ROTC PAPER

I have spent a long time altering my aspirations for life achievement. For a great deal of time I had daydreams about military glory, but due to the fear that death is inevitable in a military setting, I decided that my life was too important to waste as a soldier. I saw the uniform and relative anonymity as a deterrent to my participation, because fame and glory given to an anonymous soldier leave no legacy for me. Over several years of talking to other soldiers, my view gradually changed. My life was no longer too important to enlist, but too important NOT to enlist. Other things to factor in to my enlistment would have to include my divorce and being fired from a couple of decent jobs. It became dreadfully apparent that I had failed at marriage, at College, at a few rock bands, at a “career” in retail of all things. Here I was, at 21, and everything had collapsed. I saw then that I was far too immature to continue in life in the grown-up world.
In an effort to become a decent human being, worthy of leaving the kiddie-table and being a man, I decided to go somewhere that would destroy me. Throughout Bible College every mentor tells every apprentice that the only way to be filled is to be emptied first. What is left of one’s self needs to be shattered so that it can be put back together in a more stable structure, and my construction was in desperate need of rebuilding, so the place I chose to be shattered was the military. Due to a month-old tattoo that followed the full length of my spine, I could not be in the Marines or the Army, but there was a recruiter at the National Guard who decided I’d be worth a waiver, because perhaps he was in need of a bonus that month. So I went to Fort Benning and I graduated from Basic and AIT, which was the first thing I’d ever started AND finished, and although I didn’t think it was as difficult a time as I had signed up for, people who had been in the closest proximity to me were convinced that I was more mature and respectful, which made me more respectable. People in my family who had been somewhat detached because of my strangeness were suddenly drawn to me, as I had recently joined the ranks. I felt elite again, and I had accomplished something real.
When I went to Iraq and Louisiana, I still didn’t feel like I was doing anything as spectacular as I anticipated. I never made any dramatic rescues from Hurricane Katrina aftermath, I never shot a suicide bomber (or anything outside a range, for that matter), I never even passed a fitness test. But I went, I did what I was told, I completed the tasks set before me, and I came home a better man for it.
So in essence, I never seemed to accomplish anything of glorious proportions, but if I had, I would never have learned that I don’t have to. I don’t have to be a rock star to enjoy my music. I don’t have to be a General to enjoy the army. I don’t need a Medal of Honor to be a veteran. In fact, what I enjoy most about anything I do is not being good at it, but finding someone else who is fumbling worse than I am, and then showing him how to stop fumbling so much. I want to help by being a mentor. I want to teach.
Thus, here I am in college. Obviously because nobody hires a teacher with a GED, and slightly less obviously because most people won’t even respect a single word out of my mouth until I have made up for that GED, as though NOT spending two more years getting beat up and robbed makes me stupid! My intention in the short term is to complete college this time. Whether I transfer in any credits from Bible College really depends on whether they get in the way of opportunities to take new classes. I want to learn as much as I can in the University, and it is being funded by the National Guard, so transferring in two years of classes may actually make me graduate early, but at a sacrifice of valuable classes. Plus, if they transfer in as anything, it would probably be toward a Religious Studies minor, which if I claim, I would love to get more religious studies classes here while I’m at it. (For example, in case my two years of Greek don’t transfer in, I’m taking Hebrew.) While in college, I plan on changing up my workout routine. I would rather work on my strength and endurance to be a great warrior than do all the heavy lifting, work on my aesthetics, and look like a warrior but not actually be able to pass a fitness test! I would love to finish up college in amazing shape so that I can dominate the fitness standards, rather than aspiring to reach them. But that, again, is for the respect of my peers, as well as my own morale. In short, I need to build up my self in such a way that I, and others, will admire me. I want to finish the things I start, no matter how trivial. And in the long term, this will build me up so that I can do the things I want to. I will get my commission through college so that I can lead troops and be the one who chooses the missions, so that someone in the position I was in can go home and say they didn’t just sweep the sand out of the halls for the entire deployment. Through college, I will get a degree so that I can teach, because that is the real joy of doing anything: preparing others to follow after, so they can accomplish much in my stead. Through college I can have grown-up conversations with people that do not end with the realization that although I may be right, I do not have the credentials that I need to add weight to my “theories.” In the longer term, I hope to be a better husband, better father, better friend, better mentor, better apprentice, better leader, better follower, and better man, because I do what I set out to do, and the things which I set out to do need to be done.