The further account of Donald Sensing's son in boot camp.
"I feel happy!"
Not the usual claim from a Parris Island recruit
From Monty Python and the Holy Grail:
DEAD PERSON:
I'm getting better! ...
CUSTOMER:
Well, when's your next round?
CART MASTER:
Thursday.
DEAD PERSON:
I think I'll go for a walk.
CUSTOMER:
You're not fooling anyone, you know. Look. Isn't there something you can do?
DEAD PERSON: [singing]
I feel happy. I feel happy.
[whop]
My son, Marine Recruit Stephen Sensing, matriculating at the Marine Corps Resort at Parris Island, fell ill midweek last week, developing a temp of over 101 and diagnosed with pneumonia and possibly strep throat, for which cultures were taken but I haven't learned the result. He spent one day on bed rest and at least two on light duty.
His recruiting sergeant happens to be at PI taking a course; he called today to tell me that Stephen is listed as "present for training," indicating that he not sick any more, or not very. Certainly not strep, he said, else he would have been isolated. He also said that this kind of illness is very common the first couple of weeks at boot camp and he was certain a number of other recruits were equally sick, too.
Stephen's letter we received today, written Sunday, related that his morale over the weekend was absolutely at a nadir. He said he was practically decided to give it all up and ask to be sent home. "I prayed a lot, too."
But 15 of his platoon mates noticed his state and bucked him up.
Let me tell you, God answers in mysterious ways. I'm feeling better. I'd like to go for a walk. I feel happy, I feel happy.
Stephen is a Monty Python fan, and I take this inside joke as a very encouraging sign. I am much more confident now than before that he has at least started to turn the corner of deciding he really can make it.
His recruiter told me that the first three weeks are very harsh, in which the recruits are made to understand that the sand fleas are more valuable than they are. There is no positive reinforcement given. The recruiter said that his morale was so low as a new recruit he wrote his mother demanding she call their Congressman to get him discharged.
But after three weeks, the Drill Instructors start building them back up. If you can make it through those three weeks, the odds are extremely high that you'll make it to graduation. Look at it this way: out of 70 total training days, individual portrait photos are taken on day 27. That's a sign that the ones who make it that far will finish.
Former Marine Matthew White is tracking Stephen's progress through boot camp with explanations of what it's like to be a recruit there.
“Free will” is not in the Parris Island Edition of Merriam Webster’s. I cannot think of one independent decision I made in the 86 days I spent aboard Parris Island. Along with that comes a period of adjustment. In some respects life is easier because you don’t have to think. But human nature dictates that individuals do what they want to do. They don’t teach that kind of human nature at Drill Instructor School.
Stephen is in the throes of that adjustment. It’s a hard one to make.
Then after one recruit disassembled his disposable razor and tried to slash his wrist,
A week later another recruit took a big swig of liquid laundry detergent in hopes of ending his life. Idiot. He just got sick….everywhere. The rest of us were left to clean up the mess he made, literally. We never saw him again and I’m glad.
I had never been around a suicide attempt before or since. Both of the guys that tried were good recruits – physically fit, smart and disciplined. I was not a good recruit, already having messed up quite a few times. If they were so disillusioned as to contemplate suicide, was I next?
Later that night, I sat on my footlocker and penned a letter home.
“Dear Mom,
This place sucks. I want to go home….”
When I was a training company commander in the Army, the favorite suicide "attempt" was taking an bunch of Tylenol tablets. You can't possibly swallow enough Tylenol to harm yourself. We discharged them. Or trainees would try to cut their wrists with a P-38 can opener (this was pre-MRE days). You can cut yourself with it all right, but it's so difficult and painful to make a serious cut that no one ever managed more than a couple of superficial cuts, at least not that I ever heard of.
One day a drill sergeant in the next company got so fed up with this nonsense that he called his platoon into formation, took out his Buck knife, rolled up his sleeve and gave them a class on successfully killing yourself by slashing your wrists. "Don't cut across!" he yelled. "Put the point deep into your wrist and then slash real hard, straight down all the way to your elbow! If you're going to do it, do it right!"
He was relieved of duty, of course, but all the other drills and company commanders actually thought it was pretty funny. And it was.
donaldsensing.com |
