2 Down, 14 To Go

Today was the end of week #2. Just a short 14 more weeks until graduation.

Yesterday was our first neighborhood road run. We ran in two columns like the soldiers. After about a mile of flat streets, we made a sharp turn up South Mountain. The incline was pretty steep and was about a half mile up. The 'bonus' for us faster runners is that we got to remain still in the pushup position for as long as it took for the slower runners to catch up. This took about two minutes which seemed like an eternity as my arms and chest were trembling with exhaustion. Once we were all at the top, our Sergeant asked who could identify the address of the house at the bottom of the hill. Nobody knew the answer so we all had to run back down to look at it. We then ran all the way back up to the top of the hill. With the house address fresh in our minds, there were still some people that got it wrong. Guess what this meant? You got it; another trip back down the mountain to the house to look at it a second time. The third time back up the mountain was topped off with several rounds of abdominal, leg, chest, and arm torture. Our Sergeant was disappointed at some of the out-of-shape recruits and was going to give us more exercise but we were late for the morning flag raising.

Our class of 50 is now down to 46 members. One guy left for medical reasons and the other three voluntarily dropped. The rest of us have come together as a team and are just now starting to enjoy the experience. There is still a lot of anxiety and stress but some of the pressure is starting to let up. We have been rewarded with an early allowance to start wearing our duty belts on Monday (10/03). We'll start getting used to wearing these gun belts even though all of the holsters and pouches will be empty. Monday will also be the second block of tests so I'll be spending the entire weekend studying. I can't wait to sleep in to about 6:30 or 7:00 am on Saturday and Sunday. I haven't missed too much sleep but waking up at 3:30 or 4:00 every morning begins to take its toll.

Thanks again for all of the comments. If you leave an 'anonymous' comment, please type your initials or name in the comments so that I know who is writing.