07SEP09

Today most of us ran two laps around the track to practice for our physical qualification test next week. The rest of our company is on “green belt” which means while most of us are working our bodies to death, they stand and do arm circles and even get shiny green belts to wear. The “green belts” are considered the broke people of the company. Being on light duty is a so called vacation for the “green belters” but they are missing out on the suffering that brings our company together. Some would give anything to have their bones broken and torn muscles healed so they can participate in the company’s confidence building team exercises. As it is, a few of the green belts are thinking about how bad they don’t want to get reverted; sent back to another company  a week or two behind us. Because this would mean they would be missing valuable physical training. This also hit home when we did a joint exercise with Hotel company and their company commanders. Hotel company is one week behind us so some of us have the unwanted potential to join them…And we thought our company commanders were scary…We now realize that our company commanders are so tough on us because they want us to improve on being a team. They are truly doing all this for our own good… but of course they enjoy our pain at least a little bit. We can’t really complain because our company commanders have all been through where we are now. They all went through Boot Camp when they first enlisted and then again when they were training to become company commanders. If they can do it twice, then we should be able to get though this at least once. We just need to toughen up. The rest of our day was filled with classes ranging from: how the G.I Bill works and sexual harassment awareness. The treat came tonight when we finally started to learn manual arms drills. Our pieces were finally being used for learning instead of punishment. It seems that the first two weeks were the hardest, but we can finally see ourselves pulling together as a team. We are all eager to see what week three has in store for us.

08SEP09

Today our company took a step towards being an effective military unit, by learning to stand watch. Standing watch is an important aspect to every military service. Unlike civilian jobs, the Coast Guard never stops operating. We must always be ready and alert. Usually a watch consists of 02 to 03 people making sure that their assigned area is secure, and they do this in 04 hour shifts. Since we are just learning this and our company consists of over 70 people, the watch is broken up into 01 hour shifts, so all recruits can learn the proper way to stand watch. This meant that some people went to bed, just in time to wake up shortly after. Our watch standing consists of walking our deck and checking all squadbays and stairwells. This gave us an opportunity to see our shipmates in a professional way. The young men and women that we normally see dripping with sweat from intensive training, we now saw crawled up in the fetal position, sleeping like babies. Our first two classes were the driest yet. We learned about safety and hazardous materials, very important information to learn but hardly anything that the instructor could make riveting. Most of our instructors start off their classes informing us that their biggest pet peeve is recruits falling asleep in class. Today we all had a hard time with this. Heads started nodding, highlighters drifted across pages and eyes became very heavy. Every break we would all rush to the head and try and jolt ourselves awake with wet paper towels soaked in cold water. Our next class was able to keep us awake because we were interested in learning about the history of the Coast Guard. Most of us did not realize that the Coast Guard is the oldest maritime service; The Navy ain’t got nothin’ on us. The stories of the great men and women and ships that came before us gave us goosebumps. Hearing about their brave and selfless acts of heroism made us all eager to graduate and be in the fleet. We can only hope to achieve the same. We all will depart Cape May, hoping to walk in the steps of our forefathers.

09SEP09

Today the weather took a foul turn. Instead of blue skies we endured a day of pouring rain. As the day went on the weather put a damper on the company’s spirits. Just when we were all ready to give up, we got the boost we sorely needed. The chaplain came by to give us updates on the outside world. We all sat eager to hear the news. The boys were thrilled to hear all the current events in the sports world. At the end of the news we had a somber moment remembering the events of September 11^th. We were all reminded of why we are here, and that we are proud to be here serving our country.

10SEP09

Today was an early and tiring wake up for those needing to start attending physical fitness enhancement class. This class is a daily practice for out fitness test in week 04. Waking up at 0430 to be at the gym by 0530 felt impossible. We all learned that sleep in a privilege earned. We were eager to have our first seamanship class today. The company was curious to meet a new instructor and begin learning the ins and out of a ship. Even though we were running on no sleep, we all made it through the 04 hour class successfully. If the days do not already seem long, the company commanders make it feel that much longer…most of us recruits are careless at times. We forget to refill our pockets that are supposed to contain 02 performance trackers and 02 ink sticks, therefore our company commanders lined us up and demanded us to empty out pockets, it was no surprise that we were unprepared. Their solution to this was to rip up performance trackers along the quarterdeck, and then came some well deserved intensive training. Our sweaty palms stuck to the paper and beads of sweat rolled down our cheeks. Through exhaustion and insanity, we all know through blood sweat and tears that graduation gets closer every day.

11SEP09

September 11, 2001 is an unforgettable day in history. Today were reminded of the tragic events of that horrid day, and gave up our thoughts and prayers to the friends and families affected. Our company watched a slideshow on the effects of September 11, and emotions began to run deeply through the room. The boys even teared up, breaking the poker faces that we must render on a normal day. During mid-afternoon our spirits were lifted when our Lead Company Commander, petty officer Rosas gave us encouraging words that we are improving and fastly approaching week 04. Even though sad emotions rolled through the day, we were reminded while we are here; to serve and protect our country which is the most honorable job in the world.

12SEP09

Saturday is normally a relaxing day but not today for Golf Company…we spent the entire day in our seamanship class. Although tying knots and taking tests were making the day seem slow it was exciting to get behind the controls of a boat simulator, which taught us how to steer a ship correctly using seamanship terminology. After arriving back at Healy hall, Petty Officer Bailey ordered us to get outside on the wet parade field. After completing some teamwork intensive training he told us to look around the regiment to see how many other companies were outside at 2100 training. There was only one other company out there. He told us only the best train day or night, rain or shine. Our response echoed through the regiment and then our company proudly resided in Healy hall for the night.

13SEP09

Today is most recruit’s favorite day of the week because of divine hours. We get five hours on Sundays to attend chapel, write and read letters, and square away our uniforms for the week. We all appreciate the few hours of relaxation to think about what we have accomplished thus far, and to plan for a successful upcoming week. Now that week 4 has finally arrived, it is time to split our company into two parts; port side (left) and starboard side (right). We are split in order to start attending our more hands on, interactive classes, such as; marksmanship and firefighting. This is a very important week in training because we also have our physical fitness test and midterm vastly approaching. Wish us luck!

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