June 09 My last Sunday at Basic Training. I never thought I'd live to see the day. This week we have been on a lot of details around base, like moving furniture and police calling (which is a fancy way to say "picking up garbage"). I took three naps yesterday and our fireguard schedule is back to normal, so I feel better. Last night was a "pizza party". "Party" in BCT means sitting in our assigned seats in the classroom, being yelled at to shut the f*** up. But there was pizza. We watched a dumb movie, but a movie, called Tropic Thunder. I'm still spitting up blood, even more than before ..read more

June 05 It's the first chance I've had to write in a while. They say the weeks before graduation are really chill, but this week has been crazy for me. Honestly, it's been harder than Red Phase. More work and less sleep. I'm like a zombie. A really emotional zombie. At first it was a really good week, because we got to go to a concert celebrating Fort Jackson's birthday. Everyone got to go, even trainees in Red Phase. (Can you imagine?) There was PIZZA and CANDY, a live band, a drill team, and fireworks! Durant, Eversmann, Fales and I ended up jumping up and down near the front of the crowd ..read more

May 19 Today I talked Durant and Briley (the booger guy... We ended up being friends after all) into going to the Islamic church with me. Some of the other girls from our bay were being so snotty about it. They said it was wrong of us to go. One girl said, "Do what you want then, but I worship Jesus Christ." She said it in such a way like she was better than us, it made me feel a little less proud of being a Christian myself. For me,going to the Islamic service was a cultural and educational experience. It was really interesting. It wasn't a typical mosque service; since there's so many non ..read more

Disclaimer: There are times at Basic when you find yourself regretting your decision to join the military. This was one of those times.  Looking back now, if I had the chance to go back and do it again, I would still join the Army. I feel like I have learned too much and developed too much as a person to give it all up for the difficult times. I wish that someone had told me that in Basic: that it would all be worth it.  As it was, the drill sergeants seemed to hate their lives as much as we did. They had a warped, depressing sense of humor that had already begun rubbing off on us by the tim ..read more