The coolest thing

Matthew and I were eating dinner at Singleton's last night and this lady across from us leaned over and asked if we were in the Navy. She said that her son was wondering if we were. We said yes and didn't think twice of it. She thanked us and continued eating. We finished our meal and were about to ask for the check when our waitress brought it over with a note on it. The lady had paid for our meal. She had told our waitress to wait til she had left and then bring our bill over paid for. On the back of the bill she had wrote, "Thanks for protecting my kids". It was the coolest thing.

It is finished

Well it has been a minute since I wrote last. My ship was preparing for INSURV and I barely had time enough to breathe let alone write about it all. It is done now. Deck is traditionally a problem area for INSURV. There was a lot of pressure for us to do well. Too much pressure I would say, but it is done now, and we did very well. The three days of the inspection were actually enjoyable. The inspectors were amazing and used the inspection as an opportunity to train young officers and sailors alike. It was a great experience for me to go through. Had you asked me that a month ago, I would have told you that I would rather be OC-sprayed everyday for a month than go through INSURV again. The experienc has taught me a lot about people, about leadership, and about being in the Navy.

I learned a lot about myself at the same time - the way I react to pressure, how I treat people, and how to lead a group of people in a very bad situation. For the four months leading up to INSURV I worked extremely hard every day. We were under constant scrutiny which added to everyone's stress level. But even with all that, I count the experience as a good thing. Very few things in the Navy will be harder than that, so they tell me.

God has taught me a lot in this time. Just like the first year of college, where I hated every day, the addition of a community made it bearable. I made a lot of new friends since January. Other officers from the ship, new people at church, and just meeting other people out and about. People are what matter. I have always known this and I try to concentrate on that, but with all the "work" going on I lost sight of that. God has blessed me with amazing people in my life. All of this has shown that God is always good in His plans and even in times of distress he has a plan to better me. I have a four day weekend and I am going to live it up like a king. I think we deserve it.

A pint

"Hey you want to stop by the Irish pub for a pint"
"I can always stop in for a pint".
Thus started one of the best Sundays i can remember. We were on our way to K-Mart to pick up some deck furniture and a small grill to cook some steaks. One pint turned into a pint and a very rare whiskey for Matthew, neat of course, and some wonderful live music by some cool old dudes in kilts. We met some nice people and they convinced us to stay and have dinner. The food was great. The atmosphere was very much like Brocach, which of course made me miss home, and the music made me miss my great celtic heritage. It was a little odd hanging out in a bar with a bunch of kids running around, but it was fun. This lady brought her two year old son and he was so cool. Me and Matthew got to hang out with him. He was hilarious!! We got him some water and he kept spilling all over himself because he didn't know how to use a straw yet. We went home and burned stuff in the little picnic area at our apartment complex. I forgot how much I missed fire. It is very relaxing. Fire kind of puts me in a trance. All in all it was a great Sunday.

Saturday 06 MAR 10

It's crazy that I finally have a night off and I don't know what to do with it. I have been working so much lately that I feel the need to squeeze every second for what its worth. Duty yesterday and staying on the ship freed up the rest of the weekend. I got a good night's sleep and was up with the sun. Normally I come home and go back to sleep. It usually takes up most of the day to catch up on the sleep that I have missed out on the rest of the week. For some reason this morning I felt fresh. The weather is finally starting to turn my way. I spent the majority of the morning outside on the porch reading. Before lunch I got in a good workout which hasn't happened in too long. The afternoon found me on the couch sleeping/watching a movie.

And now at 7 PM on a Saturday night, I do not know what to do with myself. I am sure that I will go out tonight but not til later and now I am left with three open hours. Back in Madison I would be hanging out with the boys, watching a movie, or playing video games. Who knows, maybe I would have a date. But down here, there is none of that. Matthew and I still have a lot of fun, but we each have our own thing that we do. There are a few people at work that I hang out with, but there is really not too much time. I understand that this is a new phase in my life, but it is hard to adjust. I am used to having a huge social circle and lots of time. I have neither here. I am growing up and getting old, but I won't really change, not that much. I guess I miss my family and my old friends, and my old life. This is good though, and it keeps getting better. If anyone wants to visit though, I would love it.

Dream Job

Throughout the course of my life I have, like most people, had several dream jobs. As a kid I wanted to be a cowboy. You know, own a horse, ride it around, and do cool stuff like her cattle. As I grew up it kept changing. I wanted to run a floral shop with a green house attached. I wanted to open up a coffee shop. For a while, I had this idea to open up a restauraunt turned jazz club at night, coffee house during the day. I have always wanted to teach high school English and be a cross-country coach, and that may end up being what I do. But the most surprising one was for a short time I wanted to be a ballerina. Just kidding. Ibe do like to dance, but no tights for me, and I could never do that.

The most recent one and perhaps my favorite dream job is to run a camp. Buy some land, a lot of it, 100 acres or more, in the prairie somewhere, or up north, someplace surrounded by wilderness. It would have to be near a lake and/or a mountain, anywhere that you can look around and not see anybody for miles. The camp I went to as a kid had a beautiful lake, two of them actually, surrounded by woods and cabins and teepees. I actually lived in a teepee for a summer as a camp counselor. It was the best thing I have done. We taught kids, we affected their lives, we made their lives better. All our time was spent outdoors, we cooked outdoors, we ate outside, every night we had fires and talked about what we had learned that day.

I want my camp to be targeted towards troubled young men, disappointed older men, and boys who were never taught to be men. Guys who seek more than the status quo of what society says men ought to be. I want to help kids who have never had a chance or an opportunity to be a man - juvenile delinquents, orphans, or just kids who grew up with no one helping them out. Guys need a chance to live with passion and express the deep emotions that every man needs to know and appreciate. They need to know what God intended when He made them in His image. God is not a meek or well-mannered individual with a part in His hair, and a quiet disposition. God is a mighty force, a warrior, and the creator of love and passion.

A man must love deeply and experience real fear and respond to it, deal with it, to know what it means to be a man. Someone needs to tell a boy that it is okay to be feel fear, to feel love, so that he can know how to deal with it. The phrase "Be a man" is thrown around so flippantly with negative connotations, but truthfully most boys never are taught how to be a man in many situations. My dream job is to have a place to give boys that chance, to give them guidance. And for other men who are grown to get the chance they never got.

There is an opportunity to raise the next generation of men to be just that - men. Not confused boys, who wake up one day at 30 and realize that for some time they have been labeled a man, but not really knowing what that means. Today's men are not given the initation and induction into manhood that they need in order to know their role. Plus it would be cool to work in the woods with a bunch of guys who want to live wild.

I received that, and I am extremely grateful for it. But I know that I am the lucky minority. I was raised by an amazing man, my father, and grew up in the church with men of character and integrity who taught me by example how to be a man. I am not saying that I am the "man", but rather that I was given the opportunity to grow into manhood. An ongoing process, but a process that has to start somewhere. And hopefully, I want my camp to do that. I know that a few of my friends share my vision, and I pray that someday it will come to fruititon.

Scam

So I think I just got scammed for the second time in two months. The worst part is that I am pretty sure that it was the same scam. They came to my door late at night and they told me about some pre-college thing that they are doing to raise points to be able to go on some trip to Europe. The first kid got me to buy Men's Health, which I wanted in the first place, but I haven't received the first issue yet. This chick showed up, I was watching a movie, I was in my pajamas, and it was cold. I told her that I had already bought some stuff from the other guy and that I didn't want to buy any more magazines. She told me that there was another way to help out. I could send books to poor kids who need books. I told her I didn't want to. But then I caved in and I bought some huge book about Undersea Adventures for $72.00!! I am such a sucker. I am such a sucker. Really all you have to do is tell me that it is for the kids and show me a list of foundations that helps Domestic Violence or Foster homes. Stuff like that really gets me. It's funny because I knew that the whole time she was probably scamming me, but part of me wanted to believe that I was helping her and the kids. Man I am such a sucker.

10 February

Up again at 0545. I set three or four alarms now so I can hit my clock and go back to sleep even if it is just for five minutes. Into work to try and beat the traffic early. The commodore came to the ship again looking at our progress. Unfortunately for us, they found a lot wrong, and they decided that we would be better served by post-poning INSURV for another month, until late April. On the surface that sounds like a good deal, but all it really means is another month of pain. We are still in 3 section duty and working until 1800, 2100 if you have the duty day. We may start working weekends, but there is nothing official about that. I am so tired of the constant strain. This kind of strain cannot be sustained. People are already getting stressed, but if we keep this up people are going to do something drastic. I am afraid of losing my guys. It's not just the time either, but the type of work we are doing is very stressful. Especially on my level. I get yelled at on a daily basis. It's either OPS or someone else, but it is never very fun. I get home by usually 7 or later, and all I have strength to do when I get home is eat, shower, and maybe watch some TV before I fall asleep. I'll keep you updated.