I read that book all day: in between patients, during lunch, even snuck into the bathroom for five minutes of uninterrupted blissful reading peace. Once I got off around eight-thirty p.m. I went back to my barracks, showered, then retreated into my sleeping bag not to sleep but to plunge back into The Catcher in the Rye. For once I was thankful that my bunk was cursed with being right next to the door and therefore always basking in the alien green light of an exit sign; that intensely green glowing sign which I normally cursed for its very existence, always contemplating smashing it during the night as it illuminated my face. That night it magnificently lit every word up allowing me to finish before morning. I felt so connected, so full, it was glorious. I didn’t even mind seeing that nauseating face in the morning.
I know now why I read the way I did, I was trying to save myself. I was a low ranking enlisted female stuck on a two mile by three mile guarded base and in most of the minds of the male ran world of the Navy, no one can be dumber and more useless then a low ranking enlisted female. Like Alexie on his Indian Reservation expected by both Indians and non-Indians alike, to be nothing but a dumb Indian, I refused to be some stupid little girl; brainless dimwitted words would not fly out of this mouth. I would not let them make me think that my mind was weak; I would feed my mind with the nourishment of books and words of strength. I would not give in and play a role. I would save me from all of that; I would read with insatiable hunger.
Then it happened: I was noticed for being smart, for picking up on problems and solving them efficiently. Low and behold I was put in charge, me a low ranking enlisted female. At first I thought they’d lost their minds, maybe it was it was the heat. Only they hadn’t and I really was in charge. This did not go over well for some of my higher ranking male counter parts but it didn’t matter to me, like Alexie I refused to fail. I was constantly battling these men, threatened with being charged with petty things like not calling them by their proper rank and showing them the proper respect that they thought they’d earned. They tried to belittle me, question my given authority over them, and sabotage my clinic, yet for all their efforts they never succeeded. I was always one step ahead of them. That’s not to say that at times I wished I just fit in but in the end I knew I didn’t need them, I had books.
