Basic Training week 5

Hi All,

First off I want to thank everyone for posing messages on the blog and sending me letters.  I unfortunately have zero access to a computer but my mom sent me the blog comments and they were truly uplifting.  Monday was an extremely busy day.  We had to go back to 30^th AG where I had my first week in reception.  We were all getting sized and tailored for our dress blues for graduation…. Still a way to go this felt like a bit of false hope.  Since there are about 220 guys that have to be fitted and they went by alphabetical order I sat there from 0700 until 1630.  This made for an extremely long day of sitting and standing without being able to talk.  Then when we finally got back to the bay for some unknown reason a few people in our platoon started acting like they forgot where they were.  Walking up and talking to a civilian (a huge NO GO!)  finishing their food while standing… (not allowed you must be sitting) talking to a drill sgt. without a battle buddy and not showing them respect by standing at ease and responding with Drill Sgt.  So needless to say we got smoked again.  I am at a point now where I just look at it as extra training.  Then to top it all off as a Squad Leader I have to check up on my guys….. well over the weekend one private was caught with two books (any personal reading books are not allowed and you know this from the start).  Then I caught him with a stolen belt from another private in the platoon.  So, I had the honor of getting to write up my first affidavit against another soldier.  We have been having issues with him from day one and now that I have the ability to do something I have.  He will most likely get re-cycled that means he would have to do basic all over or he will get kicked out of the Army with a dishonorable discharge, either way hopefully one of my many headaches goes away.

Tuesday morning for PT we had A.G.R. (Ability Group Run) my group which is the top group ran around three miles in 21 minutes.  I did really well and when it was over I felt really good.  After that we ate breakfast then changed into ACU’s.  We packed up our assault packs and got ready to go to the grenade course.  At first we were suppose to have transit there but the First Sgt. thought it would be better to march there.  So after a three mile run we had a 1.5 mile RUCK with 40# of equipment, because we were informed that grenades explode.  When we got there we had to go through a safety briefing and how to learn how to properly throw a grenade; it’s not like in the movies where they sky hook it. There were a lot of people taking videos and pictures so I’m sure you can see it on face book.  Throwing grenades is a go / no go event.  It is actually very simple as long as you do what you are told.  You do not get to see it explode when you throw it because you have to get down or your safety Sgt. will put you on the ground.  But after your turn they take you behind the ballistics window so you can see other do it, and it’s really crazy to think how something that small packs such an enormous punch.  After this you go through seven obstacles in which you would use a grenade but due to time restraints because there are 220 soldiers in our company we only completed three.  The first was a 35 meter toss which was supposed to be from the standing position but they made us do it from a knee so I was about 3 meters short.  The next was a low crawl to a bunker, check inside then arm the grenade toss it in and roll away, passed this one easily.  The last one we did was probably the hardest.  Arm the grenade (everything used on the obstacle course were dummy grenades) and throw it perfectly into the center of a trench where a .50 cal would be set up.  After that we got our stuff together to march back, it was hot again today so that 1.5 miles back really kicked all of our butts.  When we got back we changed into PT clothes (shorts & t-shirts) and went to chow for dinner.  When we got back from dinner there was a girl there that sets up the designs for our platoon t-shirts, I think they will turn out pretty cool and on the back it will have all of our names.  A nice memento of this wonderful place!!  The rest of the night was just cleaning and preparing for B.R.M. (Basic Rifle Marksmanship) we qualified in the next three days so I spent a lot of time cleaning my rifle.

Wednesday we woke up and did PT and got ready for BRM.  BRM was the one thing I was most worried about because of my lack of experience and knowledge.  The day out there actually flew by and it was the practice day and I did alright but still have a lot to work on in the next couple of days.  When we got back some of the platoon again forgot where they were and started acting stupid.  It was the last straw we got absolutely destroyed.  We actually lost all privileges and got knocked back down to red phase.  They took our banner away and put a mop pole in its place.  This was very hard for the leadership.  We have been working so hard to try and get everyone squared away.  It just made us feel like we were failing.  I’m not going to lie that night I lost my motivation and actually started to doubt why I came here, but then I sat in my bunk and thought about everyone back home and all of my family that I am here to make proud.  I thought that I have never quit anything in my life and I was not going to start now.

Thursday to make things even worse the drill sgts decided that we were no longer allowed to stay in our bay; we can only be in the bay to sleep.  We now have to be outside all of the time except when we sleep.  I still did not let this get me down I let it fuel the fire.  I improved my shooting by 10 targets and I actually qualified on the prequalification day.  I was actually pretty proud of myself but still I was upset that even thought I do well the rest of the platoon is failing which means that I and the other leadership is failing.  When we got back to the bay all the leadership guys got together to try and figure out how to correct this issue.  After our meeting we all got with our respective squads and laid down the law but we did it in a family oriented way.  The next day something clicked.  We went from the worst platoon in BRM to almost winner the streamer for it and we were actually the only platoon to have all members get a go.  Aftern we were done we were doing some training to get ready for next week and some of the other platoon were disrespecting our NCO Sgt V and it was kind of amazing our whole platoon went off for once it wasn’t just me going off everyone finally stepped up. These two things showed the Drill Sgts that we all do care and we all have potential.  That night there was a bit of pride I the platoon and it was really nice.  Then I found out that if you hit a certain amount of targets you could get a 30 minute call home… I missed it by one so that really sucked cause I really want to hear how everyone is doing that kind of put me down for a while but that night I knew I just needed to get some sleep because we have a 6.2 mile RUCK march on Saturday.   The RUCK march on Saturday was rough I’m am getting pretty beat up both physically and mentally.  Being a squad leader has so much responsibility that I really do not have any time for myself anymore.  So if you write me thank you very much (Uncle Bob Kord and Jake Jacobek) the letters truly mean so much but I am not sure if I will have the ability to write you back.

I just want you all to know that I am doing well despite all of my minor injuries and mental headaches.  I am ready to push through and graduate in around 4-5 weeks!!!!

Miss you all,

Patrick