AWOL

Before I left home, my father had such a heart attack that the doctor told - I was on a three day weekend - the doctor told me, “You know, your dad is really serious.” So what should I do? I’m supposed to go back to Montreal. And he said, “I’ll give you a letter and you better stay here.” He gave me a letter and then the next weekend, I’m down to Union Station and I meet the other members of my crew who were just coming home for a weekend, a three day weekend, you see. So, I decided that there’s no point in me going down there because we can’t go anywhere without, you know, the pilot and the rest of the crew, so I took a train back to Palmerston. So, then when they were going back, I went back down to Toronto and go up to Montreal and since I was AWOL, I wasn’t thinking much about that. I didn’t bother checking in at the main gate.So that was, say, Monday. And Wednesday was payday. And here’s the senior warrant officer - there were two senior warrant officers at Dorval - he’s reading off the names of the people who were getting their pay until he came to my name. It wasn’t Goettler, it was Gootler and he says, “Gootler, Gootler.” And I said, “Here I am.” “Where have you been? ” And he’s handing the papers over to someone else and I said, “I’ve got an alibi.” I was thinking, I wasn’t going to tell all these people about my dad’s sickness. And he said, “I’ll see you later, you get over to the headquarters!” sort of thing. And we were leaving the next day and I had gone and got everything checked out, your blankets and whatever department you had to get checked out before you could leave. And I got the last person to sign who was the senior warrant officers. But there were two of them, and there was a lineup, and I got in the lineup and I went into this office and put this paper in front of this fellow, and he started to write. And all of a sudden he stopped. And all he said was, “Out! Out!” And I was supposed to, in ten minutes I was supposed to be at a briefing to go to Karachi sort of thing. And I’d say, “But...” “Out!” “But, but, but...” “Out!” And, eventually, there was no way he’d let me say anything. And I am outside the door and it was the busiest corner of this whole station. And I actually stopped - I was a sergeant then - I actually stopped three officers, one was a squadron leader. And I said, “Which is the worst offence; walking away from this warrant officer here, or missing a briefing? ” And as I remember, everyone says, “You got me, kid!” And so I stayed there and this other warrant officer came back and says, “Come with me,” and took me down a long corridor. “Take your hat off, go in and stand in front of this officer at attention.” Maybe I knew that, but I went in and I was so tense. And the officer read I had been AWOL for 14 days. I think it was 14. “Have you got anything to say in your own...” And my face was going up and down like this I was so nervous. And I had this letter from the doctor, in my pocket, and I was afraid to say one, anything. I stood there and I said, “Nothing sir.” And he says, “Well, I have no choice but to give you a reprimand and 14 days loss of pay.” So, and then I left because I was afraid that I was going to start bawling in front of this man and I didn’t want to do that. I got outside with the senior warrant officer and amazingly he said to me, “Sorry, kid.” Somehow or other he realized that I had been taken.