The Big Schnitzel~Outflanking the Corps with the Coffee-call Commandos of the KAB

By Steve Smith

Every soldier's tour had its share of obtuse NCOs, chickenshit details, and those exquisitely torturous and endless waits best characterized in the ironic phrase, "Move around all you like, but keep one foot in place." This belated salute is for you disgruntled veterans who have known the joys of KP, guard duty in the rain, GI'ing latrines, hikes in the humid Georgia boonies, and above all, Army chow, a scourge to eye, nose and palate which will forever live . . . in infamy.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Steve Smith
• Release date: Oct 13, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463545799

Steve Smith

Steve Smith (March 11, 1962–March 13, 2019) served overseas with the International Mission Board (SBC) for eighteen years, helping initiate a Church Planting Movement (CPM) among an unreached people group in East Asia, and then coached, trained, and led others to do the same throughout the world. Upon his retirement from IMB in 2016 until his death, Steve served simultaneously as the Vice President of Multiplication for East-West Ministries, as a Global Movement Catalyst for Beyond, and as a co-leader of the 24:14 Coalition.

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Preface

You want me to talk at this dingus here? Just say anything I want so long as its about . . .? Okay. Whatever you say, mister. It's your nickel. So, whosever out there listenin, this here is a interduction to a book what I'm told is funny, and that's why I was chose for the job. Name's Huck Finn. Huck for Huckleberry, which I hate, so just call me Huck.

You don't know me without you has read some books Mr. Sam Clemens wrote a while back. Mr. Clemens gave me permission to engage in this, what he called a visitation, though I don't have no notion what that means. He said bein in a book that people read and enjoy gives you a kind of immortality, so I guess that's supposed to explain it all.

Anyway, I stepped out of the pages of the book with my name on it, and Whango! here I am. Tom Sawyer and me we call Mr. Clemens Langhorn cause he has some funny notions, but the old feller takes it well. Besides, he's been hit kinda hard what with losin his daughter and all, so we try to cheer him up with our Abe Lincoln imitations.

Anyway, for those of you who ain't read the other two books by this Smith feller about his time in the Army, I'll try to give you some background. So, this all takes place back in 1960, which was peacetime, or close to it. According to Smith the Army was taking a snooze as there waren't much of anything goin on where howitzers and bayonet charges was needed. He got bored with all that tame book learnin at this here school out in Texas and went off to enlist, which means sign up, because sooner or later he would have to give hisself over to the military anyway. He spent his first eight months at places like Fort Benning and Fort Gordon, which is both in Georgia, and then got shipped over to Germany, a place which I'm told is in Europe. I got no idea where that is. And ask me if I care.

He was there for about two weeks in this one burg called Swinefurt, which means Pig City, if you can believe that, then got hisself transferred to a music band and started toting around a trumpet horn and tooting sour notes in this town called Kitzingen, which ain't much bigger than my home town of Hannibal. This was tole about in his first book which is named Single Striper. Don't go askin what that means, either.

Anyway this band he joined was a unruly bunch that didn't go by the rules, which upset the Army people supposed to be in charge. They couldn't do much about it though because one guy who played a tubing or tubat in the band lived next door to the U.S. President, Mr. D. D. Eisenhower, in another small place called Gettysburg, which is up north in the colder parts.

This guy got letters from Mr. Eisenhower up at the White House? That's in Washington at some district or other, and it kinda scared the high-up officers in the command and they started smilin and wringin their hands and kissin the guy's rump.

Well that didn't happen really, but they did give the guy and the band he was in a lot of freedom, which the Army don't do often. See, they was afraid he'd go whinin' to the old boy in the White House causing their careers to go bust, and that turned out to be a mistake. But you have to read that book to get the picture. And you should cause it's pretty funny. I didn't read it myself, but my pal Tom read it out loud and we got to laughing pretty hard at all the crazy stuff that went on.

Anyway that book is called Close Enough for Jazz, and I don't know what the hell that means either. Maybe my Aunt could tell me cept I don't wanna go near her right now.

And folks, I do wonder about this here author, cause he jumped from this higher school he war at and decided to go into the Army? (pause). The Army?

Well, I'd have to be hard up and out of pipe tabacky somethin fierce afore I'd join any damn Army. And I aint got no interest in crowdin my brain with stuff you get outta books, either. I got better things to do. Can't see no use in it anyway, cept glorifyin yourself. Fact is, though, this writer don't seem to have no grand notions like that. He's just an ordinary, passably decent-lookin guy what likes to observe things and people. Though he don't smoke none, which you gotta wonder about. Anyway, he decided one day to write down what he observed and make a book or two about them. And that's what you got in your hand right now. And I hope you paid for it—dang fool took some fifty years to finish it.

I better tell you that at the end of that jazz book just before this, Smith was leavin the band after nine months of tootin a horn and gettin into all kinds of mischief, because the baseball season was startin. Now I ask you, what the hell is baseball I'd like to know. And how does it come to have a season? Anyway this guy wrote a whole damn book about it, so I guess there must be somethin to it.

Maybe you modern-day folks will know what its all about and even enjoy it some. As for me, I'm headin out before my Aunt catches wind of me and makes me take a bath. Hell, I already had one last Spring. So, uhh, I guess that's all?

Yep, that's all they wanted me to say, just that this is a humdinger of a book. So, where do I go for my fifty cents?

——~~——

Like Huck said, this book continues my peacetime Army adventures begun with Single Striper and followed by Close Enough for Jazz. Having left the band for the post ball team and a new set of wacky adventures, I kept up with the bandsmen of the KAB as they continued to subvert the peace with their signature nonchalance, while living in sweet domesticity with my dear little Dane, Birthe, and milling around on the mound for the Kitzingen ball team.

Sonata in J sharp minor

for Sousaphone and Louisville Slugger

Smith, show some life out there. You're not tooting a flute in the damn band anymore. Show some hustle.

—Sgt/Coach Carlos Santos

Chapter 1

Harvey Barracks, Kitzingen, GY

Home of the Red Sox

Each year in mid-April, dressing in a flannel uniform and jogging out on the luxurious green turf of a ball diamond always sent a rush of excitement through me. Though there was still a nip in the air, Spring was on the horizon and the competition to come stirred me to the core. Nothing in life could match baseball for the sheer animal pleasure derived from using your major muscle groups to their maximum—form and execution, grace and power, eye and brain, quickness and accuracy in response—all one’s physical and mental attributes were engaged and tested, sometimes riskily, and the kid in me exulted in the challenge.

Sgt Carlos Santos, the coach, was a lefty pitcher/outfielder and good hitter. During a tryout in Puerto Rico, Carlos had been offered a professional contract with the Washington Senators, but had opted instead for the security and travel of military life.

Practice was twice a day, at ten and two for a total of four hours. We eight pitchers trying out for the team were put on a strict running regimen—ten to twelve wind sprints of forty yards each for the first two weeks.. I soon found myself running alone because it was hard to sprint when laughing at something fellow pitchers Eric Reichel or Jim Robinson said. And then the group would slow down having run thirty yards or so.

Knowing that leg conditioning and good lungs were what helped a pitcher keep his stuff through nine innings, I didn’t stint on this part of practice. And I knew Santos was watching. As a veteran NCO he was familiar with all forms of shirking and knew when we were only going through the motions.

Having finished our wind sprints, we pitchers positioned ourselves about ten feet apart and flipped baseballs to each other using only our wrists to propel the ball. We were not to throw at all for the first week and after that only gradually in a program that would have us throwing light batting practice in two or three weeks. We would not throw hard until after four weeks. This was to counter the tendency to develop sore arms or shoulder problems while it was still fairly cold, setting one’s conditioning regimen back a few weeks.

Before closing off the afternoon workout, Santos clustered the pitchers at shortstop. Taking us one at a time he hit ground balls to one side that we had to chase down, though they were usually past us as we neared them. Before we collected ourselves he hit one far to the other side that we ran for and usually missed as well. This was repeated until we were unable to whistle. Santos knew when we were faking exhaustion, so the drill continued until we moved with a rubber-legged stagger. He had watched us running wind sprints and knew who was dogging it.

The workouts were far more grueling than anything I'd ever experienced and put basic training to shame. Yet I was filled with a quiet exhilaration to be readying myself to play baseball in an organized venue where I might get the most out of my right arm, which I had long felt was the single natural gift that defined who I was and set me apart from my peers . . .

Behind my lifelong passion for the game and the hopeful notion that I was destined to be a ballplayer lay my dad's own shelved dreams of a baseball career. A muscular five-ten, he was hitting the ball with power from both sides of the plate in a semi-pro league in Central Iowa when love detoured him into early fatherhood and gainful employ.

When I came along four years later, he was a devoted husband working for the El Paso post office, where he labored for twenty-eight years, retiring as a day-shift supervisor. When I reached ten he was playing church league softball and hitting towering left-handed shots over the right-field lights that disappeared into the deep gloom beyond while still rising. At such moments, Mom and I, watching from the bleachers along the third base line, would lunge to our feet and shriek with excitement. After the game Mom would tilt her head against Dad's shoulder and say, Ken, that was just splendid.

While Dad drove us home wearing a smile, Mom would caress his arm with a rueful expression. I learned much later that this was her way of sympathizing with him over giving up his dream of becoming a professional baseball player to make a life with her.

Maybe Dad had hopes that I might pick up the baton where he dropped it because he became a fine coach, patient and encouraging despite my slow development. Upon coming home from work at the post office each day he would scoop up our gloves and say, C'mon kid, let's throw a few. Following this evening ritual, we'd check the box scores of the previous day's major league games to see who had done better, my idol Stan Musial, or Dad's favorite, Ted Williams.

Even at supper, to Mom's sighs of dismay, the topic of conversation usually turned to baseball. One evening while forking a slab of breaded liver onto his plate, Dad said, Three fifty-six.

Ken, no, snapped my exasperated mother.

Shoeless Joe, I answered off-handedly. Lifetime BA. Too easy, Pop.

Growing up in the twenties when Ruth, Sisler, Gehrig and Goslin were hitting the ball all over the lot, Dad kept scrapbooks of their exploits and knew the statistics of all the big-name players. I studied his scrapbooks behind his back and eventually knew players' numbers almost as well. To stump him I memorized stats for such unlikely players as Shags Horan, Pickles Dillhoefer and Footsie Blair. Then I'd spring them on him.

Okay, Dad, what was Doc Ozmer's lifetime won/loss record.

"Doc Ozmer. Where'd you dig him up? Who'd he play for?"

The A's in '23. He pitched 2 innings. Went O and O lifetime. And Dad would chuckle about that for hours.

Once I fed Mom numbers on the sly. Then at supper, while Dad had a mouthful of liver and onions, I said, Mom, 147-89.

After a thoughtful pause, she said, Firpo Marberry. Lifetime won/loss. Got any hard ones?

Dad almost choked. He coughed up the contents of his mouth in his napkin, then laughed hardest of all.

Every few weeks those Iowa summers before I turned twelve, Dad would take me to see our hometown Waterloo White Hawks of the Class B Three-I League (Iowa, Indiana and Illinois) play at their home park. We got there early to watch the teams take batting practice. Then came the rapid-fire choreography of infield warm-up, which primed us for the action to come.

Watching the play from the shaded grandstand, I hissed with excitement at the physical poetry played out on the field below:

—at the sweeping arc of a powerful swing driving the ball deep with a resounding crack;

—at a quick stab of a hard grounder by the third baseman, followed by a low slingshot throw across the diamond from deep behind the base;

—at the flat blur of an overhand fastball before it slammed into the catcher's mitt;

—at the balletic moves of a shortstop going to his right to snag a bouncer before leaping into the air to fling it across his body where it was scooped on the short hop by the first baseman doing the splits, beating the runner by half a step.

And to play the game was to experience the purest form of physical joy. Saturday afternoons we walked the three blocks to Irving Grade school in Waterloo for batting practice. The baseball diamond there had been used in the late twenties by Dad's own high school team, the West Waterloo High Wahawks, for their practices.

Once we had warmed up, Dad hit some fly balls to me, teaching me to spot the landing and head for it full tilt, glancing at the ball every so often to adjust my approach. Then, in a bit of intriguing coaching strategy, he'd station me under a huge willow tree in deep center field and hit pop flies that plunged through the branches.

This always got me excited. What other kid had a dad who would do neat, risky stuff like this. To avoid a beaning I had to stay focused and not flinch, which became a point of pride with me. Dad was both amused and concerned when a branch-deflected ball bounced off my shoulder or knocked my hat off. But I could tell he was impressed that I didn't duck out of the way or wince from the pain.

Just don't tell your ma, he always said.

Baseball practice as character development.

When I'd had my cuts from both sides of the plate, I'd pitch to Dad and watch as he poled left-handed drives so far down the right field line that I screamed with excitement watching the ball shrink to near invisibility. He owned the sweetest inside-out power swing I've ever seen. And just before contact he grunted and gave a wrenching twist with his torso that produced more distance for his hits, something that he said he learned from watching Joe Jackson take batting practice once before an exhibition game in Iowa City.

It was natural while watching Dad swing a bat to believe that I inherited some of his ability and might someday be the hitter that he was. But my retarded physical development through junior high in Hobbs, New Mexico—having moved there for mom's health—kept me a second-stringer. After two years we moved to El Paso, where as a junior playing first base for my Austin High team in El Paso, weighing 120 pounds and standing just under six feet, my slender frame and ten-inch biceps lacked the strength or quickness for my bat to catch up with my peers' fast balls. Consequently, I managed only one hit in thirty-one at-bats in my high-school career at Austin High, a record that still stands in West Texas sports record books as a living monument to futility.

As I trudged back to our bench once after striking out for the second time in a game, I heard an old timer in the stands say to another, That kid couldn't hit stink in an outhouse, an offhand remark that rattled around in my head for years. Though I was a decent fielder at first base—nicknamed Scoop by our shortstop Dudley Swofford, whose throws often came with sand and bits of dirt shoveled up in his oversized glove and unleashed along with the grass-stained ball. Amid the approaching cloudy gray