An Entry From Watchstanding

The boredom that always ensues during watch has enveloped me like a comfortable cloud of ubiquitous spite. The futility in assigning watches during ungodly hours of the night has become frustrating only when such duties fall to me, which is the case this weekend, hopefully the last Saturday and Sunday I ever spend at Naval Hospital Corps School, Great Lakes, Illinois. I graduate on the sixth of October as a Hospital Corpsman, quite a world apart from what I thought I'd be doing when I signed my initial contract with the Navy on January 5th, 2006. Having completed the Corps School Curriculum, I'm slightly surprised to report it lacking in many aspects, foremost among them: difficulty, and an assurance of student comprehension and accountability. I am beginning to doubt the importance of the Hospital Corps in U.S. Naval Medicine, the quality of the training, and the lack of actual instruction makes me wonder if the Navy's interests might be better served through outsourcing, if outsourcing is even a possibility for such menial duties.

Perhaps the late hour and my fears and worries about my new career are speaking for me a bit, and turning all my ruminations bitter. My "Shipmates" also share in a piece of the guilt pie. Navy Boot Camp, even with its modern and pathetic requirements, does a reasonable job of instilling military bearing, discipline, and a zesty semi-dash of integrity. For some reason, a lot of my fellow Corps School students left what they were indoctrinated with at RTC in their divisional compartments with their guard belts and canteens, as if military bearing was a limited resource that only needed to be passed on to the next generation of recruits. Many of my classmates have become, in no uncertain terms, dirt bags. Leaving unpaid bar tabs (in uniform, no less) in their wake, spouting profanity like stuffing on Thanksgiving, and sprinkling some good ol' disciplinary and academic infractions in for good measure. I cannot help but believe these problems to be symptomatic of a disorder within my generation. We are the Me II/Too generation. How else to explain junior enlisted kvetching about officer and NCO privilege? Or the utter lack of humility? I no longer consider it a coincidence that shows like Star Trek are so officer-centric. Who doesn't want to be Top Dog, at the upper echelon of the hierarchy? But if you've enlisted and consciously chosen to take the short straw, the path to success is built upon sucking it up, and dealing with the quirks of enlisted life in the military. Members of "The Greatest Generation" knew their place, members of the Me II Generation are still struggling with "stay", "down", and "fetch", until they can figure out how to really obey, no treat. Maybe the new recruiting commercial tag line should be, "If someone were to write a Forrest Gump-esque novel on your life, would you be Bubba, Gump, or Lt. Dan?" Now that I think about it, the question doesn't make much sense...thanks sleep deprivation.

On the subject of sleep, I do find myself grateful that life in the military has seemingly corrected my circadian rhythms, aside from duty days and weekends spent watching empty early morning spaces, only occupied by stumblin' parties of Phase III liberty partiers. I don't think I would be stretching the truth in any fashion if I were to call Corps School the least healthy environment I have ever lived in. Surprising, considering the ever-present debauchery and other factors found at the University of Arizona. Strangely, this is the only time I have ever written anything out of pure boredom, and it shows, yet time keeps dragging onward.

After this watch, I'll only have six hours of watch and four hour long sessions of sweepers cleaning crew left, no to mention two half-an-hour-or-longer 0615 duty section musters. I wonder if I've completed the PQS to be a night security guard, I mean, how many qualifications can there really be? Time is finally flowing a bit more smoothly, and as I am fifteen minutes from two hours of sleep, I can't help but wonder what wicked turn of events is around the next corner on the great road of life, or maybe the metaphor should be a carousel, who knows? I don't.