I Never Take a Bath

Guy Madison, my all time favorite movie Hunk

I shower.

The last bath I took was sometime in 1953 when I was twelve years old.  Our family lived in a second floor apartment building in Downingtown, Pennsylvania.  Our family of five shared one bathtub.  We bathed once a week, on Saturday night.

When my self-awareness started to kick in around age twelve, I felt a need to take a bath more than once a week.  My father didn't approve.  He thought it was a waste of water to take a bath more than once a week.

I never thought much about taking a bath more than once a week because that was the way I was brought up.  However, I did notice that my feet were dirty.  My crotch area was sweaty and sticky.  My armpits smelled.  Maybe it was my Gay Gene kicking in this desire of mine to be clean.

I compromised with my father and I would wash my feet daily.  I would take a Whore Bath (wet washcloth in a sink and pat down stinky body areas).  That sufficed.  At least I didn't stink when I went to high school

Then in 1954 our family moved to a different apartment.  This one had a shower.  I started to shower, it was so much easier and quicker than drawing water for a bath.  My father still didn't approve of anyone in our family taking a daily shower.

In 1958 our family moved to a newly built ranch house.  Our Family of Five still had one bathroom.  This bathroom also had a bathtub shower combination.  Now that we were working off of our well, my father definitely didn't want us showering (or bathing) once a week.  I continued to wash my feet daily and other address my other body concerns with Whore Bath.

After high school I joined the Army.  One of the major culture shocks I was in for was the Daily Shower.  Now it was required to take a daily shower.  I saw what happened to a fellow recruit from Kentucky who didn't shower daily.  One day he found a bar of soap and a scrub brush on his bunk.  That was a message from his fellow recruits that if he didn't take a shower on his own he would be subjected to a "G.I. Shower."  A "G.I. Shower" is where your fellow soldiers strip the miscreant soldier, drag him to the showers against his will, and scrub him down. Hot stuff for sure but I wasn't about to be subject to THAT ACTION.  So, I began the habit of showering daily which I continue to this day.

Bradley Cooper - I would go back to taking baths...with him

Ft. Dix, New Jersey, February 1960

Reading my blog roll this morning, the general subject seems to be the snow.  Well, we've had our fair share here in LSD (Lower Slower Delaware) but this time we dodged a snow storm.  While it's still gray and cold outside, the snow is gone, thank goodness.


All this snow reminds me of this time exactly fifty-one years ago.  While there are a lot of things I've forgotten in the past fifty-one years (A LOT!), something I will never forget.  


January 27th, 1960 is the date I got on a Trailways bus out of Philadelphia and with millions of butterflies in my stomach, I headed to the Great Unknown.  The Great Unknown this time was Ft. Dix, New Jersey.  I was about to begin basic training.  


To say that I was nervous would be a massive understatement.  My legs were wobbling when I piled off that Trailways bus at the bus depot in Ft. Dix.


I won't go into all the details of that first day in this posting, I'll save that for a future posting.  In fact I'll save that for several future postings because I remember EVERYTHING ABOUT THOSE EIGHT WEEKS.  Every event is imbedded in my brain including my Serial Number RA 13 678 593 (see, I remember it to this day).  That was how we identified ourselves.  First name?  Forget it.  My name after I got off that bus was "F__cking Trainee":


Anyway, the point of this posting is that I only have one official mug shot of my time in the Army.  It was taken along with my fellow F__cking Trainees" (we were further identified by out last names only).  Most of my fellow sufferers were Army reservists and a few draftees.  Actually I was part of an elite group in basic training.  I was an "RA" which stood for Regular Army.  We always got to go first in line for mess hall and we were usually last to be chosen for the really dirty jobs.  Other than that, we were required to rise and shine at 2:30 am in the morning to stand out in the cold and WAIT.


Back to the point of this posting.  You will see a page of photos.  Look at the bottom row, second from the left.  That is yours truly.  To my left was my friend Michael Tine from Massachusetts.  Oh yes, this was in the Fifties Era when everyone was placed alphabetically.  


I remember the day they herded us in to have our picture taken.  I was beside myself because I felt I needed a haircut and I didn't have a chance to get one.  Our pictures were taken and I was given the opportunity to purchase them.  I passed. I assumed I would have another chance later when a better picture was taken.  Guess what?  In my three years in the Army I never had another official portrait picture taken.  I didn't even think about it until I got out.  Sure, I had plenty of candid photos of myself.  Well, really not that many but enough.  But I never again had that iconic picture taken.  You know, the one they show in the newspaper when you're killed in action.


So, the only official Army picture I have of me is the one from our basic training yearbook.  Actually, in a way it's good because seeing all the other guys I took basic training with, brings back fond memories.  Really, it does.  Basic Training and my three years in the Army were the best three years of my life.  If I wasn't gay I would have made a career out of the service.  But, you know what the rules were Back Then.


So there it is, Private Ronald Walter Tipton, F--king Trainee.  

Letter From Basic Training

Pvt. Ronald W. Tipton, 1960 

Picture taken in living room of my best friend Larry's parents after I completed basic training

A few months ago when I was cleaning out my Mom's back room, I came across this letter I had written to her when I was taking Army basic training at Ft. Dix, New Jersey.  The letter is dated March 4, 1960.


I wrote many letters when I was in the Army but this is the only one that I have in my possession.  It is interesting to read it and see my thinking fifty years ago.  


Two areas in which I haven't changed much, determination and immaturity.


The area of determination is where I note that I had a cold but I decided not to go on sick call because that would almost insure that I would be recycled which was a term used for starting basic training all over again.  I knew I didn't want to do that.  I remember that cold I had.  It was awful.  The worst was when I was crawling with my elbows through the infiltration course on a cold, wet day with tracer bullets whizzing inches above my head and my nose running like a spigot.  But the worst thing I remember about the infiltration course was that I got my brand new fatigue jacket caught on the barbed wire and tore a big strip of cloth out of the back.  My gay gene was horrified that I damaged my new duds.


The area of immaturity was the joke I repeated to my parents.  Reading it now it I can see where it isn't even funny.  It's actually childish and immature (am I being redundant here)?  But I thought at the time it was really funny.  But then remember I was a 18 year old small town boy being exposed to the vulgarities of the world outside for the first time in my life.  


Boy was I innocent in those days.  Boy did I have a lot to learn.  


Here is the letter.  WARNING!  This letter contains sexual references and cursing.  If you're offended by such language and references please do not read the letter.

If I only knew what an adventure lay ahead for me, this small town, determined, immature kid from Downingtown, PA.  But you know what?  I wouldn't change a thing.  


As I wind down this life, I'm looking back on my past years with the goal to accumulate and write my personal history in a book.  This is my last goal in life.  


My story may not be of interest to most other people but I do feel a need to put in writing my life experience.  Maybe there is that one person like me way off in the future who will pick up this book and appreciate my retelling of my journey in life.  


If for nothing else, when I leave I want to leave my version of events.  And to leave a small footprint.  


I am still determined and immature for which I make no excuses or apologies.  


That is me.