up for me. The chief, who I had had several heart to hearts with, and whom I trusted, stabbed me in the back while lying to my face.

"Kroll is a terrible sailor. You should remove him from the navy." This statement was echoed by LT Keefer, my division officer. Almost word for word, the two of them lied.

At this point, my disbelief was so palpable that I actually smiled a little. Captain Liggett saw it and asked "Do you think this is funny, Kroll?"

I looked at him and said "No sir, this is not funny. This is sad, and pathetic."

"What is?" he asked.

"It is sad that these men have so little honor that they would sell their integrity just to look good for you. It is pathetic that they feel they can lie without any repercussion or aforethought, just because they think it is what you want to hear."

"Calling people who out rank you names, will not help your cause here, Kroll. You are to give these men your respect." I had been looking at the men that had just betrayed me, but at these words I turned back to the captain.

"You tell me I am too blindly follow these men's orders and give them respect? Why would I give them an ounce of respect when they clearly think that the Navy values of Honor, Courage and Commitment are nothing but some fancy words? They just lied to your face, and all you can say is respect them." At this I turned to the Chief, who I felt had betrayed me the deepest and I asked him to clarify some things for me.

"Chief, you just said that I was a terrible sailor. Do you want to refine that statement at all? No? Then answer me this, why am I the highest ranking seamen in your division? Or better yet, why did you give me all those jobs if you thought I was so horrible? Are you in the habit of giving bad sailors the best jobs? If I was so bad why did you make me line captain, or Master Lee Helmsmen, Paint Locker PO, Flight Crew, Damage Control Maintenance Man. Why did you give me permission to spend my time working on getting my ESWAS qualifications? Why did you let me spend all that time in medical so I could get my quals for Corps School? Why did you have me get qualified for watches that were not only above my rank, petty officer of the watch, but which I would never stand, Officer of the Deck?"


At that I turned back to the captain and said "Does that sound like I am a terrible sailor, or does it sound like you just got lied to?"

Captain Liggett narrowed the little slits he called eyes and he said to me "Seamen Kroll, you just disrespected several ranking officers in my presence. Do you want to elaborate on what a good sailor you are? I am finding you guilty of all charges. You will forfeit $200 a month for two months, be reduced in rank to Seamen Apprentice, you will be given extra duty and put on restriction at TPU for 40 days. I will also be dishonorably discharging you from the Navy. You will now turn and return to the hallway and wait to be escorted back to TPU."

"Yes sir, and Captain, this is my notice to inform you that I will be appealing your decision. Unlike these people here, I still have my integrity and I came prepared to defend it." With that I turned and marched out of the room and waited in the hallway. The people in the room started filing out behind me and the Chief stopped in front of me and said "Kroll..."

"I will not be responding to you any more chief. I will have no more of your lies." With that he snapped his mouth shut and walked away. BM1 Manns stood there watching him go. "Kroll, I'm sorry this is all happening to you, truly. But I think what the Chief was going to say is that your future is not here. You were never meant to be a military man, you have a lot more going for you than the people here. I think the Chief just wanted to get you out so that you can start your real life." With that the MAA came out and escorted me to the duty van, which took me back to TPU. They put me on restriction for about five days until the appeal was formally lodged and then I went back to normal duty.

Being in TPU wasn't all bad. The CO of TPU took a special interest in my case because she saw that I was always impeccably dressed, I always passed my inspections with outstanding's and I was always reliable in the jobs I was assigned. One day not long after my captains mast she stopped in front of me during inspection. "Kroll, your uniform is clean and ironed. The creases are all in the right places and you have a very high gloss on your shoes. Yet another outstanding uniform inspection. About your situation with your boat, I think that you are being railroaded. While I have no authority to change any of that, I can make your time here go as easily as possible. And one thing I will promise you is that if they do kick you out, I will make sure it goes as quickly and easily as possible. When they finally officially transfer you to my command I will have you out of here and back in the civilian world in less than three days. Does that sound good to you?"

To which my stunned response was "Yes mam, thank you very much."

For another two months I fought my boat. To help my appeal along I wrote a very long scathing letter. I felt completely betrayed by my command and so felt that it was my obligation to make things as difficult for them as they were making it for me. In this letter I stated that I had been harassed and called a fagot so many times that I was always in a state of fear for my life while I was there. I then proceeded to list the name, rank and date of every person on my boat that had broken the Don't ask, Don't tell rule and when they did it. I asked for justice, and that an example be made to show that it was more than just a paper law.

When I finished this letter I sent it to everyone I could possible think of. I sent it to my congresswoman, my senator, the vice president (I couldn't send it to Bill because technically he was in my chain of command and that would get me in even more trouble), the national press syndicate, civil rights attorney Gloria Alred, my family attorney, my JAG attorney, and finally I sent a copy to my captain.

At the end of April I got a summons from the new Executive Officer on my boat. He was new to this whole situation and wanted to get it all from the horses mouth. Again I got into my best uniform and waited for the duty van. When I got to the boat I was escorted into the officers quarters where the XO has his office. He called me in and I stood against the wall in what was a very small office. He looked at me for a moment and then asked me if I could please explain this letter to him. I asked what he meant, since in my mind the letter seemed pretty self explanatory. He asked me about my captains mast and the things I had said there. I didn't know what to think of this guy since he was so calm. Unlike most of the other officers I had experienced this guy seemed to have a firm grasp on logic. After the question and answer portion he finally asked me if I wanted out of the military.

I think it was the first time someone had actually asked me that and expected an honest answer. It took me a moment, but I finally decided to open up to him. I told him "I did want out of the military, since the day I joined. But I had put my name on that enlistment form of my own free will. That was the only reason I had stayed in the navy. I put my name on that piece of paper and promised to defend my country to the best of my abilities. I had plenty of reasons and plenty of opportunities to get out, but I didn't. My name is my word, it is my bond of integrity, by putting my name on that paper I made a promise and my name is only as good as the promises I keep."


I then went on and told him that the Shiloh had put a stain on my name with innuendo, rumor and irresponsibility. "If that is the state that our military is in, where people can lie with no consequences. Where power hungry people have no checks put on them, and where one lie can spin so far out of control that it starts ruining people's lives, than I suppose my answer is yes, I want out of the navy."

"Ok. I will let you out of the military, and I will give you a general under honorable discharge. You will still have to do your time on restriction, but the day your restriction is over you will be processed out and released from service. Does that sound amenable to you?" He gave me what I was fighting for, and so my only response was "Yes sir."

I went back to TPU and went back on restriction. While I was on restriction the USS Shiloh officially transfered me to TPU, and true to her word as soon as TPU got all my paper work the CO of TPU expedited my release. I was about six days short of finishing my restriction when the CO of TPU said that my restriction was over and I needed to go to all the standard end of service appointments. Three days after that I was discharged from the United States Navy. I got in my car with everything I owned and after a brief stop at my parents house, I drove the 5 north to San Francisco.

My disgrace: The day the music died

December 8th 1999:

I was on the boat that night, not really sure what I wanted to do. It was a Wednesday night and I had to work the next day so I couldn't do anything crazy. I had made friends with a couple of the new guys in my division on the boat. I was pretty sure one of them was very gay (Greene), the other one was just so cute and I figured he liked gay guys cuz I was gay and he knew and he still liked me and wanted to hang out (Romanowski). I ran into another friend of mine on the dock that I knew from the gay bars (Dustin) and he said we could all chill at his place that night if we wanted. So the four of us were off, we stocked up on liquor and movies, including a couple porno's, and went over to Dustin's house.

All in all the night went by pretty uneventful. Romanowski and I were just a couple gigglers and Dustin and Green were doing this weird whose-more-manly thing, also know as flirting. It was a fun night. When it became apparent that Green wasn't really a drinker, we picked him up and took him to Dustin's bedroom and put him to bed. The three of us stayed up for another hour or so and then finally we all went to bed. Dustin to his room to watch Greene and Romanowski and I into the other bedroom. Some time passed while we fooled around a bit and then Dustin came bursting in saying that Greene was having involuntary personal protein spills... all over his good sheets!!!

Dustin and I helped him up and put him directly into the shower. He still had his boxers on when we turned the water on him. He sobered up a little bit almost at once. When he was talking coherently we turned the water off and helped him out. He sat on the floor giggling, and asked for some dry underwear which Dustin ran to get. We helped him change and then all four of us went back to bed. The next morning the four of us got up with heads pounding. We all sat around the kitchen table and tried to eat something while giving a recap of the previous night. Greene and Dustin seemed to be getting on fantastically. They were touching knees under the table like you do with someone you like. After breakfast and what seemed like Greene and Dustin taking a long time to get dressed, we managed to make our way back to the boat. That is when everything exploded.


Greene was still drunk and he passed out as soon as we got back to the boat, missing the morning muster. When the chief heard that Greene was sleeping and that was why he missed muster he headed straight down to give him a good yelling at. Neither of them had come back by the time we were given our assignments and I figured that Greene had been yelled at and Chief had gone on to other things. I was doing my maintenance work in one of the main hallways inside the ship when the Chief Master at Arms (the cop of the boat, basically) approached me. He started asking me about this Dustin person that I had hung out with the night before. I asked why he wanted to know and he said in a rather loud voice, so that anyone else in the hallway would hear, that this Dustin person had raped Greene the previous night. When I told him that he most certainly did not, the MAA got even angrier. He started talking about Faggots and what happens to them in the military and then in accusing tones he said I had to tell him everything about what happened.

I had gotten pretty riled up during this tirade, and when he put it to me like he was ordering me to disclose not only who Dustin was but whether or not he was a faggot. I stood up straight, dwarfing him in the process, and said that he could go directly to hell and while he was there he could direct his ignorant illegal questions to my attorney. Then, while he was still in shock at being talked to that way, I turned and walked away from him. That day turned out to be an all around nightmare. At lunch instead of the usual time to eat and relax, our division officer forced us all to go on a mile and a half run. If you know me, you know that running is probably my least favorite thing in the world.

By the time we got back to the boat after the run everyone but the die hards were pretty exhausted. We all started walking toward the gangway to get back on the boat when our LT. said that we were going to do the same run again, right now. I turned back to him to see if I had heard him right, as did everyone. He was totally serious. So the division started filing back onto the pier to run again, with one exception. I was done running. I turned toward the boat and kept walking to the gangway. He called my name and I pretended that I didn't hear him. When I didn't respond he ran over to cut me off.

"Where are you going?" he asked

"To eat lunch" I responded, trying as hard as I could not to scream.

"We are doing this run again, right now. The entire division, and that includes you, so come on..."

"No."

"Excuse me?"

"The navy requirement is that I be able to run a mile and a half, which I just did. I am not skipping lunch, and I am not running another mile and a half."

"Yes, you are. That is an order. We are a team and we will do this as a team."

"Sir, you can go fuck yourself. It's not one for the navy and one for you. I am going back on the boat, eating lunch, and then going back to work."

If he had a response to that, I never heard it. That was when the MAA saw me on the pier and came running.

"Kroll, what the hell are you doing off the boat?"

"I was running with my division, why?"

"Because the Officer of the Deck has orders not to allow you to leave the boat. You need to come with me, right now."


So without another look back at my LT I walked to the gangway, onto the boat and down to the MAA's office. I had no idea what was going on now. He sat me down in his office doing his best Nazi impersonation, and started questioning me again. And again I told him that if he wanted to talk to me about legal matters he could consult my attorney for I had nothing to say to him. It felt good defying this man who seemed to think that he could do whatever the hell he wanted. For one brief moment I belonged to me again. We sat there in silence, him filling out papers, and me arms crossed waiting.

Finally he looked up at me and asked if I was going to tell him anything. I told him that Greene was lying through his teeth if he says he was raped. He asked if I had anything more substantial to say, and I said yeah, attorney. Then he picked up a stack of paperwork, stapled it and told me to follow him. We went down to the berthing that I called home and he asked me to take him to my rack and my locker. Once there he asked to see my seabag and when I got it out, he said "fill it".

"With what?" I asked

"All your belongings" he said. I looked at him in confusion and his reply was "as of today you are to be removed from this ship and placed under disciplinary restriction in the Transient Personnel Unit Disciplinary Barracks." What the fuck!!

So while people filed around in the berthing trying to figure out what was going on, I packed everything I owned into that seabag. When I was packed the MAA took me up to the quarterdeck and entered into the log book that Kroll had been disembarked from the USS Shiloh and was on temporary assignment to TPU Disciplinary Barracks.

It took me a few days to get my feet back on the ground. I was so thrown for a loop when it came to what to do. The first thing I did was go to the JAG office and get myself an attorney. I explained everything, carefully leaving out the part the morning after that looked like two lovers reliving the night before. NCIS came to question me, and again I told them they could speak to my attorney. It all got very tense. The rumor mill on the boat had started flying. The worst and most widely believed was that I raped Greene. So anytime I ran into someone from my boat I got an evil eye. When it was someone I considered a friend that gave me the cold shoulder I would be pissed and yell at them saying "Seriously? You think I raped that fuckwad? Him? If I could rape someone, why on earth would I have chosen him?" Not a very convincing argument I know, but it was all I could think of. I mean, he wasn't an attractive guy, to me at least.

My disgrace: Preamble

All the pictures in this post are of the USS Shiloh (CG-67). This is the boat I was assigned to while in the Navy.

I have told this story a thousand times so I figured I would finally write it down. This is the story of how exactly I got the boot from the military. I will do a little catch up for those of you who didn't even know I was in the military.

Preamble:

I joined the Navy September 17th, 1997. I joined for one very specific reason; to save myself. After high school I was a very lazy boy. I didn't want a job. I was pissed off a lot. I couldn't afford to go to college so I just pissed around and did a lot of nothing. I had several jobs that all sucked and that I always left prematurely. I didn't really like work you see (nothing changed there, I still don't like having to work!). My parents, not knowing what else to do, finally gave me the boot from the familial manse. I hopped around between abandoned apartments, friends living rooms, and anywhere else I could find to sleep. There were a few nights when yes, I actually did sleep on the streets.

I hated my life and I knew I was on a path to an early death or prison. I was a wreck and even when I did get jobs I couldn't keep them. My life seemed to be stuck in a bad after school special. My parents would let me come back for spans of time after I would cry and tug at every one of my Mom's heart strings. But these were usually short lived because once I got back into the house I would sit around and do nothing. I faked it well though. I told my dad that I had a job at a store in the mall and when he came home from his morning route I would either hide in the garage or run out saying I was on my way to work. In actuality I would go to the mall and sneak into the theater and watch all the movies two or three times, or until enough time had passed that I could pretend that I had worked a full day. Told you, pathetic.


Well they always caught on eventually. After a couple years of this cycle I finally got that I needed to do something drastic or it would be too late. I was in a very ugly downward spiral that would not end well for me. I started seriously thinking about what I could do. I couldn't hold down a job, my parents were always on the verge of kicking me out, and that was when it came to me. Shortly before my 22nd birthday I went down to the Navy recruiters office and signed my name on the dotted line. That night was a very intense night in the house. Both Mom and Chuck thought it was one of the worst things I had ever done. Mom couldn't get it out of her head that gay people die in the military at the hands of their shipmates (it didn't help that some made for tv movie about that very thing had just been on tv). Chuck thought it was a bad idea because he didn't think I could handle it, and he too, didn't want to see me hurt or even killed. Remember my parents are hippies, my Mom's response when I told her was "I knew I should have listed you as a conscientious objector when I had the chance".

Well, I went anyway. And there are a lot of fantastic stories, a lot of great port visits, some amazing people and some horrible times that I could tell you about. But the one story that beats all the others, and the one I use to dissuade people from joining the military is about how I got kicked out. And just for those of you who think it was because I am a total MO, you are wrong.

A little story, part 3

The little boy was having a hard time adjusting once he was released. He felt unrelated to everyone. It seemed to him that in one year the entire world had changed, and he felt as if he had slept through it.

He still had no friends, his parents were more worried than ever, and his Big Brother was no longer interested in him at all. He became a quite and impenetrable wall to everyone. He no longer cooperated with therapists, they had destroyed his trust. He no longer trusted anyone but himself. The school he had gone to eventually refused to allow him back and expelled him. But the loving parents arranged home schooling so that the boy would not be without. The parents had no idea what to do anymore, they were at the end of the line. They lived in a small town with only 700 people and the only junior high school in the area refused to let the little boy back in.

So in April of 1989 when Grandma got sick, it appeared to everyone to be a blessing in disguise. The loving parents decided that it was time to disappear from their lives and start over completely somewhere new, and hopefully this would give the boy the chance to begin new with a clean slate. May first 1989 the boy and his Big Brother got on a plane alone and flew to California to meet up with Mom who had flown out a month earlier to take care of grandma and get herself settled. Dad took a job playing for soldiers in Europe, so when he took the boys to the airport they all seemed to go their own separate ways.

The boy was thrilled that he could be anyone he wanted this time and no one from his old life would follow him here. He couldn’t wait to start a new school that he might actually stay at long enough to get some real friends. On registration day, Mom took the boy to school and registered him directly into the special education classes. The boy’s heart sank back into despair. It seemed the end of his clean slate and the beginning of a whole new level of torture. He managed to barely make it through the first year of high school. He tried to make himself as invisible as possible so that no one would ever remember him, should he come back to this school again.

During the summer, he and his Big Brother had a little bit of a reprieve. They hung out a lot and went to the pool together all the time and Mom and Dad would even let them go all the way to the beach by themselves. That summer was one of the best that the boy ever knew. When it came time to register for school for sophomore year, Mom took the boy again to the school, and was about to register the boy into special education again. The boy stopped and said to his mother: “if you make me take those classes for one more day, I will drop out of school. This is no new start, it is the same thing somewhere new, and I will not do it again.”

This was very brave of the boy because he was terrified of what she would say. This was the first time he could remember that he had taken a stand for himself and went against what his parents thought was best for him. His Mom looked at him in that way she has and said “Do you really think you can handle a normal class schedule?”

“yes, I can. And even if it the hardest thing I will ever do, I will do it because I have never wanted anything as much as to be normal and be in the normal kids classes.” And she said ok, and the boy began his new start a year late. With luck he had made very little impression his first year, and when the second year rolled around he became a good student and excelled in his studies. He was on his way to being what he had always dreamed of being; normal.

A little story, part 2

Not long after the Big Brother stopped playing with the boy a lot of trouble started rolling down the hill to find the boy.

When it came to home, the boy had a pretty regular if not storybook family and home life. Mom and Dad loved them both, and gave them everything they could afford on their meager salary. They didn’t want for much.

School on the other hand was an entirely different matter all together. The boy had been in special education since the very first grade. That was a recommendation from his therapists that he had been seeing since the age of three. When the boy was still a baby in diapers and Mom had not Found Dad yet, Mom had a boyfriend named Richard. One day while Mom was at work, Richard had to change the boy’s diaper. Richard was a strong man, and when he pulled the boys leg up to put the new diaper under the boy, he accidentally broke the boy’s leg.

That would not have been that bad, but then he didn’t tell anyone about it and a week went by before the mother noticed that anything was wrong. The Doctors were very angry with her and threatened to take the boy away from her for being a bad mother. Needless to say, Richard was no more after that…

But the long term repercussions of that event haunted the boy until he was a middle aged man. Everything that went wrong with his life seemed to start with that one act.

Now back to the story at hand… When the boy found himself alone and without a friend to keep him company he started to misbehave, as boys often do. He started getting into fights at school, and breaking into peoples houses. He even got assault charges filed against him. His Mom and Dad didn’t know what to do with him any more and so they took him to a new Doctor. This new Doctor said that the boy should try a little inpatient care.

He explained that there was a hospital that the boy could put himself into to get the help he needed. This hospital was a voluntary place and the boy would only be there for two weeks. He made it sound like a little vacation, and so the boy and his parents decided that it would be best for all of them if they did this. Little did they know that the name of the hospital was Ft. Logan Mental Institution and that the two week stay was only the evaluation period.

The Boy ended up staying there for 8 months, one of those 238 days was the boys 12^th birthday. The boy didn’t feel quite at home in his home again for a very long time.