This will probably be my last letter since there isn't much more to write about. I welcomed in the New Year by converting to Catholicism, which is exciting. We just have a few more things left and that's it for us. 171 question test, final drill, prac app test (over first aid) and the Battalion Commander's inspection. I'm not too worried about any of them.
I'm looking forward to visiting, though I have no idea what to do with my uniforms and stuff. I also can't wait to get to my MOS school and then to my first duty station. I'm going to try to get stationed in the base in Okinawa, Japan. I hear it's pretty deployable, though, but that doesn't really matter. We're all going to go to war no matter where we're stationed, except for the bitches who go get pregnant so they don't have to go, and then a good Marine has to go in their place.
That doesn't make sense to me. Marines belong with Marines; it doesn't matter where you are, or if you're alive, or if you're dead; your brothers and sisters will make sure you stay with them, where you ought to be.
Now that it's almost over, I'm looking back and I remember when it was TD5 and I looked forward to now and thought it was an impossible, long way away and I'd made a mistake joining. Now I'm glad I joined. I'm getting to look at the world in the way I wanted to look at it but couldn't easily describe. Yea, not all Marines are perfect or how I expected, but some are, and that's what I'm here for - the intangibles that your recruiter can't bribe you with. I'm here for John Basilone, who died for his buddies on Iwo Jima, and Dan Daly who yelled the infamous, "C'mon you sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?" I'm here for the Marines who were killed when an IED blew up their convoy, and for the ones who didn't stop to think about the grenade - they jumped over it. I'm here for honor and courage and commitment, and I DO love the Marine Corps. Everything has a significance, even our seven belt loops (for the seven seas), because nothing can be considered insignificant; it might save your life somehow.
I'm also glad to be here for how we look at the war. It's easy to judge a war that you see on TV from your couch, but civilians aren't over there dying. Yes, Saddam is dead but he was only a tiny piece. They get to see all of the bad things that happen but the media doesn't cover anything good. They'll show our mistakes in a heartbeat but not the schools that are being built, not how we are training their troops, they don't see how hard we work; they want us home and we want to be home, but that's not how the world is, and when we adapted and overcame, they sat on their butts and bitched about it.
So who is really wrong here?
Oltman out, yo.
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