Even when you win, you lose!

I swear that this place is designed to screw you over.  Thirteen weeks is a long time but considering all the stuff that needs to be crammed in, it might be too short.  Swim qual alone could take two or three weeks.  Instead, they cram an inspection in that week as well.  Everyone needs to get through the initial swim qualification.  Whether that takes one day or five is insignificant.  Combat Water Survival Qualification takes five days.  So here is part of the mind fuck that is Marine Corps Basic Training.  The DIs love to tell us that every Marine is a rifleman, every Marine needs to know everything there is to know about basic infantry skills.  If a Marine can't swim, he needs to take five days to learn.  However, if you know how to swim then get to the pool get through Day 1 and worry about getting the other four days done once you get to your unit.  Oh and by the way, the platoon gets points (yes points, like the friggin houses at Hogwarts) for how many recruits pass all five levels.  The DIs go postal whenever somebody succeeds in the pool and has to go back the following day, but go equally postal when somebody comes back with a failure.  I was a lifeguard for three years before I joined the Marines.  I grew up going to a lake every summer and swimming everyday.  My uncle taught me to swim by throwing me off the dock without a lifejacket on when I barely old enough to walk for christ sake.  The one thing I knew I wouldn't have a lot of trouble with here was the pool.  So after being starved for the last month and not seeming able to do anything except stutter when asked a simple question, I finally got to shine.  I was the only recruit in Platoon 2070 to get CWSQ 5.  I didn't realize that I inadvertently screwed myself over by doing well in the pool.  The rest of the platoon spent most of the week prepping there uniforms and cleaning their rifles.  I didn't have the same amount of time to clean mine, and you can't unlock your rifle at just any given time.  The DIs told us that when the Inspector asks how long we cleaned our rifles we were to answer "This recruit cleans his rifle for one hour every day, Sir!"  The screws in the buttstock of my rifle had sand in them.  I knew it. My squad leader knew it.  My DIs knew it.  The Inspector asked me why my rifle was dirty?  How long did I spend cleaning it each day?  I answered the way I was ordered to.  The Inspector failed me.  There were six failures in the platoon for that inspection.  Each of us got quarterdecked for a half hour for our unsatisfactory performance.  My personal favorite part of the quarterdecking was Sgt Smith repeatedly asking me if I enjoyed my leisurely week at the pool?  Ya you stupid jackass!!  Of course I did!!  Especially the part where the Instructor jumped on my back and tried to drown me!!!   I guess Gryffindor gets no points today!!!!

Combat Water Survival

Every time I think that I've officially heard the dumbest f@#$ing question imaginable, one of these sons of bitches goes above and beyond the limits of rational thought and delivers a gem.  We are at Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island South Carolina.  We are not at boot for the Army or the Air Force.  The Marine Corps fights on land, in the air and in the WATER.  The freaking Marines Hymn states "we will fight our country's battles in the air, on land and sea!"  So maybe somebody else can explain why one of the guys in the platoon asked this question,"Why do we have to pass a swim qual?!? My recruiter never said anything about going in the water!"  How the hell did this guy graduate from high school?  How the hell did this guy pass the ASVAB??  How the hell did somebody think that giving this imbecile a gun was a good idea?!?!

Before I came down here I thought that I was pretty smart and reasonably well travelled.  It never occurred to me before this week that a majority of young black men can't swim.  I am admitting my own ignorance here and I'm not trying to lump anyone into a stereotype.  Almost all the black recruits in Platoon 2070 failed swim qual.  I only mention this because they excel in all the other physical activities that we get forced to do; running, pull-ups, crunches, obstacles, pugil sticks..  you name it they are awesome at it.  Now, to be fair I should mention that we aren't talking about simple swimming.  I am talking about swimming in fatigues and boots, so it's not easy.  There is also a jump into the deep end of a two meter platform with a band around your arms and legs.  One recruit started to cry and scream at the top of his lungs on the platform because he was so scared.  This is where I don't understand the DIs.  This kid is terrified and screaming..  so what does the DI?  If you guessed scream at him that he is miserable, good for nothing, waste of air.  Now that is a reasonable reaction.  

History

Have you heard the expression "Beat it into your head"?  You're probably thinking that I'm about to describe one of my fellow recruits getting beaten down, and if that's the case then in this particular case you would be mistaken.  What I'm referring to is the idea that you can learn something by putting a beat to it and repeating it over and over.  Whenever we go anywhere, we march in four columns to the cadence of one of the DIs.  The cadence is a simple one, usually "Left, Right, Left, Right, Left, Right, Left."  Any subsequent command will always come after the last 'Left'.  But this is the standard beat.  After we start marching, the DI guiding the platoon will say "Echo On!!!" and the entire platoon will repeat "Echo On!!!"  From this point the platoon will repeat everything the DI says until he says "Echo Off!!!"  This is how the DIs beat facts into our heads.  For example, the DI says "The five major battles of World War Two are", the platoon will repeat this. Then he says "Key word B.I.G.O.T.", the platoon repeats.  He finishes with "Bougainville, Iwo Jima, Guadalcanal, Okinawa, Tarawa", the platoon repeats.  In three sentences the platoon has just learned that the Marine Corps five major battles of WWII are Bougainville, Iwo Jima, Guadalcanal, Okinawa, and Tarawa.  Does it matter that this keyword has the battles out of sequence, no.  This gets 'beaten' into the head due to it's simplicity and repetition.

That is one way that we learn the history of the Marine Corps.  The other way is to sit in giant lecture halls and have actual classes about USMC History.  It has occurred to me sitting through these that the Marine Corps takes more pride in it's history than any other group anywhere.  It also occurs to me that they get some of the most eccentric SNCOs on the planet to teach it.  We learned about one of the two two-time Congressional Medal of Honor winners in Marine Corps history.  He received his first Medal of Honor in 1900 during the Boxer Rebellion for singlehandedly defending his position against repeated attacks and inflicted casualties of around 200 on the attacking Boxers.  At the Battle of Belleau during WWI he is credited with yelling to his men "C'mon, you sons of bitches! Do you want to live forever?!?!"  You may have heard that quote before in a movie or TV show, but now you know that a Marine coined it.  This is the kind of thing I mean when I say that nobody takes more pride in their history.  The History classes are usually taught by the same Staff Sergeant.  What makes him unique is that after he tells us some fact about an individual or unit that won a battle against seemingly insurmountable odds he'll say, "That's pretty GODDAMN MOTIVATING, is IT not?!?"  I have written this exactly how he says it with the capitalized words being the ones he put emphasis on.  He's a character for sure.

These classes are a welcome change of pace to our day.  They are held inside, in an air conditioned auditorium.  All we have to do is sit there, listen and stay awake.  That's it!!  Now that sounds pretty easy doesn't it?  For some of these clowns this is too much to ask.  On average at least 10 guys will fall asleep, another 10 will get caught talking, and inevitably the whole platoon will get smoked after the class.

All that silliness aside, I heard something fascinating in one class this week.  The instructor was talking about the changes in warfare and how much the world has changed in the last ten years.  He told us "The next war that the United States will get into will be a direct result of an attack on American soil and that it will happen in the next five years!"  I heard this and thought "Holy SH@# how the hell do they know this?!? And then I got scared because I looked around the room and realized that these stupid sons of bitches sitting all around are going to the ones fighting it?!?!  God help us!

FINALLY!!!

They say that revenge is a dish best served cold.  I shed a tear this morning, but it was a tear of joy and relief.  Finally, the vicious, mass murdering, evil bastard who masterminded 9/11/01, Osama bin Laden is dead. For so many reasons this changes things for the world.  A zealot of evil and a demagogue of hate is dead.  There will be no more audio tapes.  There will be no more speculating about his possible whereabouts.  There will be no more doubting American resolve.  In the wake of Vietnam, there has a been a standing doctrine from enemies of America that if you can make the fight last long enough and kill enough Americans that America will lose its nerve.  No matter how long it takes, justice will be done.  I'm not foolish enough to believe that this will end the war on terror or future wars.  As long as there are people on this planet there will be intolerance, envy, hatred, violence and war.  However that doesn't mean that it's not okay to take a minute to celebrate and breathe a sigh of relief when a giant stain on humanity is removed.

Fifty years ago, President John F. Kennedy proclaimed, "Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans -- born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage, and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world. Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of liberty.  This much we pledge -- and more."

With joy and relief I salute the men and women of the United States Armed Forces, all our veterans, the intelligence community, President Barrack Obama and former President George W. Bush, and the American people.  You have reconfirmed to the world that we will pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and success of liberty.  Now let's turn the page.

Osama, I sincerely hope that you enjoy Hell.

Nothing is off limits

Remember in kindergarten when the teachers and our parents used to say "Sticks and stones can break my bones but words can never hurt me"?  That is an absolute crock of steaming horse manure and Drill Instructor school teaches people how to say the most cutting and evil things.  Most of the time they can do it without cussing.  Nothing is off limits to a DI:  How you look, act, talk, eat;  Where you're from;  Who your parents are;  What race or nationality you are;  Why you joined the Marines.  All these things are on the table and the results can be comically cruel.

My platoon has a Russian kid named Andrei Chernyshev.  He has a thick accent.  I'm talking about a spy movie thick accent and English is not his first language.  Throw in the fact that we aren't allowed to speak in the first person lets the jokes write themselves when it comes to his interactions with the DIs.  The Senior, The Heavy, Smith and Cain either can't pronounce his last name or purposely don't.  Every time Chernyshev tries to ask or answer a question, they cut him off.  He has been called Chernobyl, Moscow, Siberia, Cherry Blossom, Cherny-whatever, Commie, Rusky, KGB and my personal favorite, Sputnik.  The Heavy stood in front of him and started asking him about his family.  His parents are immigrants.  Andrei has four brothers.  It turns out that one is in the Army, one is in the Navy, one is in the Air Force and one is in the Coast Guard.  Upon hearing this, the Heavy accused him of being a spy and ordered him onto the quarter deck!

We have a set of identical twin brothers, Alex and Justin Wilhelmsen.  They are rack mates.  They stand right next to each other on line.  The DIs mispronounce their names:  Wilshammer, Windjammer, Wisenheimer.  They've called them Thing 1 and Thing 2.  They've asked each of them which one is the smart one and quarter decked them both no matter how they answer.  They've accused them of using telepathy and quarter decked them for that.  The Heavy stood in front of one and asked him if twins could feel each other's pain?  He decided to do an experiment.  He punched him in the chest and asked his brother if he felt it.  When the other one said no, he hit him again and asked again.  This happened about five times before his brother finally said he felt it.  Then the Heavy simply moved over and began the experiment again with the other one.  The DIs would send one to the quarter deck and yell "Take your idiot brother with you!"

One of the squad leaders is named David Umoren.  Now in case you don't see the comic aspect of this perhaps I should explain how his name is pronounced.  I sounds exactly how it looks phonetically, or like you moron.  I can only imagine how the DIs felt when they saw his name on the roster.  I mean this is like Barry Bonds playing bar league softball.  It's just plain unfair.  Add that to the fact that he is from the Caribbean and has an accent, well I think you get the idea.  Another recruit's name is Allan Gay.  Another grapefruit pitch.  Thomas Berger.  How many variations of that name do you think you can list?  Samuel Silin.  One of his many nicknames was Silly, but for some reason whenever they call him that it never seemed funny.

Blending in is not really an option.  Somehow, someway, they seem to find something on each of us.  It's only a matter of what it is and when.  There's a blue light special in the insult department and it's on all our gear lists.

Games

This entire experience is one giant mind game.  Drill Instructors have a seemingly endless array of games.  Everything is designed to get us to move faster, listen better, and work as a collective.  The games only start when someone screws up.  Who exactly can one screw a simple instruction like turn to your right??  This friggin platoon somehow figures out a way.  It's almost unbelievable that we can't do anything right. When we first got here I really thought that the DIs were just psychos.  They scream all the time and they always want more.  They snap at you even when you do it right.  I got up in the middle of the night to make a head call.  The squad bay is really dark and on my way to the head I didn't see Sgt Cain until I was about to pass him.  I said "Bye your leave, good evening Sir" and attempted to keep walking.  I should have known better.  "Oh hell no" was his reply, "Get back and try again."  Just so you know get back means go all the way back to my rack and then walk up and do it properly.  I didn't roll my eyes when he said it, but he cussed me out anyway "Good to Connors, you nasty thing lose your bearing too!  You owe me on the quarterdeck in the morning!  Get out of my sight!"  I was almost relieved to be able to go the head and just hoped that Cain would forget about the quarter decking in the morning.

When we move to slowly we hear "Oh?!?  Good to go?!? You want to move slow?!?" and then the bizarre task comes.  What constitutes a bizarre task?  Here is a list of notables:

• get on line with two sheets and a blanket
• fix your racks now (after you just stripped it)
• get to the rear of the squad bay
• get to the front of the squad bay
• get to the port side
• get to the starboard side
• get on line with a footlocker
• dump out your footlocker
• put everything back in your footlocker
• dump out your footlockers in the center now
• put everything back in your footlocker (good luck getting your stuff back)
• get into your PT gear
• put your uniforms on
• form a school circle
• get out to the street
• get back to the squad bay
• get into the pit

There are a lot more of these.  If you don't think that this sounds bad, you're right.  You're right because listing them doesn't include a DI screaming at you.  The games begin when the DI tells you to do this and then decides we aren't moving fast enough.  Get on line becomes get on line with two sheets and a blanket, which then becomes make your racks now...  "10, 9, 8, 3, 2, 1 You're done."  Everything always started with "Good to go, you want to move slow?" Then the instruction. Then the countdown.  No matter how fast we did it, we didn't do it fast enough.

The DIs have another set of games.  These are punishments.  We aren't allowed to say I.  We have to refer to ourselves in the third person as "This Recruit."  One recruit called himself I and got the following punishment; He had to stand at the POA and point at his eyeball and shout "Eye!" and then at his chest and shout "Recruit!" repeatedly for an hour.  Another time a recruit fell asleep during a class, so the DI chewed him out asking how he'd feel if he fell asleep on guard duty and got the platoon killed?  Then to emphasize the point he gave eight hours of fire watch and made him stand at the POA holding a pen in his finger tips with his arm straight out.  If he lowered his arm or dropped the pen he had to report to the DI Hut and announce that he had killed the entire platoon.  This kind of thing can happen at any time for any reason and I think I'm becoming paranoid.

Flash forward

Today is March 20, 2011.  Eight years ago today Operation Iraqi Freedom started.  I don't know how I feel about this.  It doesn't seem possible that it's been eight years.  My birthday is March 18.  I turned 27 two days before OIF began.  To be completely honest I didn't think I was going to turn 28.  War in any form is a scary thing, there is nothing glitzy or glamorous about it. People die and get hurt.  I knew all the Marines in MAG-39 who were killed.  I saw the pictures on the news of guys I went to Parris Island with who were killed.  I remember having chow with my friend Otis and sitting and talking to a guy Otis was friends with.  The next day he was killed.  Just one of the many to the folks back home who disagree with why we came to Iraq, but a real face to me.  Life became very simple for us.  Get up in the morning, check your boots for scorpions, go to the head and clean up, go to chow, go to MAG HQ work for 20 hours, go back to the tent, try not to fall asleep untying your boots, pass out...  repeat.  All the while you are doing two things:  hoping you don't die and trying not to think about home.  I know that I chose to join the Marine Corps.  I didn't have to do this.  We were trained to be hard as nails and that the most important thing was the mission.  We were trained to improvise, adapt and overcome.  We were trained to never give up and never surrender.  I never broke a bone or got shot or hit by shrapnel from a IED.  I wasn't deployed multiple times for over a year at a time.   I do have scars.  Sometimes it's very hard to keep my mind focused or my emotions in check.  I can get overly sensitive or insanely angry for no reason.  This happens to a lot of veterans.  The saying goes that time heals all wounds.  I've come to the conclusion that just isn't true.  Some events are so earth shattering, so traumatic, so scary that you will never be able to let them go and you will never feel the same again.  I have developed a bizarre coping mechanism, I focus my rage and aggression on the small and insignificant rather than real issues.  You could say that I sweat the small stuff in order to deal with the big stuff.

I have been telling the story of The Misguided Children which began almost twelve years ago in a real time format, but today I wanted to pause and remember the 4,439 brave men and women who have died in Iraq and the over 300,000 who survived but have come home scarred in one way or another.  All gave some, some gave all.  Semper Fidelis.

Black Flag

Have you seen Biloxi Blues?  When they get off the train Jerome says "God it's hot!  It's like Africa hot! I don't know if I'm gonna be able to stay here if it's gonna be this hot!" That's pretty much what Parris Island is like.  It's humid ALL the time.  It's hot ALL the time.  This is not an exaggeration.  It's hot when it rains. It's hot at night.  It's so hot here that the Marine Corps has to categorize how hot it is with the cunning use of flags.  It's called the Automatic Heat Stress Index or AHSI (I swear to God I should have signed up for the MOS that makes acronyms because the Marine Corps has an acronym for F@#$ING everything!) and it has four levels:  1) Green Flag Condition is 80 to 84.9 degrees.  Heavy exercises, for unacclimatized personnel, will be conducted with caution and under constant supervision. 2) Yellow Flag Condition is 85 to 87.9 degrees.  Strenuous exercises or physical labor will be curtailed for unacclimatized, newly assigned Marines and Civilian Marines in their first 3 weeks.  Avoid outdoor classes or work in the sun.  3) Red Flag Condition is 88 to 89 degrees.  All PT or very strenuous work will be curtailed for those not thoroughly acclimatized by at least 3 weeks.  Personnel not thoroughly acclimatized may carry on limited activity not to exceed 6 hours per day. 4) Black Flag Condition is 90 and above degrees.  All nonessential physical activity will be halted.   There have been days when the black flag is up by 9 am.  If we are out practicing drill on the parade deck and the black flag goes up they we go back to the barracks.  It should be noted that drill instructors hate these limitations and take it out on us when they have to alter their plans.  Now we may be in the barracks but that doesn't mean we are getting a break.  We will drill in the squad bay.  This gets extremely messy.  Platoon 2070 sucks at drill and trying to drill in a closed space just makes it worse.  The barracks are air conditioned.  This is not for comfort.  That would be an amenity and there are no amenities here.  They are air conditioned so we can train when it gets too hot outside.  There are 110 guys in this platoon.  It gets hot when 110 guys are running back and forth in a closed space.


I wish I could tell you that the recruits of Platoon 2070 are some of the finest young men America has to offer, but I can't.  Truthfully this might be the biggest collection of assholes and retards ever assembled.  These morons don't listen.  They can't walk in a straight line.  They won't sound off when answering the DIs.  We get chewed out and punished for everything and I'm actually beginning to think we might deserve it.  Why go off on this rant when I've been talking about black flags?  Well, because the funniest and saddest thing that has happened to date occurred while we were drilling inside during a black flag.  We were in our four squads lined up facing starboard in the squad bay.  There are two types of drill: marching and rifle manual.  We were doing rifle manual.  The Senior was standing on a foot locker calling out the commands and the other three jackals were moving through the platoon watching and correcting mistakes.  The Senior yelled "Left Shoulder Arms!" and you can hear all the rifles move but one loud thud on the ground.  Hockenberry for some unknown reason went to order arms.  In case you are wondering what the difference is I'll explain it quickly.  Left shoulder arms basically means that the muzzle of the rifle is above the left shoulder and the buttstock of the rifle is in the left hand.  Order arms means that the muzzle of the rifle is in the right hand and the buttstock is on the ground.  There is slightly more to it but that is the gist.  Now the Senior saw this and lost it.


Senior: "Hockenberry?!?!  God dammit?!?!  Do you even know what state you're in?!?!"
Hockenberry: "Sir Pennsylvania Sir!"


WTF?!?!?  Seriously?!?!  I can only assume that Hockenberry thought the Senior said from instead of in.  Well all hell broke loose after that.  The Senior actually fell off the foot locker laughing.  Most of the platoon laughed.  Sgt Smith started cussing out Hockenberry for being too stupid to breathe!  SSgt Askew got angry because everybody laughed.  Sgt Cain just stood there looking angry in a stupid way.  The Senior got himself together and ordered us all into the pit.  The sandpit behind the barracks is for punishment PT.  We spent almost 30 minutes in the pit that day.  We weren't even supposed to be outside.  

Candy Cain!!!

Boot camp is all about routines.  Every morning we get out of the rack when the dreaded "LIGHTS, LIGHTS, LIGHTS" gets yelled and we get dressed as fast as possible and on line for the head count.  All the recruits in the platoon stand on line at the POA (position of attention) while the drill instructors count the recruits and rifles.  In the beginning of boot camp all the DIs participated in the count.  We've gotten to the point that it's usually Sgt Cain who does the count.  Sgt Cain is the most hated of the DIs.  Everything the man does is annoying.  His voice just makes the skin crawl and just resonates in the small of your back.  He always wants the platoon's complete attention and then talks out of his ass.  When a DI yells "Zero" all the recruits have to literally stop and freeze in position and yell "Freeze Recruit Freeze."  The DI can leave you in this position for however long they want.  Cain is the worst offender of this.  Despite all his habits that have so endeared him to the recruits of Platoon 2070 one stands alone as the most hated.  In the morning while we stand on line at the POA he will correct recruits hand placement.  It's not the action so much as his particular method.  In the POA, proper hand placement is thumb on the trouser seem and knuckles against your leg.  If Sgt Cain feels that your hand is too far forward or back or that your hand is against your leg, he will adjust you by opening his index finger and thumb and jabbing this open claw into the fleshy part of your wrist between the bones of your hand and arm. (BTW if you don't think that will hurt or is annoying, open your hand like I said and now jab into your other wrist...  I'll wait...  See what I mean!!!)  You can see guys wince and glare at him when he does this.  You can see it in their eyes that they want to punch him right in his Where's Waldo looking face!!!

Now we all hate Sgt Cain, but Colson hates him to the point where he has become outright hostile.  Colson is a 5'10 fat black kid from Kentucky.  He is such a hick that I honestly question whether or not he ever owned shoes before he joined the Marines.  Colson tends to stand at the POA with his his fists pointed out instead of in and everyday Cain adjusts him.  Colson is stupid, annoying and unpleasant to be around, but he does have one talent.  He can throw his voice.  He has figured a way to talk out the side of his mouth and make it appear that it's not him.  He likes to do this to Sgt Cain.  After Sgt Cain passes him Colson will yell "C-A-I-N!!!!" in a high pitched squeal.  This drives Sgt Cain crazy.  He flips out every time and we all get punished.  No matter what he does to us, we won't tell him that it's Colson. While I think Colson is a total idiot I will give him his due, he won't do it when any of the other DIs are around.  After a week of yelling "C-A-I-N!!"  He decided to add "C-A-N-D-Y" to it.  I thought I had seen Cain at his maddest but "C-A-N-D-Y C-A-I-N!!!" pisses him off to end.  It's getting to the point where I personally can't believe that he doesn't know it's Colson yet.  I also can't believe that he hasn't caught him yet.  It's just another way that this place is completely insane.  Colson antagonizes Cain, Cain cusses us out and punishes us and nobody says anything.  Colson is becoming as unpopular as Cain.

This all came to a head last night.  Cain was the on duty DI for the night.  Colson pulled his little stunt twice and we got reamed out.  After lights out, Cain went into his office and shut the door.  About five minutes after he went into his office Colson decided to yell "C-A-N-D-Y C-A-I-N!!!" at the top of his lungs.  Before anyone could laugh Cain's voice came out of nowhere "THAT'S IT!!!  I CAUGHT YOU COLSON YOU FAT STUPID BASTARD!!!  GET UP AND INTO MY OFFICE YOU'RE DONE!!!"  First of all, I saw Cain go into his office, so I'm wondering what ninja technique the sneaky bastard used to get back into the squad bay?!?  Second, see first question?!?!  WOW!!!  This morning the Senior told us that Colson had been dropped from our platoon and that anyone else who wanted to test the DIs would meet the same fate!  I still can't believe how Cain caught him.  I'm actually in a state of awe right now.

You missed a spot

Every time I think that I have seen the full extent of the pure evil nature of my DIs, they prove me wrong.  All my life I've heard that if you don't like the weather in New England, wait a minute.  That principle can be applied here.  Sgt Smith is a hard man.  I don't think that he knows what sympathy is and I know for a fact he doesn't know what empathy is.  Our platoon scribe is a kid named Throck, that is short for Throckmorton.  Yes that is quite a mouthful.  Throck bears a striking resemblance to Drew Carey.  He is about 5'8, has a belly, wicked thick glasses and a seriously high pitched voice.  Throck has been on PI for two months because he broke his leg and got rolled back in training.  Throck can be whiny and seems to operate on his own program.  More than just about any other recruit, he seems to inspire the ire of Sgt Smith.  We were waiting in the chute at the chow hall at lunch time.  Throck was standing in the line closest to where Sgt Smith was cussing out the platoon.  All of a sudden Throck reaches up and with his left hand and smacks his right forearm and quickly tries to put his hand back to his side.  Of course, it made a loud smacking sound and Sgt Smith saw this.  He yells at Throck to get out of line and explain himself.  The exchange went like this:

Smith:  What in the HELL are you doing Throckmorton?

Throck:  (High pitched voice) Sir, killing a mosquito Sir!

Smith: (Smacks Throck in the face with his right hand and then uses that hand to guide him toward the back of the platoon) Come with me Throckmorton!

(Now at the rear of the platoon)

Smith: Don't unpack your bags son, you won't be staying here very long!

Throck is an extremely nervous young man.  This has completely freaked him out.  He's terrified of Sgt Smith.  During Senior Square Away time, Throck asks the Senior if he should be nervous about what Smith said to him.  The Senior who is not the most even tempered man quickly and emphatically says "Throck you don't have to worry about how long you're staying till I tell you that you're in trouble.  Now sit down and shut up!"  Throck seemed more at ease after this which makes me seriously doubt his intelligence because there was nothing reassuring about that statement.  

Now you might be saying to yourself right now that wasn't so bad.  Maybe you're right.  A drill instructor slapping a recruit in the face (not supposed to happen, but it does) isn't that bad.  But maybe you'll feel differently about this.  We had an inspection today.  So last night we had to shave, scrub our hands and fingernails and get a pre-inspection inspection (yes that apparently is a real thing)  We had to come out and stand in front of Sgt Smith with our hands presented at waste level and then turn our heads to the right, left and sky.  If we were clean enough we got to our foot lockers, if not we had to go back and try again.  Now shaving is really rough for the black recruits because some of them get really bad razor bumps.  It goes so bad for some of them that Medical will issue No-Shave Chits.  Guys would be coming out of the head bleeding because they had cut off a razor bump and then Smith would cuss them out.  Now that's pretty bad, getting forced to painfully shave, cutting yourself and then getting an ass chewing for it.  But that's not the focus of my story.  One recruit, Hockenberry (I am not making these names up!!!) is a 5'7 white kid from Pennsylvania.   He is a little slow and not really athletic.  The most distinguishing feature he has is severe acne and pits on his face.  It actually looks like mountains and valleys on his cheeks.  Hockenberry is also terrified of Sgt Smith.  Hockenberry shaved his face as close as he could.  Let's just say he shaved too close.  He came out of the head with a beard of blood from all the acne he cut off. (This is not an exaggeration!!!)  He stood in front of Sgt Smith for inspection and at first Smith's eyes bulged out of his face in shock.  Here's what happened next:

Smith:  What in the HELL were you doing in there Hockenberry?!?!

Hockenberry:  Sir shaving Sir!

Smith:  (Stares at him menacingly then inspects him, then he points at one side) You missed a spot. Go do it again.

So Hockenberry went back into the head and shaved again!  When he came out the second time looking just as jacked up as he did the first time, Sgt Smith inspected him and then sprayed him in the face with after shave!  I don't even want to imagine how much that must have stung.  

Diet trays to the front

When I first went to my recruiters office I weighed 242 lbs.  That was in March.  When I left for PI, I weighed 222 lbs.  My recruiter told me that I needed to weigh 225 before I left.  This freaked me out because I was having trouble hitting that mark.  If I didn't get to 225 or below would they not let go to boot camp? (Bear in mind that at this point I don't think that would have been the end of the world but I did then!)  Well, it turns out that this was one of many false things that my esteemed recruiter told me.  I could have weighed 250 and as long as I could pass the IST they would have let me go to boot.  Why does this bother me?  It bothers me because what the bastard should have told was that I needed to get under 215 lbs because is the weight limit for men who are 74 inches tall.  Had he told me that then I would have worked harder and cut more weight.  Instead I came down here thinking that I had lost enough weight and low and behold my DIs held a different view.  I have been placed on diet tray.  This means that when we go to chow I have to move to the front of the line when we go in and announce to the mess staff that I need a diet tray.  All my brown skivvy shirts have two white lines printed on the front and the back so the DIs know to spend a little extra time torturing me during PT.  All of this just seems to add to the overall humiliation and brain washing that this wonderful place has to offer!

That being said it should be noted that this place might be the best dietary program in the history of the world.  I came here at 222 on June 15th.  It is July 1st and I weigh 200 lbs.  I asked the Senior when a recruit can get off the Diet Tray program and he told me they would take me off when I was 15 lbs under the weight limit.  I'm not rocket scientist but that should mean that I should be off diet tray NOW!  Well, as with everything else they do down here, the DIs operate on their own time frame or whenever they F@#$ING feel like it.  Anyways, there is a side effect to losing 22 lbs in fifteen days and that is that you can lose muscle and stamina as well.  I am exhausted.  I could eleven pull ups when I came here and now I am maxing out at seven.   This came into play when we had pugil sticks the other day.  The first two times we had pugil stick matches I won easily because I was stronger than my opponent.  This last time I got knocked around for two reasons, I am a lot lighter and I am not used to it.  I know why it happened and so do the DIs but that didn't stop the evil bastards from chewing my ass for losing.  You know, maybe that's why I'm dropping weight so fast cuz the damn DIs chew our asses so much!!

Do you think that I am making up how devious the DIs are?  Do you think that I am exaggerating because of how much I hate them and this place?  Maybe you have a point.  However, I want you to consider this little tale first.  Every night we have Senior Drill Instructor time.  We all sit around with the Senior and mail is passed out and he tells what is going on the world.  Everyone wants to get mail.  Sometimes guys get packages with food in them.  Not just any food either, candy or sweets!  If a guy gets one of these packages he has to come to the front, open in front of everyone and he can eat what's in it until all the mail is passed out.  However, this is yet another of the Catch 22s.  When all the mail is passed out, you aren't allowed to keep what's left.  You must turn it in to the heavy who puts in the trash and then dumps cologne and bleach on it after he tears open all the packaging to ensure that no one will attempt to eat it later. (I've seen guys dig through the trash at night and eat the stuff anyways!  Desperate times I guess!)  Then the guy who got to eat will get called up the quarterdeck and get PT'd for about 15 minutes or until he looks like he's gonna throw up or actually throws up!  The DIs love it when a recruit pukes!  I haven't gotten any care packages yet, and honestly I don't want one.  I think I'll write a letter to my dad and tell him not to send me anything other than letters, I catch enough hell from these vultures as is.

You aren't worth...

We have been Platoon 2070 for a week and it has been the longest week of my life.  I read every book, saw every movie I could find and talked to as many Marines as I could about what PI is like.  I actually thought I was prepared for this.  I must be a complete fool.  I wasn't ready for this.  This is a God damn nightmare.  The DIs are omniscient, maniacal, slave drivers.  The other recruits in this platoon are either completely insane or complete idiots.  I've seen guys sleep walk, and have night terrors.  One of the sleep walkers must have been dreaming about getting his ass chewed out because he was screaming "SIR, YES SIR" and standing on line.  I am not kidding.  One of the guys has pissed his bed every night.  He's eighteen years old for Christ sake?!?!  This one big black kid must have decided that this isn't for him because he waited by the door of the DI office and when SSgt Askew came out, he slapped Askew's hat right off his head and said "I'm going home and if you try to stop me, I'm gonna kick your ass!"  Are you kidding me?!?  This dude was big and he had the jump on Askew.  I really thought somebody was gonna get killed.  Instead what happened was SSgt Askew pulled a Jedi mind trick on this big bastard.  He talked him down and brought him in to his office.  Of course it should be noted that he never came back out.  I can only assume that the Heavy either sent the kid packing or that he killed him and ate his remains.

I never thought that marching in a formation could be so difficult.  This platoon either can't listen or can't understand simple instructions.  We start drilling and before we even get 20 feet we inevitably hear "Oh hell no! Get back!"  So everyone turns and runs back to where we started and we try again.  This goes on for hours!  It is ridiculously humid here, and there are little bugs that swarm around your head because of the layer of sweat that is always there.  If you move, wince or God forbid slap at one, you will get destroyed by whichever one of the DIs sees you..  and one of them will ALWAYS see you.

I'll go more into detail about the general insanity of this place some other time, for now I want to focus on one that happened.  We apparently are the worst collection of screw ups and retards in the known universe according to our DIs.  They are so sick of us that the Heavy chewed our asses out last night for at least an hour.  He took the Platoon guidon and threw it in the trash.  He told us, and this is a quote, "Not one of you is worth how many hours your pathetic mothers were in labor with you!"  Well, this got a reaction from a few guys, including me, but one of the squad leaders spoke up and said "Sir, this recruit doesn't appreciate that.  Some of these recruits' mothers are dead, Sir!"  The next thing the Heavy said was quite possibly the most evil and cruel thing I've ever heard.  He said "Good, then they aren't here to see the DISGRACE you've all become!"  He delivered this line with such venom that I have no doubt he meant it.  After that he basically told us that if we don't get our heads out of our asses and start doing things the right way that we will all wish we were never born.  I am relatively convinced that this is Hell and that if the Heavy isn't Satan, then he is his right hand man.

Lights! Lights! Lights!

I used to watch the Marine Corps' ad when I was a kid that said "We do more before 9 am than most people do all day!" It seemed to me that they were either lying or that most people don't do shit.  Well, I can only speak for myself as a recruit at Parris Island, it's not a lie and most people don't do shit!!  There are three words that every recruit who goes through Marine Corps boot camp will learn to love and hate based on when they're said, either at Reveille or Taps.  Those three words are "Lights! Lights! Lights!"  In the morning when you hear them it means get your worthless ass up and on line for the head count immediately.  There is no snooze option.  There is only instant obedience.   Don't believe me?  Well, on our second day as Platoon 2070 one young man found out what happens when you don't get up.  He stayed in bed while the rest of us got on line.  The Heavy went over and knelt down next to his head and said softly (to my eternal amazement) "Son, it's time to get up." The kid said "Five more minutes, please?" The Heavy didn't even bother to reply.  What he did instead was stand up, grab the mattress and flip the kid out of bed and onto the floor.  The startled recruit jumped up with his fist clenched and was met instantly by the Heavy and the other two green belts who were all screaming at him "Go ahead and swing and you will not even feel your teeth break as your face hits the floor!!!  Now get your ass on line now!!!"  On line does not mean connect to the Internet and check your facebook.  The squad bay is a wide open room with beams that divide into three sections.  On the port side (left) and starboard side (right) there are rows of bunks and footlockers.  The middle of the squad bay is called the DI Highway.  It bears this name for to reasons: 1) this where the DIs inspect the platoon because the recruits line up in between the beams on each side (Hence the term ON LINE) and 2) if a recruit steps into the middle, he will get run over.

While on the subject of the DI Highway, I should probably introduce the other two Green Belts.  Sgt Smith is a short, bald white man with a sarcastic wit and an evil disposition.  He has a spider web tattoo on one of his elbows and what I can only assume is a woman on the other.  I say assume because I can only see the legs beneath his shirt sleeve.  Sgt Smith doesn't answer questions right away.  Instead he stares you down menacingly an sticks his hand, which he holds hook shaped, into your face and twists it until he finally answers in a quiet evil whisper.  He's an extremely scary individual who I'm convinced may have murdered several people before he joined the Marines. Sgt Cain is a tall, wiry, young white man who wears glasses and is the closest living resemblance to Where's Waldo that I've ever seen.  He is the only DI that makes mistakes when he gives orders which gets snickers from the platoon and then all of us in trouble. Cain is also the only DI that every single member of the platoon believes they can kick the snot out of in a straight fight.  He speaks with a weird drawl that makes him sound like he has minor cerebral palsy.  Maybe that is too harsh a way to describe him but I can't think of a kinder one.  Have you ever seen Police Academy?  When Lt Harris introduces himself to his cadets he tells them "You are going to hate my guts for the rest of your lives."  Sgt Cain seems like he studied Lt Harris.

The days are long and there are absolutely no amenities.  This is a bare essentials existence.  Every thing is done on the go.  Even chow is fast.  And the DIs have tricks for days.  Everything they say is a test.  The Senior came through the chow hall and asked us if we were enjoying chow.  2070 responded "YES SIR!"  Then he asked if we wanted seconds.  Again, "YES SIR!"  The Senior smiled and then loudly said you got 30 seconds to finish and began counting down from 30.   Like I said, everything is a test and we just flunked!  Now I said that "Lights, Lights, Lights" are the most hated and welcome three words at boot camp depending on when you hear them.  At night when you hear them it means the day is over and you have survived a day in the closest thing that resembles Hell.

Oh You Want to Move Slow?!?!?

Everything that happens during boot camp is planned, regimented and expertly timed.  The precision is mind boggling and down right scary.  This entire experience is a manufactured brain scramble.  Everyone here volunteered to be here.  Every single person signed their names on the dotted line and said "Let's do it!"  The Drill Instructors asked to be here.  The recruits asked to be here.  Everybody WANTED to be here.  Yet, deep down everyone HATES it here.  It's because Parris Island is a means to an end.  As Joker said in Full Metal Jacket "A 13 week college for the phony tough and the crazy brave."  Okay, so Joker said eight in the movie but times have changed.  We spent the last three days in Indoc getting our heads shaved, getting poked and prodded, getting our basic issue, being yelled at for everything including breathing wrong (that's right, I said for breathing wrong!), not being allowed to sleep.  All of this was done in preparation to BEGIN training.

So after the dust settled on the IST (Initial Strength Test for those who are just tuning in) and the groups were divided, the somewhat smaller platoons march to their new homes to meet their Drill Instructors.  For me that means that I am now a part of Platoon 2070, Golf Company 2nd Battalion.  2070 was the last platoon formed and our squad bay is on the 3rd deck of the barracks.  Once we get to our squad bay we immediately report to the front and sit form a school circle.  Four men, our DIs are waiting for us.  Staff Sergeant Noland is our Senior Drill Instructor.  He is a tall and lean white man and has a deep raspy voice and an angry scowl.  There a short ceremony where he explains that it his and his team's mission to train us.  His exact words are "We will make every effort to train you, even after some of you have given up on yourselves."  Once the ceremony is over the Senior, as he will be called from this point forward, turns the platoon over to his Heavy.  The Heavy Hat Drill Instructor is the enforcer, and for the recruits of Platoon 2070, his name is Staff Sergeant Askew.  He is a tall and lean black man with a booming voice and a cutting stare.  SSgt Askew is a walking breathing nightmare.  Once the Senior closed the door to his office, a terror was unleashed.  Orders were barked and people started running this way and that way.  Everything had to be done at ridiculous speed.  "Get on line now! 10-9-8-3-2-1 YOU'RE DONE! STOP MOVING!"  I don't know if he noticed that he left out 7-4 but I sure as hell am not going to tell him.  The DIs were inventorying our gear.  If someone was missing something, they got their asses chewed out!  "Where is your canteen?!? Why are you a worthless piece of nasty trash!?!?  You better miracle me a canteen or I will DESTROY YOU!!!"  This went on for the next hour.   I can't even honestly describe to you at this point what the other two DIs looked like because they moved so fast and furiously they looked like angry pointing, screaming blurs...  I have a feeling this is going to get a lot worse without the luxury of getting better!

Why Oh Why?!?!

I can't believe how much insanity can occur in just a couple days.  I can't believe how little sleep a person can get and still function.  I can't believe that the Marine Corps clams to be the finest fighting force in the world and recruits such unbelievable idiots.  I mean young, dumb and full of cum doesn't scratch the surface.  My platoon has over 130 guys in it (Only 75 will graduate, but we'll get to that later) and you could say that we're a motley crew.  You have black militants, racist rednecks, stud athletes, geeks, a Russian immigrant, a pair of twins, high school dropouts, college graduates (me and one other guy), morons, gang bangers, smart asses, alpha males, cocky little punks, failures, and criminals.  The only thing we all have in common is that for some reason we all want to be Marines.  Personally I wonder every minute what the hell I am doing here.

We have marched back and forth between three buildings for the last three days.  We aren't allowed to talk, or move without permission.  We have been taken to the dentist and the eye doctor (I fell asleep while I was reading the eye chart and smacked upside the head...  So much for no physical abuse!).  We lined up outside medical and removed our blouses (Cammie long sleeved shirt.  Don't you love Marine jargon?!?!) and rolled up the sleeves of our brown T-Shirts.  Then we snaked around this big room to eventually stand in front of what I can only describe as a gauntlet.  Six Naval Corpsmen lined up in in pairs, each has a shot gun (not a double barrel or a 12 gauge, but literally a hand held shot gun with a needle, a big handle trigger and mixture of shots in it ranging from Flu vaccine to TB).  Each of us has to walk in between the three pairs and stand there while each loads his gun and then fires a shot into the meaty part of the shoulder, I can't help but wonder if this is what cows feel like as they are branded.  Six actual shots, I don't know how many vaccines, one recruit fainted during the second round of shots and one recruit who threatened to punch the Corpsman if he even thought about sticking that gun in his arm.  He was pulled out of line.  I can only assume that I'll never see him again.  After this pleasant experience it was time for head calls (bathroom breaks).  I was taking a leak when the guy in the next stall passed out while he was pissing.  Yes you heard me correctly.  When he fell, he fell forward but he kind of crumpled.  He hit his face on the toilet and broke the toilet and his jaw.  Can you believe that?  He was on the floor face down, with his hand on his junk, a piece of the toilet next to his head and he was still pissing?!?!  Turns out his name was Crooks.  Crooks had a hell of a first day and he spent the next couple weeks with his jaw wired shut.  The funny part was that when he came to the Drill Instructor cussed him out for breaking the toilet?!?!

Before I left for this Godforsaken place my friend Dan told me to bring a packet of Nodoz with me and not to get caught with it.  I brought it with me, but the DIs spook me out so much that I threw it away.  I really shouldn't have.  Sleep deprivation is a powerful tool. Combine that with being kept in the dark about what's going on and having a maniac scream in your face about everything you do is mentally, physically, and emotionally destructive.

Now I don't know what some of these retreads were thinking when they signed up, but what shocks me the most is that some of them failed the initial strength test.  A couple guys couldn't do a pull up.  Not one pull up!  To pass you need to do three.  A bunch couldn't do fifty crunches in two minutes.  To pass you need to do seventy.  And a whole butt load couldn't run a mile and a half in under fifteen minutes.  So all of these failures were taken away to Physical Conditioning Platoon, PCP or Pork Chop Platoon for two weeks and will try to pass the IST again.  Screw that!!!  That's two extra weeks in hell that doesn't count for remedial physical training!!  One guy started crying when he found out he had failed and just started running down the street wailing.  Where the F@#$ did he think was going?!?  Besides if he'd run as fast during the test as he did while he was trying to escape he might have passed.  

Mind Job

Question: How do you get a person who wants to know the reason why things are done and doesn't want to get hurt to instantly follow orders and put himself into harm's way?

Answer:  The United States Marine Corps has developed a system to accomplish this very task in 13 short weeks.

The system is so effective that upon completion the Marine will not only instantly follow orders and put himself into harm's way... he'll do it enthusiastically!

Today is Saturday, at least I think it's Saturday, one of the DIs said it was Saturday.  I've been here for 3 days and it feels like 3 years.  The first thing I noticed about Paris Island is the humidity.  It's like 98% humidity here all the time.  We got here at 2 in the morning...  sorry 0200 (probably gonna get quarterdecked for that! What is quarterdecked you ask?  I'll get to that later!)...  and it was 85 degrees and humid as hell.  I told you that the biggest, baddest looking black man I ever saw was our Indoc Drill Instructor.  When he came onto the bus he didn't yell.  I was ready for yelling.  I was ready for a tornado to hit us.  That didn't happen.  What he did instead was worse.  Way worse.  He stood at the front of the bus and in a bass monotone said, "Shut your mouths and listen up. When I say go, you will grab all your trash and get off this bus and get your lousy feet on those yellow footprints over there.  Do you understand? (This was a rhetorical question.)  GO!"  After he said he proceeded down the aisle encouraging the young men on the bus to move quickly.  Bear in mind that what I actually mean by encouraging was that he grabbed shoulders, shirts, maybe even hair and pushed whoever wasn't moving fast enough toward the door.  When we got the to yellow footprints we were told to lock our disgusting bodies and listen.  He barked a series of orders at us while telling us that we weren't good enough to be here but over the course of 13 weeks we would become worthy.  Right then the magnitude of 13 weeks hit me!  This wasn't even day one and it was the longest day of my life.

After the pep talk, it was time for haircuts.  Once we ordered to do so we raced into the building and lined up heel to toe at the door to the barbershop.  There is another way to describe heel to toe, nut to butt.  That's how close to the guy in front of and behind you is.  Uncomfortable doesn't do this justice.  The barbers are so old that each one looks like he has both feet in the grave and is just waiting for the right time to collapse into the coffin and call it a day.  Each has trembling hands, thick black glasses like coke bottles and long white coats.  Everyone is getting there head shaved.  We all knew this so it's not a big deal.  What is a big deal is the fact that these barber shop wraiths drag the clippers over your scalp like they were reincarnated indians out on the plains.  I could feel the tracks on my scalp and I can see spots of blood on everyones head.

Next up is paperwork.  It's gotta be nearly 3:30 or 4:00 am...  I mean 0330-0400..  and everyone has been up since 0530 yesterday, this is the perfect time to fill out paperwork.  At this point it is clear to me that I have signed my life away for the next four years so I can't imagine what I am signing now.  The DI is not in an answering questions mood.  It is entirely possible that I just signed away the rights to my firstborn child.  At one point I think I signed up for the GI Bill. (What the F@#$ do I need the GI Bill for I just graduated from college!?!?!?  Then again maybe if I'd taken school more seriously I wouldn't have thought this was a good idea!?!?!)

Now that the i's are dotted and the t's are crossed it's off to get our basic issue.  We march down the hall and into a room where there are two aisles divided by two long tables with little dividers like voting booths.  We are ordered to file down and line up in front of a cubby.  Once there we are told to strip down to underwear and put everything else into the brown paper bag on the table.  We are given tape and a marker to seal up the bag and write our info on it.  Sad to think that all my stuff fits into a paper bag and I won't see it again for 3 months but whatever.  Then we meet a large foul tempered man who seems to enjoy yelling at us and calling us "recruits" like it means "assbag".  We all go through the lines and are issued three pairs of cammie blouses (shirts), cammies trousers (pants), two pairs of boots (one combat and one jungle), two cammie covers (hats) three pairs of green shorts, two packs of three brown t-shirts, three packs of black and white sock sand one pair of gofasters (gray sneakers), and two web belts. We shuffle back to the cubby and change.  We are ordered to roll up the trouser legs and drape them over our boots.  We are told to leave our sleeves down.  It is my humble opinion that we look like complete idiots.  Our uniforms are kept looking sloppy to remind us that we are sloppy.  The gear we aren't wearing is loaded into a white mesh bag.

Our beast like guide on this morning from hell informs us that is time for chow.  So we line up and begin to walk, not march, to chow.  Little do any of us know how far away the chow hall is.  It is still dark and the street lights have an other worldly orange tint.  This is the first real glimpse of the place I will call home for the next 13 weeks and I gotta say that I'm not feeling any better.  It is so humid that just walking is making me sweat and that attracts the bugs.  And this was only day one!!!