“Black people don’t jump out of planes,” he told me when I asked him why there weren’t more blacks in the unit. The platoon was on ambush west of Restrepo and we had a lot of time to kill. “Black people don’t want to come out here and get shot at. It’s not what they do. Most times black folks join the Army because they’re trying to get a skill set to do something else with their life. I get plenty of shit around here for being the only black dude, but ninety-eight percent of the time it’s all in good fun. You’re gonna run across some guys out there who don’t like me, I guaran-god-damn-tee it,
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