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Show OLIVE O'MARA 22 2002 OLI: Anyway, let's see. At the end of boot camp when th y aid What y u g ing t do?" I said, "Well, I could never be a doctor; I want to be a nurse. I thought I c uld b a Clara Barton. I really wanted to be a nurse then. Back when I wanted to study it wasn t for being a nurse. But now, I felt for these boys in the service going in there, being shot at. I wanted to be a nurse. When they called me up to see what I was going to do she said, "You're going to be an electrician's mate." I said, "Uh, uh, uh, 'because I'd been hearing the other kids say what they were going to do. Surprisingly, I opened my mouth; usually I sit there like, "All right." I said, "I don't want to be an electrician's mate. I don't want to work with things. I want to work with people. I'd like to be a nurse." I said, "I don't even like mechanical things like that; I want to work with people." She said, "Don't you realize that this is what we call, in the service, 'a plum'?" She said, "You're being given an opportunity. There's only one other girl, the two of you, are going to be trained here in New York to be an electrician. Only two people on the East Coast and two on the West Coast. We're offering you something really wonderful." I said, "But I really don't want it; I don't like electricity." She said, "You have to like it, whether you think you do or not." She said, "You wouldn't have taken all those other courses, all those technical courses, if you didn't like it." BEC: Oh, no. OLI: That's what she said. She said no one would have taken that many courses if they didn't like it. Well, in the Navy, you don't tell the Navy what you want; you're told what you'll do. So I was made an electrician's mate. And I was resentful, even though other kids would have gone around bragging about it, there's only two of us on the East Coast. I didn't like it one bit and promised myself! wouldn't (laughs). Anyway, I went 29 |
