New Experiences

Dear All:
I hope you’ve been receiving all of my letters and have enjoyed the stories so far. We haven’t been given a phone call in a while, and no one is sure when the next will be, but I hope everyone is safe and well.
We got haircuts for the first time since the first day this week ($6.50 gets you a 30 second shave) and we feel like soldiers again. We had our first substantial road march on Saturday (almost 6 miles round trip with a 40-pound ruck sack, body armor, and helmet) which led us out to our land navigation drill. It was our first outdoor exercise—and it went bad…really bad. We had teams of 4, and were given 2.5 hours to locate 5 points with our compass and map. I know what I’m doing, but since I’m the APG, I’m out in front of our formation, and when the Sergeant asked us to file back in, I was left without a choice but to team up with the “stragglers”. That’s the term we use for the few soldiers who always end up in the back of the formation, can’t march in time, and have generally bad attitudes and no motivation. We ended up with a “no-go”/0 out of 5 (the first thing I’ve failed so far). I was disappointed, but given the situation, not surprised.
Today was a good day, and I don’t even mind this 0000-0100 Fire Guard shift because our wake up call on Sunday, and because of the holiday, Monday, is 0600. So we’re getting plenty of sleep. At mass, the priest has all of the soldiers graduating each week come forward for a special prayer. Even though we have 8 more weeks it seems close.
I was asked to create a PowerPoint presentation for Drill Sergeant this week (one of the many “technical tasks” I get because I can somewhat navigate around a computer) and he talked to me a little bit about my future. He’s infantry, 10th Mountain Division, and spent 5 years in Afghanistan, and was interested in what branch I was considering. I told him that I wanted to bounce around a little to expand my education and training, but wanted to start in either military intelligence or armor, and ultimately end up in JAG. He understood my sense of service from the combat side, but reminded me that if I put myself in the position to keep soldiers out of harm’s way, that is just as important as firing the weapons myself. Then he started talking about the logistics branch. It’s completely different from supply, and works closely with intelligence as an advanced planning sector for troop deployment, relief, relocation, strength, training and equipment. It essentially dictates where everything should be places, and when, on the battlefield and in terms of the US Army as a whole. As a junior officer I’d be working for Generals and Colonels disseminating information and preparing documents and presentations for them to make decisions. I’d be responsible for moving thousands of people and millions of dollars in equipment. He made a point to note how well that translates into a civilian résumé. It sounded really interesting, so I’ll look into that more.
Since I have the time, I’ll tell you a little bit about what it’s like moving around from Point A to Point B during boot camp. For example, let’s say we have to go to lunch. We report to our CTA (company training area) and fall into formation (we have four ranks of 15 soldiers) w/ myself (APG), Mungo (PG), and “Little Rod” (Luis Rodriguez, the 5’1” pirate who carries our guide-on/flag) at the front. We’re given instructions (usually given 10 minutes to utilize the latrine and change from our PT clothes into our ACUs) then told to fall out. There is an orderly mad dash to run up the stairs. Of course, some one won’t make it back into formation on time (usually because they had to use the bathroom for more than 3 minutes and our platoon gets smoked. The Drill Sergeant (DS) will yell something like “the front leaning rest position! Move!”). And that is our cue to drop, put the weapons on our hands and start doing push-ups. When he says “down”, we reply “attention to detail!” and when he says “up” we yell “motivation is the key!” This goes on until “he gets tired”. There are a million different variations of getting smoked like this. We could be required to put the weapon over our heads and do the military press on a 4-count movement until he hits a ridiculously high and random number like, say 219. That’s happened. Or we’ll have to do mountain climbers or flutter kicks or jumping jacks until we can do them exactly in unison with everyone sounding off (which never happens).
On average I’d say we get smoked at least twice a day but as we get further along, it becomes more individualized, which is good for my back, but bad for the few who decide to be “that guy”.
Also, I went to “sick call” today (another classic military adventure of a 15 minute clinic visit that turned into a 4 hour waiting game). But I got to watch some SportsCenter (how about A-Rod and Michael Phelps?!) so that was nice. In the end I got Return to Duty status so I won’t miss anything, was given some cough drops, Mucinex, Tylenol, and Tessalon. Not bad, and I figure I’ll have this cold kicked in a few days.
Other than all of that, I’m doing really well and getting more acclimated to the environment all the time. Hope everything is well.

Love, Nick