Random Life

I was doing some self reflection of my own and happened to stumble upon an old blog I had written about 30 days before I was to leave for basic training in Lackland TX. I will post the updated version of "how things turned out" later. For now, this is a prime example of some very beneficial self reflection on my part. I am telling you people, do this. Take time to reflect. You learn more from the past than you ever will the future.


So recently I have had a shit ton (it’s metric) of people ask me why I went to the service and others asking me if there are any ways that I can get out if I just don’t like it. This blog is dedicated to those people and maybe this will help ease the transition and/or answer some universal questions about “why” I joined the U.S.A.F.

First things first I guess. Why did I join? That seems to be a HUGE question on at least 9345398734 people’s minds. Well ladies and gentlemen that one is the easiest to answer. If you know me or have ever met me you know 2 things right off the bat. I make them blatantly obvious to those who know me as well as to those who do not.
1- I am extremely externally motivated. I like money. More than that I LOVE stuff. It takes money to buy stuff. Ask anyone with a job right now how “stable” their job is and they will probably laugh at you and say they have work till at least the end of the week and then it’s “iffy” from there. In case you are just oblivious to the world around you, we are NOT in a good situation when it comes to the financial markets of this country we call home. When some of the top economist gurus are saying “if you need money in the next 5 years, keep it out of the markets” you know it’s going to be one hell of a ride. If you guys want to stay at dead end jobs such as retail, customer service reps, etc… then by all means do it. For me, that wasn’t an option. I am going to be 22 years old and still working the same job an 18 yr old can come off the street and get. That is unacceptable to me. Always has been. Always will be. Am I above it? Fuck yes, I worked harder than that. I want a life worthy of living. A life that someone would WANT to share with me. Working for less than 15k a year? Definitely not in my definition of such a life.

2- College anyone? Have any of you guys priced the tuition rates at colleges these days? They are outrageous. Unless you are incredibly gifted smart and get in on scholarships *which are a pain in the ass even once you get them* you are going to be paying out the anus for tuition and books. The rate that I was going it would have taken me till I was 23 to have my 2 year degree then another 3 years to get my bachelors and cost me more than I could have possibly afforded and still sustain the lifestyle I live. So I was left with 2 options:

a. Reduce my lifestyle to the limits of which my school obligation would allow.
b. Forget about school and work for a living.
Obviously, neither of these are good options. So… I made a third option. THE MILITARY! Yeah, obviously not the most encouraged option by my peers but that is why I didn’t ask their opinion very often. Now some of you who are not familiar with the military thing might be wondering “how the hell is this going to help him by taking him away for 4 years?” That is a good question with an even better answer. The military will pay for me to go to school while I’m there in my free time. They will also transfer my AIT hours into college credits. What that means is this. I will go to basic (8.5 weeks) and then depending on what job I get (find out in basic) I will go to AIT somewhere in the states. (what state I end up going to depends on the job I get) after I get to AIT I will put in a few more weeks there before I am actually assigned a base to do my selected job. The base that I go to also depends on what job that I get. AIT is the equivalent of “on the job training”. The air force takes the hours I put into AIT and turns them into college credit via the CCAF (community college of the air force). They usually add up to be about 35-55 credit hours. That doesn’t sound too bad right? That’s because it’s not. If I were to pay for those hours even at WVNCC rates it would be over $4000 in tuition alone. Add in you books and time commuting and you will see this is a much better bargain.

3- Experience while I am in. When was the last time you got to travel the country/world and get paid for doing it? If you grew up in the valley and you stay here till you die you are an idiot. There is nothing here. It is a great place to retire and grow up but other than that it is more worthless than an amputee competing in a triathlon. There is so much out there to see, what is holding you from experiencing it?

4- Experience when I am out. Worth far more than when I am in. The military will give me preferential status in any gov’t job that I apply for. Think about that. Just because I served in the military I get preferential treatment in a job interview for a gov’t job. In addition to that they pay me to go to school once I am out of the military. So I am going to put in my 4 years and then I can go to school and get paid *rather well I might add* to go to school for 36 months of full time enrollment. That is a HUGE benefit to me. It means I can finish my degree I have, maybe start another one depending on what the AIT credits give me when I am active and then once I am inactive I can go back for another degree. I will be more qualified than most applicants without military preference. Add that into the equation and needless to say I am incredibly marketable.

Now, those were my reasons for going. Or at least a few of them off the top of my head. Now my reasons for not wanting to go are equally as simple. I have to leave. That’s a big one. Do I want to do it? No, of course not. Would I rather stay here and be worthless all my life? Even less than I want to leave. I have a girl here who I love and it rips me apart to think about saying goodbye for a couple months but I realize that in life you take the hand you are dealt and you play it. You don’t bitch and fuss about what cards you didn’t get, you simply take the hand you were dealt and play it the best way you know how. If I didn’t care I wouldn’t bother doing anything with my life and be content to act 17 forever. Seeing as how I do care and want to actually make my own life someday, you have to do what you have to do. There are all kinds of ways of doing things but this one just seemed to be the one I felt guided towards. Long story in that itself, maybe one day I will post it as well but not right now.

In conclusion to this I want to say that this choice was weighed out and thought about. I debated it with some people I trusted and asked their opinion. If I did not ask you it was simply because I didn’t know you or I didn’t think you were capable of giving a rational unbiased answer to a question that needed one. I look for the experience to be good and challenging. I look to come back a better person for it with a deeper understanding of “how life works”. I wish people would accept the fact that life happens and there is nothing you can do about it. This isn’t nearly as detrimental as a life threatening illness but you couldn’t prove that by the way people are acting. I am not going to change and I will be back when it’s over. Until then I will keep in contact when I can and don’t be offended if it takes me a while. I have priorities like everyone else. If you aren’t a “top priority” you only have yourself to blame for that.

It has occurred to me that people make decisions for one reason and one reason only in life. That is to get the most gain for the least effort required. That is simple logic. We comparative shop to get the most crap for our dollar and it is the same concept when making decisions about other things in life. For me, this was the most “gain” for the least amount of “effort” on my part. Some of you might be flipping out and saying “OMG it’s 4 years of your life how is that not a HUGE effort, blah blah blah”. When you say that, consider this. When unions used to run the valley most of them were under apprenticeships programs. The program meant you had to go through anywhere from 2-6 years of schooling after you got hired to do the job. It took that time before you actually made top wage or were considered “officially trained” for the job you were hired to do. If you move away and go to school you end up going for usually no less than 4 years. Then you come back or w/e and get a job. The point that I am making is that if I were going off to college and only coming home once every 3 months or so, nobody would be flipping out. If I was working out of town at a union job and doing the same *boilermakers are a PRIME example of this type of training and out of town work* people wouldn’t be flipping out as much. For some reason people just flip out when they hear the word “military”. I really want people to realize that. Realize the truth in it. Realize how short 4 years actually is in the grand scheme of things and if you had the option to better yourself as much as this is going to better me, if you had a shred of logic in your body, you would jump at the opportunity.
I want everyone to realize that I didn’t do this to escape nor did I do it to run. I did it for me. Because I know the man I am and the man I want to be are entirely different people. You have to be happy with yourself before you can be happy with anyone else. I want nothing more than for everyone to accept and be happy with my decision to do this. I don’t need anyone to back me nor do I need anyone to tell me how proud or mad they are. I have enough of those. I have a few close friends, my family, and the most amazing girl that I’ve ever known. I hope to show them that nothing but good things will come from this.