Journal Entry: "No Dark Sarcasm in the Classroom"

Its Saturday early afternoon. We started the morning off at 3:45 with a 10K ruck march. It went well. Only a 45lbs load and I was feeling good. We started classes in earnest this week – finally got our laptops too, so I won’t have to hand-write anymore except when we’re in the field. Hell, yeah! Unfortunately, it appears that internet access is going to be the exception and not the rule. After all, as we are reminded daily, we are untrustworthy, stupid and lazy “privates” who will either a) die in Iraq or b) get someone else killed in Iraq because we suck. Even though some of us are degreed, accomplished, motivated, over thirty and dedicated to doing our very best, the Army ensures that we’re all treated as badly as the worst recruit that has ever passed through the United States military. It’s the age-old bureaucratic sense of fairness. Who hasn’t been to the DMV or some other government-related entity and needed something done outside of normal process and told, “If I do that for you, I’d have to do that for everyone.” – the battle cry of the bureaucrat. Well, that’s pretty much the order of the day here. You’re going to be demeaned, threatened, beaten-down and punished whether you need it or not. Some of this is understandable. For instance, collective punishment teaches soldiers to rely on each other and work (or suffer) as a team; to place the well-being of the team above their own. Those are concepts I definitely support. However, the overall attitude towards trainees ranges from moderate loathing to absolute contempt. Its been the hardest aspect of this experience for me to adjust to save being away from my family and my comfortable, relatively carefree life.

We started combatives class this week as well. We’re learning some pretty scary, effective ways to end life. It bothers me somewhat, and I hope to never put it to use, but pragmatically speaking, if it comes to that, I want to be prepared to defend myself and put the other guy out instinctively. Its hard to deny what I’ve gotten myself into when the topic of discussion is the quickest way to kill another human. We have several classes each week on this subject and I’m actually looking forward to the next one. To be honest, I’ve never been very comfortable with physical confrontation and I’d very much like to get over that. There’s little doubt that after this experience, I should be over most of that.
We’ve been spending the day since the ruck march frantically cleaning and straightening our living quarters in preparation for inspection later this afternoon. If we pass we get four hours down at the PX/Mini-mall complex. I can’t tell if it’s a setup for failure or if they’ll actually let us go this time. You never know. I hope so, I’ve got a sweet tooth to indulge.