....it was the mid 1970's, Vietnam was ending and I was in ROTC at Southern Cal! I did not say anything about it voluntarily as I knew many students at that time were anti-war & anti military...but at one house, the gal whose turn it was to chat with me kept pressing about what had I done over the summer, blah blah blah and I had been vague about having been out of town and then I admitted I was camping and she kept going on about camps and being a counselor and all that stuff and she finally asked what kind of camp I had been to and I just could not beat around the bush any more
and I told her: "It was ROTC summer camp, we marched in formation, shot guns, did survival techniques, flew in airplanes & helicopters, and stuff like that..." The horrified gasp that emitted from her mouth and the look of scorn on her face told me that I would be dropped ASAP from that house and of course I was! Oh well, I ended up in the BEST sorority anyways & the one I really wanted all along -- The Gamma Phis could have cared less that I was in ROTC, in fact they were proud of me -- women made up less than 1% of all cadets in ROTC at that time at USC....so it showed that I had leadership & organization skills plus, I was also pretty involved at USC (I did not rush as a Freshman) -- I was on swim team and in the official University Hostess club, I worked at the bookstore and was a Flag Girl in the fantastic Trojan Marching band (of course, many thought of THAT as another geeky thing about me --LOL!) I retired in 1998 after a 22 year Air Force career -- I am very heavily involved with Gamma Phi Beta and always will be!
