The Range

Tonight is just a short post. I have, or had rather, yet to qualify on my rifle this year. Honestly I had yet to fire it this year, even after what 6 months of activation for predeployment training? So returning from leave, which was awesome btw, I love you all and will miss you greatly, I knew I would have to go to the range. Sure enough as soon as I showed up to formation they announced that today tables 3 and 4 (combat maarksmanship) would be going. They decided to cancel tables 1 and 2 which are the ranges we are scored on, and the ranges we use to actually qualify. Tables 3 and 4 are much easier to run, and a whole lot faster. The important thing about giving us an opportunity to shoot before we got in country in Iraq was to insure that our rifles were battle zeroed with the ACOG scopes. So this morning I woke up at 4, showered, grabbed my rifle, my MTV, my kevlar, and a day pack with beef jerky, dried mangoes and water (you never know if you will have food or if you will get stranded) and ran out to the parade deck. I was supposed to be out there by five so I brought my electric razor out there with me. You may be wondering how if I got up at four I didn't have time to shave. To be perfectly honest, although my alarm went off at 4, I did not get up till 0420, and the shower felt awesome because I was tired, so I was running a little behind, and I had to find my magazines, and my shooting glasses. (For you education majors, or those simply offended by non kosher grammar, that was indeed a run on. I apologize.) As usual, however, our ride didn't show up until about 0530. Our ride, was in fact, no other than the range safety officer, and the SNCOIC. I think we were somewhat of an after thought. We arrived at the range for our "low light" portion of the ranges, only to discover that we didn't have enough ear plugs to run the range. By the time we had everything we needed and started shooting the whole low light portion of the range was notional. We were working on a deadline trying to get done by 1000, as the Marine Air Station near by was having a family day and the aerial demonstration portion was scheduled to run from 1000 to noon. Apparently ricochets pose a problem for low flying air craft. We finished table three and had moved to the next range for table four. Right as we were about to be cleared hot to begin firing again a herd of bison wandered dangerously close to our left lateral firing limits. This was a problem, mostly for the bison, as the likely hood of a Marine "missing" or a "ricochet flying off in their direction" was pretty high. After a half hearted attempt by the SNCOIC to chase them off with his Dodge we adjusted the left lateral limit significantly and were repeatedly threatened with NGP is a round even thought about landing across that lateral limit. Thankfully the bison eventually wandered off and escaped without an unfortunate "accident" that would have probably caught national media attention and ended the career of some newly demoted, trigger happy private. After successfully firing off 180 rounds (it was supposed to be 160 but the guy next to me had problems with his weapon jamming and no one wanted to deal with unexpended rounds) I returned to the squad bay to give my rifle a thorough cleaning. I almost ran out of CLP (CLP- cleaner, lubricant, protectant) but managed to get it cleaned well enough to turn in after only a few minor touch ups at the armory. I then spent the remainder of the day reading e-books. E-books are dangerous. It is like iTunes for books. I can buy a lot of books cheaply, but a lot of cheap books added up is not cheap at all. But I justified it by saying it makes up for not having to buy any for Jewell. Its not a great justification because I do need to by books for school too. Tomorrow is, I suspect, the last day off I will have until I get back from Iraq. I hope to be able to secure the duty van with a few other guys so we can go to church. I miss you all already.

A poem I read not too long ago

Not of the princess and prelates with periwigged charioteers? Riding triumphantly laurelled to lap the fat of the years? Rather the scorned- the rejected- the men hemmed in with spears;
The men in tattered battalion which fights till it dies? Dazed with the dust of the battle, the din and the cries? The men with broken heads and the blood running into their eyes.
Not the be-medaled Commander, beloved of the throne? Riding cock-horse to parade when the bugles are blown? But the lads who carried the hill and cannot be known.
Others may sing of the wine and the wealth and the mirth? The portly presence of potentates goodly in girth; Mine be the dirt and the dross the dust and the scum of the earth!
Theirs be the music the colour, the glory, the gold? Mine be a handful of ashes, a mouthful of mould? Of the maimed of the halt and the blind in the rain and the cold-
Of these shall my songs be fashioned, my tale be told. Amen
-John Masefield, “A Consecration”

P.S. Check out http://7months1word.blogspot.com my newest blog chronicling my journey through the Bible.

The Training Is Over, It Is Real Now

I don’t know how much time if any you spend on airplanes, but next time you take a flight ponder the sheer strangeness of the experience. It’s like time travel. You travel down a narrow walkway into a metal tube, hours later you emerge into a new place, and a new time. Time changes really screw with me. It is weird for me to think that as I fly today two hours of my life disappear. They are just gone, and yet, I will get that time back ten days from now as a I travel the opposite direction. It is strange for me to think that my family and friends in KC have already lived two hours of their day by the time mine starts. I know it’s a very simple concept in reality, but it is a strange reality we experience in an era of constant communication more than in the past. In a few weeks I will really get a shock to my system, I will be starting my day 9 hours ahead of you all. At least I start earlier than you. I don’t like being on the other side of the clock. Constant communication is something we take for granted so easily these days too. Try spending a day without your cell phone. Most of you will feel lost. I have started getting used to days at a time with no outside communication. It is really strange at first, but as your days become consumed with the here and now it starts to matter less and less. I love to hear what is going on in the lives of those I love, but I am much more self dependent any more. You don’t realize how interdependent we are as a people these days. Communication, whether meaningful or casual has become a safety net that we exist within. You could say it is an obsession with not being alone. As you have probably noticed I have not posted in quite some time now. For the last month I have been without any internet access, and before the beginning of August my life was extraordinarily uneventful. Up until August I was working night shifts doing paperwork in the vault on the SIPR. Exceptionally boring. I am the kind of individual that cannot stand a desk job. Sometimes I really think I should have been a grunt. In August I was attached to Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 24th Marine Regiment. I am part of a grunt company now, and I love it. August was the start of Exercise Mojave Viper. Mojave Viper is part of what the Marine Corps refers to as hyper realistic training. It takes place in balmy 29 Palms California at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center, where temperatures average over 110 in August. One day out on a range we had a temperature of 128 degrees recorded. Anything left in the sun becomes unbearable to the touch, and drinking the water is like drinking hot tea. Animal life consists of 3 species of rattlesnake, scorpions, tarantulas, coyotes, and the rare and revered desert tortoise. The landscape is tortured and ruptured, if hell were in southern California, hell would be in 29 Palms. The setting is ideal for acclimatization to either Iraq or Afghanistan, making it the ideal place for the final training evolution before deployment. The exercise is set up to take place in a made up country I will refer to as X which is torn by a civil war between those desiring a Sunni Sharia government and those supporting the post communist block secular government. The UN had been conducting peace keeping missions but the situation got out of control and 3/24 was called in as one of the infantry elements of a Regimental Combat Team to straighten the situation out. The exercise begins with platoon sized operations in a huge town constructed from shipping containers complete with Arabic speaking role players. From there the operation test s the abilities of the Battalion (Bn) to conduct operations against conventional and unconventional forces at the Company, and Battalion level. The exercises include live fire ranges, and mechanized operations. In the last month I was in the field for a total of at least three weeks, sleeping on rocks, sand and whatever else was handy. I the number of showers I took could be totaled on two hands. I lost a few pounds and a few inches in my waist. Let me tell you, MRE’s get little old. And you know that it is no longer fun to be dirty when your blinks feel like fine grit sand paper against your eyes. I had the experience of sleeping in a sand storm and I have ridden for hours in the back of an AMTRACK amphibious tracked landing vehicle. Those vehicles are exceptionally loud and hot. I was bounced around in the back of MRAP’s (Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles) Those machines are capable of withstanding the blast of a 500 pound bomb, but also have no suspension, sitting in the rear of the vehicle is not advisable, you will be an inch or two shorter by the end of the trip. I worked 19-21 hour shifts as the CLIC chief in my Company during the final exercise. I questioned individuals in Arabic, compiled biometric databases, processed evidence, put together target packages, conducted link analysis, created Daily Intel Summaries (DISUM’s), debriefed patrols, and generated collection plans. Me, my Sergeant and two other LCpl’s were able to do a job the Marine Corps suggests should be done by 6-8 Marines, and we did it well. My Company survived the exercise without a single heat casualty, and preformed well overall. We are finally at the end of the work up for a deployment to Iraq. It may be uneventful, or it may be a lot more exciting than we would like. Regardless, as one Gunnery Sergeant so eloquently put it: “The training is over, from here on out, this sh#t is real.” The casualty evacuation drills will be real, the rounds that we hear snapping over our heads will be intended to kill, the mortars will no longer be artillery simulators. You probably aren’t hearing much about Iraq in the news anymore, but the Marines, Sailors, Soldiers, and Airmen are still taking casualties. No matter how over the war may be, we are still in harm’s way. Bullets and IED’s still kill just as effectively in 2009 as they did in 2006, we just have fewer of them , thank God. We are trained, we are ready, and we are willing. I will be in Iraq within a few weeks time, and I have no idea how long I will remain there. Rumors are not worth reporting. All they generally do is make people worry. It’s been a blast for me to be attached to an infantry company. I don’t do well in an office environment, and while my job requires me to use a computer a lot, I have been operating off of a power inverter in the middle of nowhere in the back of an MRAP or HMMWV. Occasionally I get the opportunity to roll out with a patrol and see the area we are operating in first hand. I am a field Marine for sure. I went from heavily demotivated working at the Bn level as an analyst, and I have absolutely loved getting to work with a CLIC (Company Level Intelligence Cell). Twenty Nine Palms is miserable place for sure, you are always sweating, always tired and always dirty. After a few days without showering or a change of clothes your cammies get a really nasty, greasy, gritty feeling to them. You find your hands blackened by grime and there is really nothing you can do about it. But it is an environment and work that I love being a part of. Not to mention that the sunrises and sunsets were incredible, and the night sky was breathtaking. I have been to some remote places of the country way out in Kansas and Wyoming and a few national parks; but I have never seen night sky’s like this. There is nowhere you can look that the stars don’t go on forever. The band of the Milky Way is so bright and close you feel as though you could dip your hand into it and cup a pool of shimmering sky in your hand. Out there away from everything I found myself in a natural cathedral. I thought of all the buildings we have tried to create to worship in, from Solomon’s Temple, to the Sistine Chapel, and God out did them all. His night sky is the most incredible cathedral ceiling imaginable. The quiet expanse of the desert is an incredible place to examine your relationship with God. In His desert cathedral I was able to read by the light of the moon, and meditate on Him. An odd place to grow spiritually to be sure. I am a part of a violent profession, the stillness of the night was often shattered by machine gun fire and artillery explosions, the dark of the desert lit up with tracer, and artillery illumination rounds. It just goes to prove that Christ is with us, and will never leave us or forsake us. Twenty Nine Palms was a month long desert journey for me, physically, mentally and spiritually I was pushed beyond anything ever before. And yet I was brought through it. I will be landing in KC shortly after I finish this, and I will spend a few days at home. I hope to see some of you then. To all of you, God bless.

School....

So we are at this school. Its starting to make some sense. Basically, we from 3/24 are the assistants to the class. The class is designed to teach majors, master sergeants and lieutenant colonels how to run a COC (Combat Operations Center). So I have sat through classes on setting up a COC, planning helicopter insertion missions, armor missions, classes on operational security, on IED's and all sorts of stuff that is majorly over my pay grade, and most of which requires a commission and several more pay grades to implement. So as a commanding Lance Corporal some day I will be well prepared. So far it has been early mornings and late nights. On the bright side I have been able to work out a lot in the mornings. That has been nice. Tomorrow I will go back to work early, and probably will be working till 2100 every night till Sunday. I will have Sunday off, and then no more time off and the same schedule till the 20th. I HOPEFULLY will be able to do intel work and get better at my job. SO far the logistical issues have not been worked out. Its not particularly difficult, but it has been exhausting. Death by power point the last few days. Even the officers were struggling to stay awake. Doing something will be nice. We ran a few simulations Monday and Saturday. It was really cool to get an idea of how a COC is supposed to be run. I got a chance to go to Church on Sunday. It was very nice to get to Church again. I haven't been in far to long. God is good. He will see us through it all.

Wow.

Today was eye opening. I learned that since I left the school house, I have forgotten a lot. Not only that, but my unit has to this point done very little to make me better analyst. I have a lot to learn. I also learned that even though my room is amazing, the work load is intense. 17 hours today. Hopefully that doesn't indicate that the rest of the month we are here will be like that. I am dog tired, and so are the rest of the guys. This has turned out to be a logistical nightmare. God has given me a challenge that is for sure.

Fresh week, Fresh start.

The last post ended with me and the rest of the gang pretty down trodden. Thank God for His mercies. Memorial Day could not have come at a more opportune time. I was able to talk to some wise men, who were able to give me sound advice and encouragement, and I had an opportunity to unwind. One of my buddies from home, Tom, a Sigma Nu with me at William Jewell, has a brother who is a Navy Corpsman that is training to work with Marines as a Green Side Corpsman. Just so happens, that the Navy Corpsman train at the Navy Hospital just a short drive up the road from 22 area in Pendleton. Before I left, Tom gave me his brothers number and we were able to hang out about a week ago. Jon, Tom's brother, is a really cool guy, so we decided to hang out on Saturday. Sea World and other Busch parks, like Busch Gardens have a Hero Salute deal where any active military can get into one of the parks free once a year. Its pretty cool. So we went to Sea World and watched dolphins and sharks and killer whales and rode some rides for free. Unfortunately they made some money off of us in food costs. I also learned a valuable lesson. When going to Sea World, bring a plastic bag to protect your phone, camera/other electronics. Do not attempt to eat an entire large bag of cotton candy as quick as you can so you can use the bag it came in. It makes you feel rather sick and gives you a huge sugar buzz. Not a good idea. I was able to relax and to enjoy time to lay in bed, and catch up on rest. I had some welcome alone time.
Today, I got up at 3:30, and we drove up to 29 Palms. I will be taking part in a joint COC training class learning how to intigrate the different shops into a team. Thats about all I can say there. This place is desolate. Man is it barren. There is nothing but scub, cactus and joshua trees. Interesting fact, Joshua trees only grow in Israel around Jerusalem and in the area around 29 Palms. Its said that one set guards Heaven's entrance, the other Hell's. I will let you guess which this would qualify as. The hours here will be long. We will work through the weekends. It is intense, and today we discovered that as reservists, we are well behind the learning curve on the newer systems they are using in Iraq and Afghanistan. We need to catch up, and quick. It will take a lot of work, but it is neccesary. Our work saves lives if we do it right. We don't want to have the death of a brother on our hands because we don't know what is going on. This class will be very good for prepairing us. We are finally getting training. After months of monotony, God finally gave us an opportunity to become better Marines. I am excited. It will be a hectic 20 days, but it will be good. To add to all that, my hotel room is awesome. I have a nice bed, two pillows, direct tv, a kitchenette and a bathroom I only share with one other guy. I am excited. Thank you Lord. You have encouraged me, lifted my spirits. I am only sorry that I haven't had a great attitude even when its tough going. Kind of a sad commentary. I need more work.

Moti, Moti, Not a lot of motivation.

Friday. Yay. The end of the week is finally here. For most Americans, that is every weekend. For us, not so much. We have been lucky to get the weekends that we have. Sad thing is, we haven't done a whole lot. Today, I drove to Miramar and back twice, over to 33 area, down to supply and that was about it. I accomplished a lot today. Yesterday, I printed a map product, a useless one made to go on an office wall, and then cleaned a bunch. I have blisters on my hands from sweeping. I have yet to touch my rifle. Since AT I have done one thing specific to the Marine Corps, a hump last monday morning. Everything else has been very dull. Lame in fact. Tonight, I am not feeling very motivated. Don't get me wrong. I love the Marine Corps. But really? Sometimes it is just dumb. I want to be careful here. My superiors can read this. I want to be honest though. I want you all to see what we feel here. What its like here. Thats the whole point.
Lately, not many enlisted non-staff have had a lot of confidence in their superiors. Most of the enlisted have also been very unmotivated. Moral is very low. At least in Headquarters and Service. No one really seems to know what is going on. Our schedule is in no way set, even a day out. We don't know where we are going, and they seem to be making stuff up for us to do. We in H&S aren't getting much training. No MCMAP, (Marine Corps Martial Arts Program), no real training. A few of us have gotten slated for schools, but not all of us. Those that don't get to go to any additional training feel pretty jipped. Half the time, things end up bungled, and behind schedule. Tasks seem rediculous. Our living conditions are a squad bay, staff and officers a holiday inn off base. Pool, cable, internet, TGI Fridays. We keep getting told we don't clean well enough. We had two all out field days this week. We have a wall locker to keep all our gear and anaything personal we own in. Rank has its priveleges, but its begining to feel like its being rubbed in. We have xbox 360's now, and some other little entertainment stuff, but really, thats not what we care about. We want to train. We want to get better. We want to be treated with respect, as men. The Lance Corporals from 3/24 proper out of St. Louis that didn't get their MCI's done before May 1st got a page 11 NJP. Its a slap on the rist really, but its permanently in your record, and looks bad. They had roughly a weeks warning. It takes longer than that to get an MCI shipped to your house. That angered a lot of them.
I want to be careful because I don't want to reflect negatively on any Marines here. I am writing this from basically the bottom of the chain as far as leadership goes. I don't know what goes on up top. I just know that from where we sit, a lot of Marines are very discontent. To add to our low moral is the expectations about our mission. As far as we can see, we won't even leave the wire in Iraq. We aren't going to war. Our deployment looks like an involuntary, very boring vacation compared to those that went before. You may think that would be motivating. But that is like being a policeman who never did more than hand out tickets for rolling stops and stop signs or a doctor who never treated anything more than a cold. Not having a real mission is dissapointing. It makes us feel like second class Marines. We aren't real warriors, just security guards for a base. Is it true? I don't know. But that is how it feels. As far as most of us know, we may never get to do our actual MOS in Iraq. We may never get a chance to in our careers. Its a once in a life time opportunity that feels like it is being squandered.
I am trying to stay motivated. I am trying to have a good attitude. I know that my superiors have been in a lot longer than me and they see a lot more than I do. I know that regardless, they are my superiors, and therefore they will recieve my respect. I have a job here, whether it be as an analyst, a rifleman if asked too, or just a janitor in cammies. I will do my best at it. I am a Marine. Its not easy though. Boredom and games are getting to us. Right now, it sucks to be here. Thnk God for this weekend. We need it badly. Hopefully, we can come back from Memorial day with a fresh breath of air, and a renewed attitude. We still have a long way to go. We haven't even left the country yet. Eleven more months till our orders end.
I pray that God would help me to keep a good attitude. I prya that He will help us all. Right now I am over a thousand miles from home. I miss green, weird as it is, nothing is really green here. Even the green is yellowy. I miss trees, I miss good radio stations. I miss my friends and family. I miss my own room, my own space, my own shower. I miss my car, I miss freedom. I'm tired of cleaning, I am tired of games. I wish I could finish my school. I could go on and on. In the end though. I am still on my rack in Camp Pendleton. I am still a Marine, and I still have to go to Iraq. I will make the best of it. Not because of me. Because that is what God has called me to. I am here for a reason. We all are.

How to do nothing.

Today was long. Very, very long. The day began at five thirty, pretty standard. I stayed in bed until 6. Also pretty standard. I don't get up till I absolutely have to. Some call it lazy, I call it smart. Today was bring your rifle to work and clean it day. Yesterday and tomorrow are wear your flak jacket to work day. Joy and bliss. Problem one. I am an augment. I came from 24th Regiment. My rifle was shipped here in a box. My rifle had nothing on it to tell the armorers here that it was mine. For all I know, someone else has it. Problem two. My rifle card that lets me check it out from the armory is from 24th Regiment. This is 3/24. My rifle card is meaningless here. I knew this and tried to get it straitened out earlier this week. So much for that. So I got up early and went with everyone else to the armory to get the rifle I don't have with the card that won't work. I didn't take my rifle to work today. I don't know if I have a rifle. So we get to the CP and we set to work trying to get some maps for an officer and to begin preparing a brief. We only have two computers with access to the Internet at the shop. Both were being used for other stuff. We don't have the equipment we need to be even remotely efficient here. Because of this I have brought my personal computer with my air card to the shop so that we can use it for research. I tried that today, but I am pretty sure the mass of com gear outside the CP was interfering with the signal. I was able to finally put one map together, but it pretty much took all morning. After that I wasn't able to use it at all. We sat around for the rest of the morning, bored out of our minds until chow. Half of us went to chow with the 3 shop while Lcpl Fisher took the Captain to supply, and the others hitched a ride with the duty back to 22 for section head meetings and other such nonsense. Those of us that went with the 3 were back by about noon and no one else would be back at the CP until at least 1300. While we were there we got word that Fisher had backed into and pretty well mangled a Pontiac Solstice with the van. We decided to draw up a certificate for the Vehicular Medal of Valor. We got a good laugh out of that. We proceeded to try and stay awake and look busy for the rest of the afternoon. I swept the carpet in the office and helped fix the Sniper Platoons' cubicle. I was then informed that the three day school I was going to in 29 Palms next Tuesday is actually four weeks, and I will be staying in a hotel. God is good. Screws up the plan to go to Tactical Language school, but I'm okay with that. I burned an hour doing pull ups and feeding ground squirrels. They are starting to get fat from all the danishes and cheezits we feed them. The 3 shop has designated a PFC to feed them. PFC Greene is officially the squirrel recruit. I think they are going to die of high cholesterol. He takes his job seriously. As the day should have drawn to a close we were called in to take an online defensive driving course. To take it we had to register on Marine net. We have a mypay, a Marine On Line too. Some how they can't condense them all into one easy to use system. As you can probably guess, my account won't log in. Oh well. My last name is Walje. Nothing works right the first time. In the end, I came back after evening chow to help out Cpl Underwood make a spreadsheet of all the deuces training and experience. I also received official confirmation from the Captain that we still don't know where we are going. I am personally betting on the MEU to fight pirates. As you can see, today I got paid to do nothing for a very extended period of time. Did I mention the map I made was to decorate an officers office? Very effective use of the training I got in basic combat training and MAGTF-ISE school. Again hurry up and wait. In classic military style. God gave me a few more tests today. I hope that I did better today than yesterday. I am praying for forward motion. Even if it is two steps forward, one step back. I am trusting Him and walking. He has a plan. He is in control. He loves me, and I am His. What have I to fear, and what do I a lowly Lance Corporal have to complain about. May I live for Him and live worthy of the calling to which He has ordained me. Semper Fi. I love you all.

Long Days. Long Weeks. Is it really only the 19th?

It has been a long time since I last posted. I apologize for that. I will try to do better in the future. Last time I posted was over a week ago. That next day, which would have been last Saturday at 0700 I went on duty as the AOG (Assistant of the Guard). I didn't get off until 0700 Sunday morning. It was a 24 hour sleeping post. Basically I sat in a little room below our squad bay at a desk and read or watched movies. Every hour on the hour the armory watch was supposed to do a radio check over the little iCom walkie talkies. Every four hours I would give a deadly force briefing to the next shift of armory watch. Then I would escort them to the armory and conduct a changeover with the current guard. We would count out the 30 rounds in the M-16 A4 magazine and ensure that the oncoming guard understood all orders concerning them. The morning started off with me standing an hour of armory watch while I waited for the higher ups to figure out who was supposed to stand next watch. It was supposed to be for about 15 minutes while they got things straitened out. An hour and fifteen minute later I was back in the duty hut. Welcome to 3/24. The day was exceptionally uneventful. I counted out the bed linens for the incoming Scout and Weapons platoon Marines. Turns out they came in late and all the H & S Marines who didn't have linens scavenged them. Again. Welcome to 3/24. Not enough bed sheets for the Marines. About 2200 the COG (Corporal of the Guard) hit the rack for some sleep. I stood duty alone until about 0330 when I woke up the COG. I was falling asleep in the duty hut and needed some kind of break. I slept till 0600 and resumed my post until I was relieved at 0700. I fell asleep as soon as I got out of my cammies and slept till about noon. I don't exactly remember what I did after that. I was a little hazy. Monday morning, the 11th, we went up to the CP and started to work. Cpl Underwood called Cpl Monroe and Lcpl Shidaker over and informed us that apparently, we were about 30 minutes late for a VEW course. We had no idea we were scheduled for any course, or even what exactly VEW was. All we knew was it was something with imagery. We hopped in the van and headed over to the Air Station across from 22 Area. There we headed up to a class in the training building. Video Exploitation Workstation is a free standing system for video and picture editing. With it we can take patrol videos and edit them with the help of software such as Pinnacle to create an intelligence product. It is a pretty cool system, and has some major implications in the field for intel work. We were the first Reserve unit to get this the newest update of the system. The course lasted 2 days, enough to get generally familiar with the system. The rest of the week was filled with generally productive days. We got a fair amount done. Saturday I had off, so I went to supply and collected the remainder of the gear that I had yet to receive. We have a lot of gear, knee pads, elbow pads, pouches, neck gaiters, waterproofing bags, ballistic sunglasses, ballistic goggles, combat jackets, hydration system, flack, Kevlar helmet, magazines... My locker is pretty darn full. After that I ran by Mainside and got a burrito for lunch. Around two o'clock I got a text asking if I would like to go fishing. Staff Sergeant Barnes was taking anyone who wanted to go out to Oceanside to fish off of the pier. It was quite a process getting to the pier, involving a trip to Walmart where we purchased twenty dollar poles, 30 pound line, hooks and mussels and anchovies for bait. Ssgt Barnes had a difficult time properly referring to anchovies. Usually he called them avocados. That was pretty entertaining. We then headed out to the pier along with Captain Suwa. Apparently even on a Saturday there is traffic on the 5 in California. Lcpl George was driving, and the Captain, who knows the area was trying to provide driving directions. At one point as we were sitting at a stop sign, with George trying o figure out whether he was supposed to be turning left or right. Ssgt and the Captain were arguing over witch way to turn, one saying right, the other left, then switching positions when finally the Captain screamed "Pick one!" at George. He peeled out left. We spread out on the pier and fished. I ended up catching a stingray and six or seven mackerel. Cpl Underwood caught a three foot shovelnose shark. It was a great evening, most of the time I was basically alone and I spent a lot of time praying. Odd as it may sound I started fishing with a prayer that I would catch a fish. Shortly after I caught the stingray. I caught it by it getting its fin caught on my hook as it passed. A "lucky" catch. It got me thinking about how Jesus called us to be fishers of men. My job here, and now is to live my life living for him. At the very least, I should be a light and example here. Its very hard to maintain a good attitude here sometimes. Generally speaking moral is pretty low. We have a lot of dumb things we deal with. For example, we are supposed to have one person on watch at the armory. That is just the standard required procedure. We have two, and when the active duty area guard shows up, we are not relieved. Instead we have a 24 hour watch where 12 hours of it are with double redundancy. Why? no idea. We have random field days, like tonight, where we get yelled at for not having a clean enough squad bay. For the average Marine, we can't help but think of how it sounds for a Staff NCO living in a hotel off base on the government's tab to tell us that our squad bay isn't up to his standards. Its exasperating at times. Some of us never sleep we have to much work to do. Other shops have so many Marines and so little work they sit around all day and do nothing. Both sides are equally frustrated. We just found out that our block of predeployment leave has been shifted to July. Instead of a 96 hour liberty where we could go home, we instead get ten days in July, either over the fourth or later in the month. plane tickets have already been bought, hotel reservations made, and plans ruined. We don't know our mission, we don't have full confirmation on the location of our deployment. Rumors that we will join a MEU and fight Somali pirates have even circulated. We live with uncertainty, frustration and disappointment. In spite of all of this, Jesus wants me to have joy. He wants me to be a light. To have a good attitude, to not complain, to be motivated. How? I am human. I get frustrated. I don't like the way things are or how they are turning out. I, I, I. Me, me, me. He died for me. He submitted himself to even the death of the cross. My life is therefore forfeit to Him as simply my reasonable service. He has saved me from eternal damnation. He is more source of joy. He is my source of strength. With Him, and Him alone I can be motivated. With Him I can be a light. Through Him I can be different. By His strength I will stop swearing and complaining. It is not easy. One of the hardest things I have ever done. Each time I fix my attitude Jesus throws another test at me. I usually don't pass first time around. I didn't tonight. He gives me rest though. Saturday night I had a fishing trip with Jesus. He gave me an opportunity to relax, fishing is very relaxing, to enjoy His creation, and to spend time in prayer and communion with Him. He is good, and He is always with me. Even when I am Debby Downer, complaining and moaning about how unfair it is I have to swab a deck or wipe down footlockers all night. Friday I am scheduled to get liberty for Memorial day. I am going to relax, read some books, enjoy His creation, and Him. Then I will go to ground intel school on Tuesday in 29 Palms for a week. God is good, and He is near. He has tasked me, and as His bond slave I will obey. He has called is to be worthy of His holy calling. We are not worthy alone, but through Him we can enjoy Him. Amazing isn't it? Until next time. Semper Fi. God bless. I love you all.

Dueces. Day two

I was almost asleep last night, about 2200 lights were out, all was quite. My night was interrupted by a Marine Corps tradition. Moving people without taking into account the consequences of uprooting a group of Marines after lights.
Apparently the S-4, supply, who had been living in Weapons barracks was voluntold to move into the H&S Co. Squad Bay. They said that since the LAR(Light Armored Recon) Marines were back they were told to move.
The result was a bunch of Marines carrying all their gear tromping around the squad bay at 2200 in the dark looking for open racks and wall lockers. Unfortunately, wall lockers were in very short supply and open racks were scattered throughout all the sections. Lights were turned on, Marines cursed, swore and dropped gear, and we tried to get some sleep before morning lights.
In the morning we got up at 0600 or so, shaved, dressed and headed off to a formation. Every name in the company was painstakingly called. Naturally, many of the augments, including all the Regiment Marines were not on that list. Thankfully, we were on the 1st Sergeants roster, and avoided the disaster that presented itself during AT when the Battalion had no idea who we were or why we were attached to them.
We headed up to the CP, Command Post in the S-2's white 12 passenger Ford van, and began the process of moving back in and resuming operations. We had some new gear this time around, our own laminator. You have no idea how valuable a laminator is to the S-2. Without it we were always running up to 1 MEF's Topo to use their laminator for our maps. 1 MEF is the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, and Topo is Topographical Intelligence (map makers). We rearanged the office, and the vault a little and started to cleanup some of the mess from AT. Cleaning up basically meant trying to shred messed up maps we tried to print.
Funny thing about shredders. The Marine Corps' shredders are always old, and under lubricated, and ours for some reason has no reverse. So there I sit, shredding maps I had to tear into pieces to shred, when I encounter a little setback. The shredder jammed. So I pulled out my Leatherman multitool.
The Leatherman multitool is one of the most essential pieces of equipment a Marine carries. It is not issued, but it sure should be. This device is a compact set of needle nosed pliars, knife, screwdrives and other miscilaneous tools all in one perfect little package. With my leatherman I have unjammed shredders, fixed cupholders, worked on vehicles, cut string, fixed furniture and just about anything else you can imagine. The Leatherman is the Marine's best friend.
Meanwhile back at the CP I flipped out the Leatherman's knife and began trying to pick out the paper jam. After a few minutes it became obvious I was not going to be succesful so easily. I removed the top of the shredder and tried to figure out a way to unjam it. It became obvious pretty quickly I was going to have to operate. I switched to the phillips screwdriver in my Leatherman and set to work removing the motor and blad assembly. Long story short I put it back together after pulling more paper out of it and it still didn't work.
Staff Sergeant Barnes joined my in the vault a few minute later and decided to try his hand at unjamming the shredder. I whipped my Leatherman back out and we dissasembled it again. This time we broke it down further, and we managed to turn the blades and clear the jam. After about an hour of screwing around with it we put it back together and tried it out. Still nothing. A little more screwing around with it pushing buttons and tweaking things we were clueless about and we tried again. This time we were victorious. A Leatherman, a Staff NCO, a Lance Corporal and a little adapt and overcome and the shredder was back in action. Its still jankity and the reverse doesn't work but it shreds. Thank God for Leathermans.
I wanted to get out of the Vault, it is rediculously hot in there, no airconditiong or windows in a small room with a coffee pot and a hot laminator filled with Marines makes for one really hot room. I ended up making an Sign in and Out log for Classified Material, and a Classified Material Inventory logbook. My handwriting sucks and Ssgnt probably won't ever have me make a logbook again. Oh well.
Today we were trying to send off some harddrives and computers to get changed over to SECRET from UNCLASSIFIED. To transport classified material requires a ton of paperwork. Remember that we are aa Reserve unit that has been uprooted and sent halfway across the coutnry and is set up in what was essentially a deserted lower floor of a building. We aren't exacatly swimming in a plethera of forms and equipment. Turns out we had none of the forms we needed. Sgnt Corpuz sent me an a mission upstairs to the MLG that inhabbited the second floor of our building for a form. Turns out they had sent pretty much everybody home, so the S-2 wasn't around. The S-3 Captain had access to the Vault though, and she was willing to give me a hand snooping around for it. Unfortunately they didn't have the form, but I did get the number of their higher command's S-2 shop which was just down the road, and found out we could get some Courier Cards from them. (Courier Cards are pretty much a hall pass for the individual actually transporting the classified material.) I returned to the shop to learn we had figured out a way to get around the form I had been sent to get, and that I should have asked for the Courier Cards. So I headed back up to ask the Captain for the cards. She was extremely helpful and after a quick phone call she was able to give me a whole stack of them. No small feat as they are a little difficult to come by. I returned victorious to the shop and was told I was going to get a NAM by Sgnt Corpuz.
Not too long after we headed back to 22 area and the squad bay. We changed back into civies and headed to chow. After chow the real fun began. After last nights upheavel in the squad bay and our influx of the S-1 and S-4 shops, their was a shortage of racks and wall lockers. Now, a few of the wall lockers that had been extra before our new residents showed up were being used by some of us as community wall lockers. As a result one of the Ssgnts was inspecting us to figure out which wall lockers were really available. After his inspection, chaos began. Marines began moving wall lockers and racks and carrying gear all over the squad bay back and forth and up and down... Shops were split up and reunited and Marines moved from one side to the other and back again. Basically it was a classic case of doing anything in the Marine Corps. During all this chaos I set out to get myself a shelf of some sort to put inside my wall locker to give it some sort of organization.
Earlier that evening I had spotted a candidate, an old rusting office desk that had a set of drawers that were falling off the desk. I pulled out my Leatherman again and tried to unscrew it, but eventually utilized a swift kick to separate the drawers from the desk. I then proceeded to bend it back into shape and fix the drawers so they would slide in and out again with my folded up Leatherman and a large rock. I then cut out a piece of a thick cardboard shipping crate as a top and returned to the squad bay. It was a perfect example of Marine Coprs ingenuity and the usefullness of a Leatherman.
And so ends another day in the life of Reservist POG's. We are getting ready for battle, repairing shredders, moving wall lockers and printing maps. Right now its hard to see the purpose in it all, but we are Marines. We have a job to do, and after all the chaos settles down and we hit the sand in Iraq we will do it, and do it well. We are the best, even though sometimes, we have no idea why. God brought us through another day, and I will rely on Him again tomorrow.
Tomorrow has another challenge. Tomorrow I fight off boredom. 24 hour duty. My next entry may be a little late.

And so it Begins

May 7, 2009

Today its for real.

My name is Lance Corporal Matt Walje, USMCR. I am a Marine Reservist and a pseudo sophomore in International Relations at William Jewell College. I say pseudo sophomore because I have never finished a full school year at Jewell. The Marine Corps called me up and so I go. I am an analyst from the 24th Marine Regiment HQ company that has been augmented to 3rd Battalion 24th Marines for a deployment to Iraq. We spent April 4-24 out at Camp Pendleton, CA doing our Annual Training trying to get as many of our qualifications (swim qual, rifle qual, etc) out of the way as possible so tht we could focus on training when we came back to prepair for our deployment.

Between the 24th of April and May 1st I was up at Jewell trying to get some stuff done for school. May 1st was my activation date. That Friday I went down to Belton where the 24th Marines are headquartered and signed my activation orders. From May 1st until June 4th 2010 I belong to the Marine Corps. Monday the 4th through Wednesday I went down to Belton everyday, and today I left with the rest of the augments from Regiment to go to Camp Pendleton to join up with the rest of 3/24 for ILOC (Individual Location Training) in preparation to deploy. I will spend through August out here in Pendleton, and then spend three weeks in 29 Palms, CA for Mojave Viper doing hyper-realistic training. From there I will get a brief stint home and then we will fly to Quwait and then Iraq.

Last night I moved out of my room in the Sigma Nu house and said my goodbyes to all my friends at Jewell. My parents helped me to move out and take all my stuff to their house to store it for me. I spent my last night in KC at home with my family, unfortunately it was pretty late when I got home so I didn't get to see them much. This morning I went out to get a coffee with my dad and he shared some encouragement and words of wisdom with me from Psalm 1. It was really good to get to spend time with my dad. I then ran all over town trying to find an open barber shop to get my haircut. You would be really surprised how hard it apparently is to give a Marine a haircut. Seriously. My head is all cut up and sore from the lady who did it, and it is a very good thing that hair grows fast. I can't wait to get a real Marine Corps haircut. I was running out of time really quick. My morning basically was not going the way I wanted it too. I was hoping I would get a quick haircut and then just hangout with my family. Instead I was frantically driving back to my house, tossing a few last things into my sea bag and running out to the car to leave for the airport. My Grampa stopped by to say goodbye before I got into the family van. We drove to MCI where I hurriedly checked my bags and went to stand in front of the gate to get ready to go through security. My whole family was there, my parents and my four younger sisters and my little brother. My Gramma showed up right before I had to walk through the gate to security. My Uncle didn't make it in time to give me a hug goodbye. We managed to get off a quick family picture too.

MCI is a horrible place to say goodbye. The gate has glass walls and as you wait to board your loved ones are standing on the other side watching you. All that separates you is a few millimeters of transparent glass but it might as well be miles thick. All it does is prolong goodbye, and lets you watch the tears. Over the past year and a half I have been in the Marine Corps I have said a few goodbyes. None of them have been easy. They don't really get better either. The last few months after I got word I was deploying have been filled with uncertainty, confusion and prolonged goodbyes.

My life, the life of Matt Walje, sophmore International Relations major, football player, and Sigma Nu is on hold now. I am Lcpl Walje now. I have said goodbye to my friends, and my family. I don't know much of what the next 13 months I am active hold. None of us do. A month ago, all of us were college students, construction workers, bank tellers, your friends, your brothers. Now we are Marines prepairing for war. Our sacrifice is this. Our lives are not our own. We volounteered our lives for service to this land, and we have been called out on it. For many of us, this wasn't in our plans. We were looking forward to summer vacations, graduations, even simple things like 4th of July, Thanksgiving and Christmas. God had different plans for us. I wasn't anticipating this. God has given me a new plan for the next 13 months, and I am very much not in control. It is an excersize in Faith and Prayer.

We are the Reservists and this is the begining of our Journey.