More from Donald Sensing.
"Tougher than woodpecker lips"
I've posted before that former Marine Matthew White has been explaining what Marine boot camp is like, tracking the training that my son, Stephen, has been going through since July 26, his first day there.
I posted Saturday of a 4:45 a.m. call Stephen made on his company commander's cell phone to let us know that he had taken so ill that he was being transferred to the Medical Rehabilitation Platoon for recovery. Diagnosis was pneumonia with fever and shakes.
Matthew says,
Don emailed me two weeks ago telling me that Stephen wasn't feeling well. (I think he posted on it as well.) I believe he was put on bedrest for a day or two. Two weeks later Stephen goes to MRP. What does this tell me?
Stephen is tougher than woodpecker lips. He's been fighting a serious illness and training through it for two weeks. I can't say for sure, but I would bet Stephen hasn't said a word about feeling ill since they pulled him off bedrest. [Note: this is true; Steve so wrote us a week-plus ago - DS] He's only being recycled because his illness was probably giving him away.
His Company Commander gave Stephen his cell phone to call home. What does this tell us?
First, the Senior Drill Instructor usually makes the decision to recycle a recruit. Stephen was probably told that the decision was made to send him to MRP. If he doesn't like that decision, he can appeal it to the CO. Which I'm guessing he did. Gutsy, very gutsy.
Second, Stephen was allowed to call home. Do you know how often that happens when someone is recycled? Never.
Third, he used the CO's cell phone. There are pay phones all over Parris Island and in the rare instance they are allowed to call home, recruits are given a "phone chit" and sent to the pay phone to make a collect call. Instead, the CO (a 1stLt or Capt.) handed a recruit his personal cell phone and told him to call home.
My guess...Stephen was being rewarded for something. Probably his toughness.
I gotta say that this lifts my morale here on the home front.
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