13 October 1997 Destiny?

After discovering that active duty was my destiny I desperately wanted to try and buddy up with my best friend Josh Shotwell who was scheduled to leave for boot camp sometime in early September. Since I was originally going into the reserves and Josh had signed up for active duty our recruiter told us that doing the "buddy program" was not an option. Personally I think he was lying to us to fill a quota but I have no evidence of this.

Now that I was going to go active I hoped that our recruiter, Sergeant Flak, could pull a few strings and make it happen for us. The best he could do was a 2 week bump to the first of October instead of the 13th so I took it in hopes that Josh and I might be stationed together or go to the School of Infantry together.

Josh left sometime in early to mid-September as I waited nervously for my departure. Josh had a mullet through high school and his hair was thin, blond and down to his shoulders. I don't remember when and where it happened, but a week after leaving I saw him in Beaver. I thought he came to my house but I am not entirely sure. Anyway, I was confused and I think I said, "What the hell are you doing here?"

His head had been shaved and it was a new, but better look for him in my opinion. As it turned out, the condition of his knee would not allow him to move forward with a career in the Corps so within a week of leaving he was sent home. It was fascinating to hear about all the craziness he had experienced in that week and to some degree it was intimidating but I had committed and I was gung-ho for it.

With Josh home I got to hang out with my best friend again for another two weeks before handing my life over to the government for four years. However, destiny would prove that leaving on October 1st was not in my life's cards. While in the weight room by myself one day in late September I was doing the leg press when something in my head felt like it exploded.

I contribute this moment to the injury I received from Daniel Carter a year earlier when he broke my back in football practice. I think the untreated injury was still plaguing me and would prove to delay my departure. The pain was so excruciating and so instant that I could not control the weight and had it not been for the safety brackets on the machine it would have crushed me.

I whimpered in pain as there was no one else in the facility to assist me. I was 18 years old and stuck on the floor as if someone had crushed my head with a sledge hammer. After withering in pain on the black floor for 15 minutes I managed to make my way to my fathers pickup truck to drive home.

A day later I called my recruiter to let him know what had happened because I was supposed to leave within a few days. He thought that I was making excuses and was going to weasel my way out of leaving. He thought I was having cold feet but I reassured him that it was serious.

He pushed my day for departure back to the original date of 13 October. It was not until a few days prior to this that my concussion healed itself and I was in the shape necessary to commit to the four year contract.

I had hoped that Josh and I would serve together our entire commitment, but now I was all alone and I was about to face the world by being thrown into the fire.

Quote of The Day: 

Winston Churchill said, "Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts"

God's Power

When God wants us to do something He has a way of getting us to do it whether we want to or not. I am not saying God takes our agency, but I believe that he has a way of steering us in the right direction. However, if we want to defy him enough he will let us.

My father was strictly opposed to me joining the Marine Corps as an active duty Marine. He fiercely believed that my calling was to serve a Mormon mission so the reserve component was the only option he was willing to allow me to take. God had different plans however.

I came to my father in the summer of 1997 and told him that I felt strongly that I needed to forgo the reserves and sign up for four active years. All I received back was a firm "No" and that was that. I accepted that and kept on working the summer away. In late August, about two months later, I opened the subject again claiming that I was having a very strong feeling that I needed to go active.

"No" again was his reply but with an alternative. He told me that if I went and prayed about it and God manifested it to me, and I had proof, then he would agree. I love my father and I have never wanted to disappoint him. I knew that I could make my own decisions but I wanted my father desperately to be part of the arrangement. I respected him that much.

So I went to "the wilderness" to pray and felt the overwhelming feeling, through tears, that I needed to change plans and serve four active years. I drove home and opened the discussion with my father once again, and, through tears, shared my experience. He too broke down in tears and gave his approval that a change of course is what I needed to do.

This was not easy for my father as I was his only son and he wanted nothing more than for his son to serve an honorable mission for the church. After our experience together he could not deny any longer that the Marines full time was the best road I could take for my life.

Quote of The Day; 

Joyce Meyer said: "I may not be where I want to be, but thank God I am not where I used to be."

www.joycemeyer.org

Pee-Wee Bomb

We were at graduation practice in the early part of May 1997 when Daniel Decker and I got the bright idea to fill a tennis ball with strike anywhere match heads and wrap it with duct tape. As we were leaving the gymnasium at Beaver High School I threw the tennis ball down the road.

When the ball hit the road it popped like a firecracker and spewed lit match heads in the air. For the most part it was anti-climactic and was harmless. The ball bounced over the fence and onto the track where the girls track coach was working with his athletes. We laughed a little and walked away without giving it a second thought.

Within an hour Daniel and I were called into the office to see the principle but we had no idea why. Our innocence was demonstrated on our surprised expressions as the principle portrayed his angry disposition. Furthermore, there was a police officer there with the girls track coach. We were threatened with expulsion, arrest, and prevention of graduating from high school in two weeks.

The most detrimental threats they barked however, were my exclusion from being able to enter the Marine Corps and not being allowed to go to the high school state track and field championchips. We were scheduled to leave that day and I was favored to win the discus again and our 4x100 meter relay team had a chance to place or win as well. Daniel and I both were on that relay team.

I was concerned about all the threats but the one that got me down the most was not being able to join the Marine Corps. If fact I was heart-broken because in my nieve mind I honestly thought that because of a stupid home-made firecracker I was going to be denied an entry into the Marines.

Within an hour they decided to let us go to Provo, Utah for the track meet where I ended up winning the discus again despite my paranoia. My father was a teacher at the high school and my track coach and thought the whole bomb thing was funny. In the end I never really heard much more about the incident and never really suffered any consequences nor did Daniel.

I feel that the whole experience was a lesson for me to combat fear, paranoia, and anxiety. I have overcome a lot of all three in my life since joining the Marines for the first time but it has taken several situations like the tennis ball fiasco to learn to roll with the punches.

After graduation, I would work the summer of 1997 laying concrete slats at the pig farm in Milford, Utah. I was scheduled to leave for boot camp on October 13, 1997. My objective was to join the reserves which would allow me to go on a full-time Mormon mission.

Quote of The Day: Albert Einstein said, "Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds."

Decisions Determine Destiny And So Do Accidents

I was 17-years-old when I jumped to catch a pass in football practice at Beaver High School in Beaver, Utah. Yes that's right I was a Beaver, Beaver! In the quarter of a second it took me to jump and catch the pass a teammate wanted his moment of glory and speared me mid-back.

After my junior year of high school I had grand hopes of having an excellent senior season in football and getting a scholarship or walking on to a college team to play. Those dreams abruptly ended when Daniel Carter made that life-altering tackle.

His hit whiplashed my head to the rear and it felt like my neck bent enough for the back of my helmet to touch my jersey. A flash of stars flooded my brain and I hit the ground like a sledge hammer. I managed to hold onto the football of which I was proud of but that did not change the fact that I had fractured three vertebrae in the upper part of my back. I would not find this out for 15 years however when a wise chiropractor decided to take some X-Rays.

I managed to get off the ground and walk to the sidelines. Something told me to go to the doctor, and I told my father, but we decided against it. My dad was afraid of paying out of pocket expenses for doctor's visits if he thought there was a chance of the visit being useless and I thought it was just a concussion.

I did have a concussion and so I sat out for three games which took away any hopes of a scholarship. The miraculous thing was that I started the season on the fourth game and played in the remaining 6 or 7 games. I contribute the quick healing to the health conscious food in my home, the weight training I loved and divine intervention.

That injury inspired me to think of alternatives to a college football career but I did not figure it out myself. I had some help from a friend name Erland Lewis who asked me one day at school in September of 1996 if I wanted to come to his home to talk to some Marine Corps recruiters. I told him I would and showed up at his home with another friend on the agreed upon night.

After the recruiters talked so highly of the Marines and showed us some motivational highlight videos (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inSzBLaTiNI) of the cool things Marines get to do, I was hooked and decided then and there that I was joining the Marine Corps. I would have to wait a whole year before going to boot camp but my motivation stayed high the entire time.

Opposition has a funny way of getting us to where our lives need to take us if we roll with the punches.

Quote of the day: "Opposition always inflames the enthusiast, never converts him." Friedrich Schiller https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_Schiller

My Daughters Love of Stories

Since my daughters could speak they have requested bedtime stories. Their favorites are stories from my experiences in the Marine Corps. Ironically the two older girls, Rebecca and Emma, were both born while I was a civilian but both got to experience four years of me as an active duty commissioned officer.

Amigrace on the other hand was born when I had two months left but never lived on a Marine base and does not have any experience with it. They all love the stories though. I love that of all the types of things I could share with them before bed, they all want to hear about the craziness of the Marines.

They beg for stories every night buy I deny or tell them stories depending on how late it is or if I can't think of one off the top of my head. I have been an avid journal writer since high school and so there are no shortages of stories. I just need to review my journals so that I can remember them.

So my girls are at fault for me starting this blog. I love to write and they love Marine stories so I have decided to start sharing my experiences leading up to the two four year tours of duty in the Marine Corps Infantry as well as my tours. I hope that my stories, my faults, my successes, and my love of being a Marine will help those who do not understand, understand, help other Marines feel connected, and be fun for the reader.

I love and miss The Corps. I love being a Marine. My service has paid for itself many times over by the experiences it gave me and the discipline it taught me. I will always be proud of being a Marine.