army strong

Dropping Tory off

Tory has begun his basic training adventure and I have received 4 letters describing his time there. He left September 7th at 8am. I dropped him off at the Rosemount Armory and they took him to the airport. His flight left at 1pm. Once he got to Atlanta he waited in the airport until a bus arrived to take him the 2 hours to Fort Benning. Once he got to Fort Benning he began his time in reception. Reception is a holding place for the soldiers while they process their paperwork, give them the necessary medical examinations, and sort them into platoons for basic training.

"We finally got into Fort Benning last night at about 11:30 and after a bunch of paperwork and briefings we didn't get to bed until 3am. I got maybe 15 minutes of sleep before we had to wake up at 4am. I basically haven't slept for two days, which has made today tough. Reception is mostly a lot of paperwork, standing in formation, and being called f-ing idiots by the Drill Sergeants all day. Just a preview of the real Drill Sergeants when we ship down range, I'm sure. We had to get a bunch of shots today and we bought a bunch of stuff at the PX (the store)."

"The food is mediocre. We get 5 minutes to eat, which is plenty of time because we haven't been physically training so I haven't been that hungry. They don't really care if you eat, only that you finish 2 glasses of liquid so we basically chug those. Chugging a glass of milk at 5 in the morning feels pretty gross."

"I had my first fireguard shirt last night which consists of waking up for an hour and patrolling the barracks and taking a head count and making sure not to fall asleep or the Drill Sergeant will make everyone get up. My shift was from 2200-2300 (10-11) so it wasn't bad because I could sleep for awhile afterward. I'm not looking forward to having fireguard duty at 0200 or 0300. Someone always has to be up so you just wake up they next people 10 minutes before your shift is over."

This week I finally received some mail from his time out of reception and in basic training. He arrived there on Friday, September 16th. His letters are short, since they don't have any personal time yet. It was so good to hear about what's keeping him so busy. Check it out:

"I finally have time to write. We just completed day 5 of BCT and it's getting better already. I am assigned to 2-19 Infantry Delta Company. Our company has about 250 soldiers total. I'm in the 3rd platoon, which is 57 soldiers. We're called the Commandos. It has been rough trying to get a whole platoon of guys from all over the place on the same page, but if I've learned anything so far it's teamwork. We all work together or we get lit up by the DS (Drill Sergeants). Our Drill Sergeants are awesome. I honestly think we got the best ones in the company. They have a wealth of knowledge and combat experience and I'm excited for how much we'll learn from them. They are extremely hard on us and they demand things be done right."

A short recap:
Day 1) "Got off the bus with DS screaming everywhere just like you'd think. We have our big duffel bags over our back and another bag that we had to hold over our heads while we ran up a hill. We didn't get there fast enough (which was impossible) so we have to go back down and run back up. We did this 4 times before they let us stay at the top of the hill. We were supposed to keep the bag over our head, but nobody could do it by the end. Then we went up to our bay and proceeded to get smoked (aka corrective punishment) for the next hour or so. The rest of the day was mostly briefings and getting smoked."

Day 2) "We were issued our weapons. I'm a proud owner of a M4 Carbine rifle. It goes everywhere with me except the bathroom and chow (cafeteria)."

"Our schedule for the last few days has been PT (physical training) in the morning, chow, some sort of class, other instructional training, more chow and that's kind of how it goes. In between we get smoked a lot. I've already sweat through just about every piece of clothing I have, but since we haven't had any personal time nobody has done laundry so we smell pretty bad."

"Tomorrow we go into the gas chamber which I'm nervous for. We were issued our gas masks today and I feel like I'm in WWI wearing it. It will be painful I'm sure, but over with quickly. We wear our mask in there to get comfortable with our equipment and then we have to break the seal and stay in there for awhile and breathe it in. Should be fun..."

I will continue trying to pull the good stuff from his letters and sharing them with you. I'm so proud of him & I can't wait to have him home. His graduation is December 15th at Fort Benning and he will be coming home that day. :) He'll be home for Christmas... God is good!

Love always, Lynette