Recent stories about the horrors of hazing make me think back to a hazing incident many years ago. My hazing happened on the flight deck of the USS Kearsarge. We were crossing the equator. If you know anything about Navy lore, crossing the equator is a big thing. Before you cross, you are a pollywog. After the hazing, you are a shellback.
Our hazing was done by the shellbacks on the ship. We had to strip to our skivvies and tape our shower shoes on our feet. You could fry an egg on the flight deck. We were forced to crawl through putrid garbage, have our hair cut and crawl up and kiss a fat belly smeared with goodness knows what. We were dumped backward into a seawater bath, etc. All the while, we were hurried along by guys whacking our butts with 3-foot lengths of canvas fire hose. At the end, we were cleaned up with high-pressure fire hoses.
Nobody was exempt, not even our ship's captain, a Navy four-striper.
The next day, we were treated to a flight-deck steak fry.
Tracy Booth
Taylorsville