My Training Unit

So who is training to be a chemical and quartermaster repairer? There are nine of us in the class from Army National Guard Units across the nation: 3 sergeants (SGT), 5 specialists (SPC) and 1 corporal (CPL). One of the SGTs is my roommate, he is from Kansas and another is from Michigan. Both of them are 50 years old. The other SGT and one SPC are brothers, both from Las Vegas. Strangely, all three of the SGTs are ex-Navy. There is an SPC from North Dakota, one from Virginia, and one from W. Virginia, besides yours truly from Pennsylvania. The CPL is from Long Island. All of the students are men, which our instructors tell us is unusual. Our instructors are both women, a sergeant from Pennsylvania and a staff sergeant from West Virginia.

Running To. . .or From

I have been writing for months about what I see and what I do. Many of the questions I get from friends and family are about what the Army is like for me. But partly they are asking what is the Army like at all. Most of my co-workers and friends don't know a serving soldier except as an acquaintance or a cousin from somewhere else.

But today when I was tired and miserable from being up late and then watching the smoke roll out of the hotel where we are sleeping, I thought, "What happens when I get deployed, and I am up all night with something more serious than a kitchen fire? Can I handle that?" I had opposing urges to let my one-year enlistment run out and leave and to see a regular Army recruiter and volunteer for a tank unit.

I am in this to both run to what I believe is my eternal future and run from the life I have been leading. I don't mean my family. I mean the guy who over the past two decades has transplanted himself from high-school-educated soldier and Teamster (four years on the dock at Yellow Freight) to "communications professional." I have a lovely family, a big house, and have made more than 40 trips overseas on business in the past decade.

To paraphrase CS Lewis, I am in the world, but more importantly, the world is in me. I do love the world in a way that I did not when the world was a big, hostile, mysterious place. I joined the Army to run away from the privilege that has become part of my life. Eventually we will say to Our Lord, "Thy Will Be Done" or He will say the same to us and we will be eternally undone. And the life I have been living is increasingly dominated by my will. But the Army is the opposite. On duty, I do what I am told by whomever is in charge. I do what they say, when they say. I eat when the chow is available, or not. But I don't choose meal times or menus.

So I am running away from my love of this life and running toward the next, but it is already difficult at one weekend per month and now a two-week school. I have enough money to skip the mess hall when I want to. So I do. I am already equivocating and I am three days in to some of the lightest duty the Army has--a school. Just two weeks of beign clean, well-fed and learning about equipment.

My long-term plan is to get the training I need, go on active duty for a year, then live a simpler life making less money. No more expensive clothes, no more expensive food whenever I want. I still think it is the right thing to do. But I have to keep running. If I stop, I will turn back.

And a Longer Night!!!!

I got to bed late Monday night. BAD Choice. At 1:45 am the fire alarms went off in the hotel where we are staying. Anyway, the kitchen caught on fire and by 2 am we were out in the parking lot watching eventually seven fire trucks arrive. No one was hurt and everybody was back in their rooms by 330 am.
It wasn't enough sleep though. I was tired all day. We got done just before 6pm. I passed my first exam, which was on the 350GPM pump, and we started on a 120,000 btu heating unit.

Long Day with a Pump

All of today and most of tomorrow we learned to maintain and operate the Army's 350 GPM Pump. This aptly named, diesel-powered, trailer-mounted device, pumps 350 gallons per minute of either water or fuels--but not both. We read schematics, did mechanical and electrical troubleshooting, and took the whole pump body apart and put it back together. If you were wondering what a 3-cylinder pump has to with chemical weapons, this course is about maintaining the equipment that helps to clean up after contamination. The various steam cleaners and field showers and laudries need water and diesel to get where they need to be and operate while on site--so we start with a pump.

We Are National Guard on an Active Army Post

The classes I and the other 30+ students are in are for National Guard and Reserve soldiers. This was evident Sunday morning. We were told it was very important to begin class at 0800 Sunday because that was the only time we could have a soldering class during our two weeks. Every other day was booked. So at 0815 after waiting 15 minutes outside a locked building, our instructors went to Plan B and took us to another building for the afternoon's lesson. The school staff person assigned to let us in did not show up. Our instructors tried to arrange for a class in the same place in the afternoon, but for reasons they were polite enough not to share with the students, that option was out also. They did say that we must remain flexible throughout the two weeks because the active Army soldiers would have priority.

Army Meet and Greet

If it was not evident in the last post, an Army meet and greet is different than the civilian version. At 4pm Saturday, our 1st Sergeant said we would a 1900 hours formation that evening for a meet and greet. Between 1900 and 2000 hours we 30 or so students sat in a conference room and met and were greeted by the senior NCOs who gave the briefings I described yesterday. In summary: be safe, don't speed on post, don't go near the active Army students, don't get drunk and if you do stay in the hotel, formation at 0715 hours every day. Have fun!

Reporting for Duty

Chemical & Quartermaster Equipment Repair School (MOS 63J10) started with in processing this afternoon. Report time was No Later Than 1600. I arrived at 1500 hours. The training school headquarters is located off post. After filling out some forms, I had to change into my PT uniform and get weighed and measured. I am 71 1/2 inches tall so I can weigh up to 197 pounds. With winter PT uniform I weighed 193, so they let me continue processing.

By 1600 the first inprocessing was completed and I drove to our quarters--just two men to a room for the entire two weeks.

After formation, I tried to get on the internet in the room, then in the lobby using wireless. No wireless in the room, slow in the lobby. My roommate, a sergeant from Kansas also here for 63J training, told me how to use the ethernet connection in the room, now I am on line.

Formation tomorrow and every day is 0715. Tomorrow we have a mandatory safety briefing after dinner. The training schedule every day runs from 0715 to 2000, so I wont have a lot of free time. It should be an interesting two weeks.