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7 janvier On the Battle of WillsIn AIT - the training after Basic - our instructor was a real ball-buster. She demanded the best of us, and we learned to be the best through endless pushups in the classroom. We respected her dearly, and beneath the hardnosed attitude, she was genuinely looking out for us.
Every block of instruction was followed by a test, with 70% being the passing grade. Half-way into training, I was sitting pretty at a 97% average, a full 7% ahead of the next closest soldier, and well on my way to completing AIT with Distinguished Honor Graduate accolades.
But that wasn't good enough for the ball-buster. While she gave us a full three-hours for the tests, I would turn mine in after a mere 20-minutes. It drove her nuts. A half-dozen times she lectured me that "If you would take your freakin' time, you'd ace every test." Instead, I preferred to take my 97% scores, and go outside to the break area, awaiting the rest of my classmates to finish the test and join me in the break area.
Near the end of the course, I made a significant error on a test, and score a miserable 87%. She called me into her office, and 100 pushups later, she felt she had made her point.
Suffice it to say, I was pissed. It wasn't the pushups, it was the principle. 87% would have been a good score for any other soldier, and I resented the higher standard she was holding me too.
So on one of our final tests a few days later, I finished the test in 20-minutes. We were allotted 3 hours, but it was a simple one. After finishing, I turned my test face-down and sat quietly, not turning in my test and going to the break area. Within another 20-minutes, with over 2 hours of time remaining, the rest of the class had finished and were sitting outside in the break area.
I remained, staring at the backside of my test, sitting rigid. As the 1-hour mark approached, she strolled past me a few times. I was well within my right, and she knew it.
An hour and a half, and I was singing country songs in my head, listening to the ticking of the clock. She had resigned from pacing the aisles. It was an empty classroom. Just me and her, and she knew I was being a little bastard.
Fuck her. If she wanted me to take my time on the test, I'd take my full fucking time.
As two hours approached, the school's commandant entered the room, exchanged some words with the instructor that were too soft for me to make out, and strolled behind me a few times. I remained stiff and rigid, staring at the blank backside of my test.
Two hours and fifteen minutes after the test began, I was running out of country tunes to sing in my mind. But I had committed to the endeavor, and I wouldn't break. I would make my point.
Afterall, my comrades were able to enjoy an extended break outside, joking and relaxing, and not doing pushups yet for the points they no doubt missed on the test.
Two and a half hours, and the commandant was pacing behind me with a ruler. I was reminded of my days at a Catholic school, half-expecting to get a swift smack for my resolve.
I was beyond singing country tunes, and into the theme song for every childhood cartoon I could recall. Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Duck Tales. The Smurfs. Inspector Gadget...
The commandant was having low words with the instructor again, and I could only imagine what they were discussing. Maybe they'd send me to see the shrink.
The final half hour passed slowly, but it was worth it.
As I rose with my test at 2:59:00 into the test, I approached her desk at the front of the room and turn it in. "You're a proud, stubborn shit, aren't you?"
Giving the school greeting, I grinned as I replied, "Army Pride, Sergeant [censored]".
"Tell the rest of the class to come back in. You better have aced this one."
It turned out I missed two points on the test, but the instructor didn't get on my ass. In fact, for the final few tests, she didn't dog on me whatsoever.
Several months later, I ran into another instructor from the AIT school. He laughed when he saw me, and shook my hand. "I don't know how you had the patience to sit there for two and a half hours."
It was easy. It was a battle of wills, me against her, and I won. 21 décembre On The Greatest Job in the WorldI've been told a few times that I seem bitter with the Army - that I have a chip on my shoulder. That's not the case whatsoever, and it's unfortunate I come across that way at times. My objective with this site has been simply to give friends and family back home a taste of the reality of Army life. That means the reality that the recruiters don't tell kids, for better or for worse, and the reality that isn't glamorous enough for Hollywood to package and sell.
Like any job, there are good days and bad days; good months and bad months; good bosses and bad bosses; good assignments and bad assignments. So, in an effort to dispel some of the notions that I'm a broken, bitter grunt, I'm going to outline 10 reasons why this is the Greatest Job in the World.
1. I get paid to work out. Sure, there are days when you want to sleep in, but the Army will never let me get fat.
2. I get paid to put rounds downrange. What red-blooded American doesn't enjoy firing 200-rounds at targets?
3. The holidays. This Christmas season, I will work 7 half-days over a three-week span.
4. The vacation. What other job gives you 30-days paid vacation a year?
5. I get paid to study abroad. Not only does the Army pay 90% of the price for my Masters Degree pursuit with the reputable Troy University, but "I'm studying for class" is always a valid excuse not to be doing real work.
6. "I wanted to travel to distant lands, meet ancient and unique cultures, and kill them." Well, I'm not killing anybody, but can a 24-year old bachelor really complain about being paid to spend a year in a foreign country?
7. The training. Civilians pay hundreds of dollars for a week of mini-boot-camp. I get paid hundreds of dollars to embark on some of the best training in the world.
8. I get to wake up every morning and put on a uniform with the American flag on my shoulder. "Patriotism" is pretty bullshit when it comes to people deciding whether or not to join, but it's definately a perk.
9. The adventure. I'm getting paid to experience things that people pay $7 to go see at a movie theatre, and watch as an escape from their monotonous 9-5 grind.
10. The job security. Face it, Americans would never allow my job to be outsourced to Pakistani's.
I could go on and probably come up with 25 good reasons why this is the Greatest Job in the World, but those are the top ten. And I think if you asked any given Joe, they'd share at least 5 of these top 10. 18 décembre On Getting SoftAs a civilian, I was soft. I was cookie dough. Waking up on little to no sleep was a beast, going to the gym and running 2 miles was miserable, and not having a Mountain Dew for 24 hours was agony.
But training makes you hard. Training makes you a big fucking grizzly bear. You come out of AIT, having so embraced sleep deprivation and the stale MRE chow that you don't know anything else.
You train for SFAS by running 20-40 miles a week, hitting the gym for an extra hour while the rest of post sleeps, and embarking on 20-mile ruckmarches on the weekends.
You're chiseled, lean, toned, and tough. You're a big fucking grizzly bear.
But then the commodities take hold. You start to taste the nectur of Playstation 2 again. You start to relax in a break in your Masters Degree courses. You start to enjoy the flavor of Taco Bell.
Slowly but surely, you become soft. And you hate yourself for it.
You want nothing more but to get to the gym at 4am and run 5 miles on the treadmill. But you've lost your edge. You aren't being pushed, and you don't have a goal to push yourself towards. And at 4am, a bed is so warm and comfortable, while December Korea is so frigid and harsh.
A week of sleeping in until 5am turns into two, and then three. And suddenly you look around and realize you're slowly losing that alert, toned edge of your physical endurance and mental drive. All the booze and video games and DVDs and have replaced the bottled water and ruckmarches and late nights in the office going the extra mile.
Excuses start to be made. "It's a holiday weekend, I'll hit the gym Monday morning". "I'll cut the Christmas cookies out of my diet after the holiday". "I'll harden my feet again on roadmarches once they salt the ice on the roads".
Being a big fucking grizzly bear is more than a part-time objective, and once you let the toys and luxuries start stealing you're time, it's a downward spiral. And while you're still tougher than any civilian, you're not that big fucking grizzly bear - each day more lean than the previous - that you were.
But with Officer Candidate School and a marathon on the horizon, I have to once again find that drive to get back in the saddle. Excuses of knee rehab and frigid weather and the holiday season need to be banished, and the big fucking grizzly bear embraced.
I'll get there again. But not until tommorrow, I'm going to watch a DVD tonight... 5 décembre Comment FeedbackComment Feedback!
On Excuses
Sully - Cast or Tab, hooah? Maybe we can modify that to "knee brace and crutches or tab"? Although there were over 360 candidates down there, I'll probably saw you at one point or another. Quite an experience, eh? You're going to have to let me know how you did.
On Fort Bragg
Brett - Alcohol works wonders? Amen. It's been emotionally tough to have poured yourself into training for something for several months, only to bust out of it - but I'm getting back on track. I once heard, "It isn't what we accomplish that defines us, it's what we accomplish in the wake of failure." Even if I can never run again, it'll have been worth it. At least I can say I took my shot. It's tough to hang your head when you know you poured your heart into something.
Previous Update
Army Wife - Your husband is in Yongsan? I'd probably recognize him. I understand that you don't agree with my evaluation of "Army chicks", but most females don't. Ask your husband, however, and I'm sure he'll admit that I'm fairly accurate in my description. As an "Army Wife", you're not exactly in the "Army chick" category, if that makes you feel a little less offended.
Where in Minnesota are you from? I grew up in the Twin Cities and went to college in Duluth. Don't get me wrong on the "Army being a dissapointment" - I love the Army, I chose to do this full-time. If I come across otherwise, that's my shortcoming.
On Holidays
Brett - You asked for me to post the shot of my xmas tree. So it has been done. I'm here to serve, bud.
Jennifer - So you're another one of the 10 people who check this site out. Glad I could provide you a few minutes of entertainment with the last entry. It's always flattering, and motivating, to hear that I'm not entirely wasting my time here. I hope I can continue - if even only on a weekly basis - to give you something entertaining and insightful to read.
23 novembre On HolidaysHolidays are always a tough time to be away from home, no matter where you are or what you're doing.
Last year, I spent Thanksgiving in a chow-hall at Fort Jackson. It was decorated, and we actually had real silverware. The training officers wore their dress uniforms and served us generous portions of turkey and lobster. It was the best meal the military ever fed me, we were allowed to take our time and have little trivial conversations, and it was the first time in my life I had lobster.
Christmas we were able to take Exodus (leave) for a week from training to be with our families. I spent a day with my family, and the rest of the time shitfaced with my buddies pledging our allegiance to one another, destined to return for the final 3 weeks of training and receive the honor of Distinguished Honor Graduate, and the accompanying medals and fanfare. How I passed the Uniralysis (piss test) is a blessing - what does the Army think a bunch of Joes are going to do when they return home for New Years Eve after being sober for over 2 months?
This year, I will be spending Thanksgiving at the private residence of a Marine officer, with a handful of the top Korea branch officers, as the token enlisted. Everyone without families in Korea will be getting together to stuff ourselves and try to take the sting off the distance from home.
The unit celebrated by having a officer vs. enlisted football game in the place of physical training this morning. The office had a 40-person Thanksgiving pot-luck, in which we deep-fried a few turkeys and ate a combination of traditional Turkey Day dishes and Korean foods. I don't think our Korean counterparts quite understood what we were celebrating, and when one asked, I told her, "Killing all the Indians". I don't think she understood my dry sarcasm any more than she understood why we chose a random Wednesday to eat like Gods and slack-off around the office.
This Thanksgiving, I am thankful though. I'm thankful not to be one of those poor bastards in the hot desert, eating an MRE. But I'd still trade places with them in a heartbeat if it means another guy could spend the time with his family.
Holidays are difficult. As much as we try to replicate the festivities with our military family, it only reminds us more of the families back home. A plane ticket to the United States is about $1500 round-trip from Seoul, but I'd pay that and more for a single day with my parents and relatives on such a difficult reminder of the loneliness. The loneliness of being surrounded by other miserable bastards who you are only united to by the mutual understanding that if 'lil Kim decides to incite a war, we're going to be the ones to hear each other's last utterance of, "Oh fuck, this sucks..."
The suicide rate in the Army increases eight-fold from Thanksgiving through Christmas. Apparently the pathetic attempts to celebrate the holiday are too much a reminder of the loneliness for some Joe's to handle. The reminders of the ex's with new guys feasting with their families; the memories of their mother's cooking; the prospect of spending the next holiday season in the desert; the kids back home who are going to develop recollections of the holidays being a time when Daddy wasn't around...
But the world goes on back in the States as if we were never there, and we do our best to pick one another's spirits up. While we pay homage to the holidays, we subconsciously try to repress the occassion to just an extra day off work.
One thing I know for certain: they can take my rank and my pay, but I'm going to be wearing a Santa hat in place of my beret on the 25th of December. Maybe I'll even go out and steal a nice little shrub from outside the General's office for a makeshift Christmas Tree in my barracks - complete with compass, glow-sticks, and spent ammunition as ornaments.
14 novembre Site UpdateAs you can see, I've put some time into tweaking this site a bit. Hopefully you'll enjoy the changes:
1. Movies that Rock. I'll probably end up doing a few "Movie Review" entries to justify this list. If you haven't checked any of them out yet, they're definately worth your time. Like with any of my lists, they're a work-in-progress, so feel free to post some feedback on a candidate for any list.
2. Say These Movies Rock and I'll Stab You in the Chin. My opinion on these is final. Akin to Movies that Rock, I'll probably end up justifying why these blow.
3. Photo Album. I've given up some of my "annonymity" for the sake of letting you bastards see my ugly mug. The shots include my final unshaven civilian days, drinking in Seoul, hanging with some of my boys from Minnesota here in Seoul, a chance I had to meet with the legendary Henry Rollins (photo and story also made the Stars & Stripes, East Asia edition), and a tattoo that only the guys in the showers get a chance to see. |
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