Sea Org recruitment slide show. Inevitably, the show would have images of people in uniforms, some of them our parents, along with awesome background music and catchy slogans such as, “Many are called; few are chosen.”
Almost every week, there was a showing of LRH’s “Mission into Time.” It featured L. Ron Hubbard recalling his past lives going back hundreds of years and chronicling his journey to connect with those past lives. From only his own recall of these past lives, he named locations around the world where, in these previous lives, he had buried various unknown items. The slide show then told the story of the first Sea Org members, who had taken on the mission of traveling to these locations in search of the items. They went by boat around the world, and sure enough, they found them all. Watching the slide show gave me goose bumps every time.
After the slide show, kids who had finished courses would receive certificates and be applauded. Then there would be awards such as “Student of the Week,” “Cadet of the Week,” and “Division of the Week.” Graduation ended with clapping to the picture of LRH and three cheers to him as well.
The best part came after graduation, when we got our five-dollar allowance. We had to sign for it, because we had to have our deductions taken for Social Security and Medicare, so it was more like $4.50. There were also deductions taken for collections toward adult and executive birthday presents for anyone celebrating that week. If overall Cadet Org stats were up, we would sometimes have org awards, which meant we could all watch a movie and have popcorn before bed, or maybe even take a field trip. And, when it was all over, we’d head back to our rooms to prepare for bed.
Saturday was a no-school day, but we still had to do deck work, which on Saturdays was intense white-glove cleaning of our berthings and the buildings. My assignment was the School House. In spite of the intense cleaning, I liked Saturdays because we were going to be seeing our parents, and Saturday night dinner was now the only time we got dessert—usually chocolate-chip cookies. By the time white-gloving and inspection were done, it was about ten in the evening. It was tiring, but leaving for the relative luxury of my parents’ apartment was worth working for.
C HAPTER S EVEN
RUNAWAY
W ITH ALL THE WORK BEING DONE, THE R ANCH SLOWLY BECAME a more and more beautiful place. The roads were paved, and the houses were uniformly painted a barn-red color with white trim. There were gardens, tree nurseries with pomegranates and apples, beautiful stone walls bordering the property, lush ice plants covering the hills, and freshly mowed sports fields. Eventually, it was hardly recognizable as the arid dusty earth that it had been when I arrived. At first glance, it was easy to see how someone might have thought this was an appealing place for children to grow up, almost like a sort of permanent summer camp. For me, though, it was hard to appreciate the improvements after all my effort.
I no longer enjoyed being at the Ranch or being a Cadet. The deck work routine felt unbearable, the course work overwhelming. While the physical labor took its toll, what really stressed me was that we were expected to have the minds of adults. With all of the procedures, information, and responsibilities that filled our heads on a daily basis, there was little or no room for the imagination and whims. It’s difficult to understand how, as kids, we possessed the mental capacity to keep track of multiple sets of daily and weekly statistics, identify trends in that data, and then strategize how to improve the statistics by applying complex formulas and writing daily battle plans to achieve our goals. Whether it was being required to sign out for tools or the fact that every dining room table had its own hierarchy of mess president, treasurer, and steward, every process was rigid and bureaucratic. Cleaning had to be done in a
Almost every week, there was a showing of LRH’s “Mission into Time.” It featured L. Ron Hubbard recalling his past lives going back hundreds of years and chronicling his journey to connect with those past lives. From only his own recall of these past lives, he named locations around the world where, in these previous lives, he had buried various unknown items. The slide show then told the story of the first Sea Org members, who had taken on the mission of traveling to these locations in search of the items. They went by boat around the world, and sure enough, they found them all. Watching the slide show gave me goose bumps every time.
After the slide show, kids who had finished courses would receive certificates and be applauded. Then there would be awards such as “Student of the Week,” “Cadet of the Week,” and “Division of the Week.” Graduation ended with clapping to the picture of LRH and three cheers to him as well.
The best part came after graduation, when we got our five-dollar allowance. We had to sign for it, because we had to have our deductions taken for Social Security and Medicare, so it was more like $4.50. There were also deductions taken for collections toward adult and executive birthday presents for anyone celebrating that week. If overall Cadet Org stats were up, we would sometimes have org awards, which meant we could all watch a movie and have popcorn before bed, or maybe even take a field trip. And, when it was all over, we’d head back to our rooms to prepare for bed.
Saturday was a no-school day, but we still had to do deck work, which on Saturdays was intense white-glove cleaning of our berthings and the buildings. My assignment was the School House. In spite of the intense cleaning, I liked Saturdays because we were going to be seeing our parents, and Saturday night dinner was now the only time we got dessert—usually chocolate-chip cookies. By the time white-gloving and inspection were done, it was about ten in the evening. It was tiring, but leaving for the relative luxury of my parents’ apartment was worth working for.
C HAPTER S EVEN
RUNAWAY
W ITH ALL THE WORK BEING DONE, THE R ANCH SLOWLY BECAME a more and more beautiful place. The roads were paved, and the houses were uniformly painted a barn-red color with white trim. There were gardens, tree nurseries with pomegranates and apples, beautiful stone walls bordering the property, lush ice plants covering the hills, and freshly mowed sports fields. Eventually, it was hardly recognizable as the arid dusty earth that it had been when I arrived. At first glance, it was easy to see how someone might have thought this was an appealing place for children to grow up, almost like a sort of permanent summer camp. For me, though, it was hard to appreciate the improvements after all my effort.
I no longer enjoyed being at the Ranch or being a Cadet. The deck work routine felt unbearable, the course work overwhelming. While the physical labor took its toll, what really stressed me was that we were expected to have the minds of adults. With all of the procedures, information, and responsibilities that filled our heads on a daily basis, there was little or no room for the imagination and whims. It’s difficult to understand how, as kids, we possessed the mental capacity to keep track of multiple sets of daily and weekly statistics, identify trends in that data, and then strategize how to improve the statistics by applying complex formulas and writing daily battle plans to achieve our goals. Whether it was being required to sign out for tools or the fact that every dining room table had its own hierarchy of mess president, treasurer, and steward, every process was rigid and bureaucratic. Cleaning had to be done in a
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