Memoirs written in prose of Sergeant Robertson, Damon M. USMC while in Iraq | ...with frequent appearances of King Hammurabi.
If you are new to this journal, make sure to start reading in chronological order by scrolling down to the bottom of the oldest post in October 2004. Damon's letters from August 20th, 2004 - October 23rd, 2004 were all added to this blog on Oct. 23rd, 2004. All subsequent letters are posted in real time.
Saturday, October 23, 2004
Dear God... I mean, Family and Friends: Ahem. Try this on for a functional definition of... huh. How to put this? Monotony. Yes. I think drudgery too drastic a word and boredom too tame. Wake up at 2300 hours. Dress. Shave. Speed walk to chow hall for the same food they always cook at "mid-rats" (midnight rations). Eat in under 10 minutes. Rush back to barracks for formation. Stand there waiting for bus that's always late. Get to flight line. Work hiney off for 13 hours. Return home. Run to chow hall. Try to work out at gym but give up for abundance of fatigue. Clean yourself. Sleep for five hours. *REPEAT* No, we don't get days off. There's only so many C130's you can offload, day in and day out, until you start to lose your mind. Our command keeps promising us the chance to get on convoys or train with MP units or grunts on our "off" time (which we actually don't have much of) but then they keep shuffling the date further and further back. Now it's 3 weeks minimum until we can start integrating with other units. It was 2 weeks one week ago. Oh well. Not my decision to make. I had to chew out one of my junior Marines today and given that he managed to yank my chain at the worst hour of the day (the hour or so after you wake up not having had more than 5 hours of sleep a night for about 12 days). I hate yelling at people. But when I stand there and say his name 3 times, each time a bit louder, honestly believing he couldn't hear me (flight line is noisy, maybe he had earplugs in, etc.), only to find out he's just ignoring me... Oh my Oh my... be the one. I don't know what they teach these kids in boot camp anymore. Ever since we adopted the new digitized camouflage uniforms it seems like every private and lance corporal addresses his superiors as "dude" or "dawg" or just by our last name. ?? We don't have to polish our boots anymore (we've gone suede) and we don't have to iron our cammies (the diggies are wrinkle proof... I mean, PROOF). What DO they do at bootcamp all those hours now anyway? Apparently it hasn't got a whole lot to do with instilling respect for the chain of command. Me and the other corporals are sitting here scratching our heads wondering "what on earth?" ... we would have NEVER talked that way to an NCO when we were junior Marines... Nevermind their behavior is causing me to second guess my whole "dignity first" approach to leadership. I figure I treat people like Marines, they'll act like Marines (honor, courage, commitment, all that good stuff). Maybe not. Maybe these kids need to be yelled at. They all seem to interpret grace and mercy as a sign of weakness. Spare the rod, spoil the child? Who knew? I hate yelling. :D
# posted by chevas @ 7:32 PM 