An old Marine buddy.

A old Marine buddy of mine called today. It was great to talk to him. He is in the Army reserves now and should be promoted to Captain any day now. I give him shit for going into the Army, but hey it's cool, at least he has the guts to wear the uniform. We talked about the days when we were just a couple of privates right out of boot camp. We talked about getting drunk at the e-club and looking to start a fight just for the fun of it, and when nobody would fight us we would kick the shit out of each other just for the fun of it. You know how us jarheads are, just looking for a good time.

We went to STA platoon together, a hard ass platoon of the best of the best from our battalion. We were doing our best to make it in the platoon, nobody just gets in, you have to go through indoc first. We busted our ass and hoped every day we would get the invite to go to sniper school.

We had already made one deployment with our unit before we got to try out for STA. Todd was a machine gunner in the .50 cal platoon, and I was a Dragon gunner. We were good at what we did and our platoons did not want to let us go, but somehow we talked our company Gunny into letting us go for a try out with STA. I was tired of humping that damn Dragon. In case you don't know both of these weapons are heavy. When we had to do our long road marches guess who had to carry the heavy load? I remember watching that old movie "The Green Berets" with John Wayne. John asked this guy if he was a heavy weapons expert and he replied, "Not if I can find a light one"

Todd and I made into the STA platoon. When we talked tonight, we talked about how we used to drink till the sun came up and would not sleep for days and still run PT harder and longer than most Marines could do sober, with 10 hours of sleep. Our chief scout sniper was a hard ass and a former Drill Instructor. I think some times he wanted to see if he could PT us to death. No really, I think he wanted to see if he could break us. If you broke, back to the line company loser!

We talked about all the women we would chase, and those who would chase us. Back then we had six pack abs, and biceps hard as steel. We would PT for hours on end and then spend hours in the weight room. We used to drive 5 hours to go party in Phoenix at the clubs by ASU. We had to fight the girls off, and half the guys too because we were taking their girls.

Then we went to Desert Sheild/Storm.

We got out 3 months after we got home. 4 years in the Corps. Even though we got out, it was the best four years of our life. It taught us things that you just don't learn out here in the civilian world. No matter how bad things get now, it can't be worse than what we went through. Todd and I moved out to Phoenix where we got an apartment with one other guy from our platoon who just got out. I wasn't sober in four months, none of us were. After 3-1/2 months the money ran out and all went our separate ways. I've never seen the guys since. Todd and I still talk. He did a tour in Iraq last year.

I have a bumper sticker on my truck that reads "You can take the man out of the Corps, but you can't take the Corps out of the man". My dad was in the Corps for 30 years, and when he dies I know he will be standing guard duty at the Marine Corps base, Pearly Gates in heaven. Some day I will too. All Marines stand guard in heaven, who else would god trust????

I've been out for almost 15 years now. I have a more important job now, husband, and father to two awesome kids. I have to be here for them and provide for them.

For those men and women who left the family behind to go fight, MY HAT IS OFF TO YOU, AND THANKS!!!!