In my one year of attending monthly reserve meetings we never knew what  duty was, and in boot camp and sub school at Hunters Point during the year we never had duty - I didn't even know what this thing called a chit was. My very first reserve meeting my mother had ironed my uniform.  While I was standing at my first muster I realized that everybody else's uniform creases were the opposite of mine.

When I was at Terminal Island the first week of the regular active Navy duty consisted of walking through the various barracks with a billy club. My interest was peaked because that also included the one Wave barracks there.  During the day our tasks were doing landscaping around the base which included the mini golf course.  This ended when my reserve center realized I was active.  They had me assigned to their center to do mostly waxing decks.

My orders came after about four weeks and they shocked me on a late Friday afternoon.  First I was assigned riverboat school, then survival training, and then Da Nang, Vietnam for riverboat patrol.  I immediately went to the base office and told them I thought there had been a mistake as I had graduated from sub school.  Turned out everybody had left their offices, and I had to wait until Monday to get a response.  After a harrowing long weekend for me and my parents my orders were rescinded and three, or four weeks later I was ordered to meet the Pickerel at Pearl Harbor. Whew, I breathed a sigh of relief.  I had just gotten in the Reserves days after taking my draft physical.  I only joined the Navy to keep away from being an  "Army Grunt" in 1965 Vietnam.  My Dad had done combat in P.I. during WWII, and he didn't want his only awkward, clumsy kid in Vietnam getting shot at either.

I did get to see Vietnam in June of '68 off Yankee Station, but being a member of the Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club is a lot safer than riverboat patrol.

Issued in NOV 1964 on Sea Robin. I think we were heading to PNSY for overhaul. 

It's stamped "CIVILIAN CLOTHES AUTHORIZED"