0310 hours
Here I am on guard duty, actually more of a CQ. We just make sure people on fire guard do their job, comes down here and takes roll call every hour. It’s been tough the last 2 days, they’ve been pushing us harder than any other platoon. We never do pushups for less than 5 minutes now, or they stay up in pushup form anyway. It’s been tough, but we kind of figure it’s for our own good. This is the only way to get ready to pass the PT test. My run is the weakest part, though. I just need to keep my head up and do some stuff. 115 degrees with humidity and BDUs yesterday, we marched, we practiced marching with rear march, countercolumn march, changestep, column, left/right, stuff like that. The drill sergeants are hard to deal with sometimes, but I know or think I know what they’re trying to do. Drill Sergeant Parker is a female, and she’s the main drill sergeant. Drill Sergeants Harris and Woods are our assistants. DS Harris is missing the top part of her thumb but still smokes us when he does pushups with us. They try to sound like pissed off, and I’m sure some other people are feeling like breaking down cuz of them, but it’s nothing but motivation. They went through the same thing we did, perhaps more. They know we’re getting so much information at one time, how to salute, do 4 different positions and what to say (parade rest “snap” – at ease “ah” – stand at ease – and attention “pathfinders! shoot ’em in the face!). I’m a Pathfinder, they’re usually the best platoon come graduation time. We got pushed today often, 5 or more minutes each, sometimes over the same stuff, people not shaving or shaving well enough, bunks not made, floors not sweeped/mopped, they find something. We get about 45 minutes to do whatever till lights out, shower, laundry, teeth, write, cleanup, change from BDUs (which actually stands for Basic Dress Uniform; the camouflaged green uniform you see on TV), shine boots, all that stuff. We don’t have time to do everything, really, we also have to memorize things we will probably need over again to do during our free time – soldiers codes, alpha motto, and General Orders. I dreamed about school today before I woke up. I for 3 $500 tickets to something, and a whole bunch of people from school were there, and I enjoyed it. Nobody reading this would understand what we’ve been through, it’s rough alright, but we keep ourselves motivated. So far most of the girls and few guys cried already the last 3+ days we’ve been here. We do things till it either hurts so much that our feet go numb, or till we can’t stand it anymore, like pushups. I’ve never sweated so much before, but it’s good exercise. Everyone else is doing it, why can’t I? I ask myself. I wouldn’t be here if the platoon was divided and I had no motivation. We go to classrooms everyday for almost 2-3 hours, we eat 3 times everyday for max of 5 minutes per person, march/pushups everyday, and the drill sergeants tell us it’s mandatory to do 10 situps/10 pushups or more every break you get, which is fine except with all we’re doing, by then everything in our body aches. Some people think it’s been ok so far, few, maybe max of 10 in our company fit enough for 71 pushups and 87 situps and 2 miles under 13:30. There’s 60 peeps in each platoon, 4 platoons in each company, and I don’t know yet how many companies are at Ft. Jackson for basic training but it’s more than 5. Half of us are females. Sometimes it pisses me off cuz we have to push (do pushups) when we do something wrong but the females just get sent back to their rooms, or we push with them. But I’ve never felt so much satisfaction during the night regarding what I and we accomplished that day. Our marches are starting to look more sharp. There is a contest at the end of basic training regarding marching, only one platoon graduating on the 30th Aug 01 gets to march and shown off in graduation as a platoon, not just walk up. Our platoon’s been falling back in terms of motivation (i.e., running faster to designated places, screaming louder, etc.) compared to the other platoons, but everything else, like PT readiness, fitness, and marches, we’re by far the best. Haven’t been able to call yet, only 1st and 2nd platoons have for 3 minutes max each person. The first 2 or 3 weeks of basic is always the hardest, we do a lot more physical workouts during that time frame, then 2-3 weeks of shooting. Gotta go, will write more later whenever possible. 0445 hours. Out.
Kim 1 Jul 01