My father went into the Navy when he was halfway through college, at least somewhat as an escape from school and an easy way to get a good steady career. It worked for him for thirty years, more or less, before he retired. He definitely does not regret the decision, he loves his country even if he doesn’t love the direction it’s going in, and he believes the military is one of the best things that ever happened to his life.
Mother joined the Army when she was ending college, too – I never really got her reasons, but I think they were similar to my father’s. They met in language school and got married and Mother left the military to take care of me and be a wife and mother. She does not, I think, regret the decision – apparently she thinks I turned out pretty darned well – but I think sometimes she wonders what life would have been life if she’d gone down another road.
Lots of my friends have been in one corner of service or another – oddly enough, most of my friends have ended up doing intelligence in the branch of their choice.
I’ve been surrounded by it all my life but I’ve never really felt the deep desire to enlist before. There was plenty I could do, I reasoned, in the private sector. There were jobs I could do that were a lot more fun than taking orders from some shouty arrogant bastard or serving politicians I didn’t trust. I have a low bullshit tolerance and tend to be outspoken when I think I’ve been sent on a stupid errand. I am personally if not professionally disorganized and I have been known to waffle on decisions that might hurt someone.
I’ve never felt that desire until recently.
The thing I’ve always found missing from my life is purpose, drive, desire. What do I do now? I bother people until they pay my company what they owe. What have I done before? Kept offices organized, talked to cranky people and fixed their problems, wrote reports. All of those are noble in their own right, but I’ve never felt ‘right’ wherever I went. I’m bad at being content. I’m tired of nothing I do having any meaning. I’m restless. I’m anxious.
And yellow-dog liberal that I am, I’m also crankily patriotic. I love my country like I love my parents, even if I hate what certain bastards are doing to it. Mom and Dad raised me that way, I guess, along with a sense of responsibility. It’s not to please my father that I’m considering this – he is of the opinion that I would be well-served if I enlisted, but he’s not interested in making decisions for me. I think my mother would spaz, but I know she would support me. I think she would not do it happily, but she would.
I’m not in favor of me killing people. Even if there’s no Hell, I think it’s bad for the soul. If I went in I would want to follow in my mother’s and father’s footsteps and become a linguist, and while there’s certainly a nonzero chance of my someday shooting the crap out of someone or getting myself shot or exploded or the like, I’m thinking that a translator’s purpose is to minimize unnecessary death and destruction. I’m good with that.
My weight problems appear to be an unexpected bonus. Who would have though tto be thankful for being obese? It means I have a lot of time and a lot of work and a lot of opportunity to decide that I am in fact smoking crack right now. I might well be. But no matter how low the military’s standards may be dropping, they aren’t low enough to accept me as I am right now. I have to achieve my main goal of getting into at least reasonably good shape before I could even consider joining up. And maybe tomorrow or next week or next month I’ll look at this and start laughing.
Then again, maybe I won’t. But I have a lot of time before I can take that step.
(For what it’s worth, I’m 27, about to turn 28, with a college education. I’ve heard a thousand and one stories about What It’s Really Like. I don’t have many illusions.)
