SPC Reverend Bakie's blog: "Most Recent Blogs"

Ah, I just had to do that.  It almost has a good ring to it, if you think closely enough.  Anyways, I wanted to share more about my recent signing up into the Armed Forces, which for me I’m going into the Army.  You won’t believe how I’ve felt going into the military, I have this renewed, refreshing  taste in life again, which is something I haven’t felt in quite some time.  Especially now, ever since getting laid off  last year and since trying to look for a crappy job which has been more like pulling teeth  than anything else, I need some light to shed on me.  I have this sense of pride in me now, being that I am going to have a chance to serve my country.  Now, for some of you that don’t really know the extent of my background, I’ll give you a briefing of it:  I have always supported the military and our troops since I was a little kid.  In fact, I have been into military history since as far as I can remember.  I have always wanted to join the military when I was younger, but thanks to a dad that kept telling me that I may not like it, I never did.  I was about to join the military twice before, first time when I got out of high school, and the second time when I was twenty-two after a terrible breakup with an ex-girlfriend.  It seemed that every time came up, a better opportunity arose from it before I even got a chance to fill out my papers.  Also, I was told before by a recruiter I may not be able to go in due to being an only child, which I even thought they would’ve kept enforcing even to this day.  However, I told them I have no siblings, and they said it wasn’t a problem, so I joined.  It’s funny how there were some people I talked to thinking that I almost went off the deep end when I signed up.  Well, for one, other opportunities were not around, and I am the type that hates being out of work for long periods of time.  Second, just simply my living situation I want to change because as I said before if I lose the place where I am living now, I would be homeless.  As a result, I saw the military something as security for a roof over my head.  Now, for some of you may be thinking, well what about family or friends, why the military?  This is pretty much a broken record that I’ve said plenty before, it’s just simply I will not live back with either of my parents, and other family I don’t talk to anymore.  As for friends, well, I don’t want to burden them as much as I have already, they have done more than enough.  Plus, I like to be self-sufficient as possible.  But this is a wonderful opportunity for me to go into the military, and I am looking forward to getting into the best shape I’ve been in yet.  For a long time, I always said if I did join the military, I would go into the Army because there’s a lot of things you can do in that branch.  Whereas the other three branches; Navy, Air Force, and the Marines, when you pick the job you want when signing up, you’re pretty much stuck doing that you’re entire tenure of service.  But with the Army, you can do different jobs, as long as you meet the requirements.  Also, in the Army, you can move up in rank a little quicker than the other branches, which means better pay in the long run.  And finally, I always saw myself as a soldier, as oppose to a sailor, or to a certain extent an airman.  The Marines was something I wanted to go into back when I was younger, but I am glad it was merely a phase.  I have heard too many horror stories of people in the Marine Corp. that it scared me out of it.  Also, I remember my ex-girlfriend’s dad giving me an ass chewing about joining the Marines.  Being he served in the Navy, he knew a lot about the objectives of the Marine Corp., and he kept telling me it doesn’t take a lot of brains to get shot and killed.  I know, the Marines are usually the first group of soldiers to deploy in a combat situation,  their purpose is the secure positions for the other branches to move into the battle.  Also, the Marines are like the Navy’s soldiers,  which technically they’re part of the Navy; they guard the ships and docks, and when a ship is out to sea it usually keeps group of one hundred Marines on board just in case if there is fighting on land and the Navy guns can’t silence it, the Marines go on land and stop it cold.  There are some technical jobs in the Marines, even some jet fighters and tank crewmen, but primarily the Marines are an infantry unit, and as their famous motto goes, First to Go, Last to Know.  Although the Army does have an infantry unit, I always felt they teach more tactical maneuvers than the Marines do, so that was a big plus.  Also, one thing not a lot don’t know is the Marines used to be a Department for the Army before switching to the Navy.   Now for the Navy, it’s a good branch to be in, because there are so many opportunities of technical work you can get into, and stuff you can do outside the military after switching back into the civilian world.  The only thing is if you can handle being out in the ocean for fifteen months at a time.  That was my reason for not joining the Navy, because I couldn’t handle being out in the middle of the ocean, thousands of miles away from the nearest dry land.  Also, there was a time when I went out fishing in the Gulf of Mexico when I was little, and I got very, very seasick.  Since then, being on a boat for long periods of time was a bit of a challenge.  However, if you are someone that likes being on a boat or a ship, the Navy is for you.  Being a sailor is not really being a fighting soldier, you’re more of a mechanic, radar man, or even a post man or tailor.  Basically all ships, battleships, aircraft carriers, destroyers and so on are like floating cities.  All the crew members have two jobs to perform, the first being everyday work to keep the ship going during peacetime, and the second if there’s a war going on and if it goes on red alert, the crew goes to their assigned battle station.  The sailor usually only fights to defend the ship, man the guns on it to repel the enemy, and even the Navy has jet pilots as well.  As far as land fighting is concerned, they let the Marines handle that.   As for the Air Force, that was my second choice of branch to join, but it was ago that kept me out.  Their cutoff age is twenty-seven, and being twenty-nine, they said no.  However, the only problem I would have if I went into the Air Force was that I couldn’t learn to fly a jet, for that being you got to have 20/20 vision to even be considered to, which is something I don‘t have.  Also, I found out you have to be an officer to be able to fly an aircraft, I don’t know if that is true, but I can understand why, because one F-16 jet is worth a one hundred million dollars.  An F-22 Raptor is even more, I think the price tag is in the billions.  So, I would assume they would want responsible people handling such valuable equipment, and officers earned their right of passage.  Now, I don’t know if the prices are accurate on the jet planes, but they are very expensive pieces of equipment.  So, if I was able to go into the Air Force, I would have just gotten a desk job at a base, probably go into working on computers or radar.  But my heart has always been in the Army, being some of the people I liked to read about were in that branch, like George S. Patton and William T. Sherman.  Both of these were generals in the Army, Patton in World War Two and Sherman in the American Civil War.  Both of these men I always felt epitomized what generals are suppose to be: hard, fair, and wanting to fight to end the war.  I don’t think I would ever go that far into rank to being a general, considering now there are too many politics in the military today for men that high in rank got to deal with, but they are a good example to stand by when serving in the military.  I cannot wait till I get into Basic Training and start losing all weight I have gained over the years.  Going into the Army for me is almost like living a childhood dream coming true, and I want to make the most of it.  After Basic gets done,  which for some of you that don’t know where I’ll be going is at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, I get to go to Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, AL to train for Ammunition Stock Control and Accounting Specialist, the whole proper term of the job.  After Basic, I become a PFC, or in civilian terms is Private First Class, being that I have college background, and I may even raise up to that rank before Basic if I study the Military Alphabet, General Orders, or anything else they need me to remember.  I just started to learn marching techniques at my future soldiers’ class at the recruiting office in town.   Plus, I started to do some physical training and was able to lose ten pounds in one week.  At that rate, I’ll be well in shape when comes to November, the time I get to ship out.  But the training I am doing though, is not only training for Basic, I’m training for Airborne School, which is what I want to go into after my job training is done.  I always wanted to be a paratrooper in the Army, and I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity.  Also, if I can pull some strings being I’m not going into Infantry in my first term, I want to try Ranger School.  Like I said, I want to make the most of my military experience.  I signed up for four years, just to see how things go and if I like it enough, I may re-enlist.  I mean, I don’t anyone to go to, I haven’t had a girlfriend in about two years now and I don’t have children.  There’s nothing for me in the town I am living in now, and it’ll be good to get out of Illinois for a while.  I even talked to my CO or Commanding Officer about how Redstone Arsenal is and what I can do if I go back to school and finish my Bachelor’s in Accounting.  He told me Redstone Arsenal is a very laid back base, fairly small, and when I looked up online to find coffeehouses in the Huntsville area, I saw there’s one right down the street of the base.  I was quite thrilled about finding that out, being that’ll be my place to go if I can get off base for a little bit.  Also, if I finish up my Major in Accounting, I can apply to work in the payroll for the US Army, which means very good money, and a very good retirement plan.  But I see going into the Army to help kick start my business once more, and perhaps getting that to full swing.  Shoot, I may even continue doing the Army after my business gets successful, just because I like the military.  I am the kind of person that wanted to join to get something with civilian credibility and also learn how to fight, which is why I wanted to do Airborne and Ranger School.  I’ll just have to see what happens from there.