Husky Battalion, Army ROTC program, Winter Quarter, January 2005.I first thought about it my first week of classes, 28-30 September 2004, the beginning of Fall Quarter though. I met my future teachers, SFC Robert Tetu, and Cpt. Lisa Pirak at the climbing wall the department had set up on the Lewis Lawn, right across the street from Clark Hall, the military science building. If you got to the top, you got a purple Army ROTC t-shirt... and in those early days of Husky Band, purple t-shirts seemed to be priceless. Couldn't have enough of them. :) I did climb to the top, and got the shirt. Anyway, I talked to the Captain, and she told me about my options for joining. Sgt. 1st Class Tetu took me on a tour soon afterwords of Clark, as I later saw many students doing later on in the year. Because I was so busy with band and 3 history classes, I thought it would be better to join starting in Winter.
But before Winter Quarter started, I got a hold of the Captain, met and filled out paperwork. I didn't know it was the same Cpt. I had met before, so it was good to see a familiar face already. I was very excited at the opportunity to do the military thing... for real.
The first day of class was thrilling... new faces, brand new type of class, with a big unknown about what it'd be like and what kind of challenges lay ahead. Some of the other MS-I's (military science - first year's) were very serious about it, and I thought that was exciting too. Some others were not, and I didn't understand them. We had former JROTC people, some people who were already in the Army, and others there for the heck of it... or just trying it on for size, like me.
Both the Winter and Spring quarter classes turned out to be pretty boring. But there were topics that definitely kept my interest... The Reserve Officer's Training Corps acronym for the core values is LDRSHIP (an acronym with an abbreviation): Loyalty, Duty, Respect, Selfless Service, Honor, Integrity, Personal Courage. We would talk many times about these, and what they meant to us. Winter quarter we had to give a presentation about a leader in our life, and what aspects of the core values that person exhibited. I chose Mr. Brannman from Jr. High band, of course, and was very nervous giving it, even to a class of twenty or fewer students.
We also talked about military subjects: uniforms, chain of command, drill & ceremony, small-scale military tactics, map reading, compasses, radio operating procedures, the military alphabet, and weapons. The final project for Spring
quarter was a group presentation. We were supposed to plan a field trip and give a brief (called an "operations order") about it. We did this, and again, even with just a small part of it to read, and even a smaller audience, I was nervous as can be. Since our field trip was a visit to the Fort Lewis Military Museum, I was able to recount previous experiences of my own there, and loosened up a bit. The MS-4 who critiqued us complimented me on this, and that really helped.
Wednesdays we were always in uniform throughout the day (in all our classes)... the old style, woodland green camouflage most days, and sometimes the Class A or B uniform, which was the forest green jacket and trousers with a light blue-green blouse (B is without the jacket). The university had it's own ROTC unit patch, a purple shield with four gold columns and the university's motto above them:"LUX SIT", Latin for "let there be light" (roughly).
I really liked the uniform and equipment issue guy, Frank. He drove me down to Husky Stadium (when I was checking in before the quarter) and got me everything I needed. My tent half, my rucksack, my sleeping pad and bag, my duffle, along with the LCE (load carrying equipment... or in plain English, a web belt with canteens), my brand new boots and socks that I was able to keep after I quit, the PT uniform (t-shirts and shorts I kept, but the pants and windbreaker had to be returned), two sets of BDU's (battle dress uniform) with a cap and jacket, and finally the Class A's... with overcoat, shoes and accessories, including insignia. Our first quarter we had a BDU inspection. There was a prize of a Kiwi shoe polishing set for the best uniform. The only person to get their uniform dry cleaned and pressed automatically won. lol. I remember thinking that unfair, especially since she wasn't wearing her newly issued dog tags. Being able to wear the uniforms and get real issue dog tags was one of my favorite parts of the whole experience.
But since this first quarter I had such a strange schedule, I had to walk off campus on 15th Ave. to Fish Biology on south campus across Pacific Blvd. I felt a little awkward in liberal Seattle walking down the street in my camo. And not only that, but Wednesdays were super late. I stayed until 10pm when Concert Band at
Meany Hall let out. Some days I stayed in uniform all the way through! Once I was waiting for band to start (at 7pm), reading my history book for my Junior Seminar class on the History of Peru at the base of the statue of George Washington, when a photographer from the Daily, the student newspaper, asked to take my picture with the setting sun in the background. It appeared on the bottom of the next day's front page, mentioning me by name and giving the weather forecast. Me in uniform, doing my homework. :)
In fact, Cadet Lindley took Early American History (HIST 301) with me Fall quarter. We sat together, and because she would wear her uniform on Wednesday, we got to talking about ROTC. She was one of the main reasons I did end up trying it out. She is the one who told me later on when I was struggling with the PT, that the only way to improve pushups was to do more pushups. Didn't like knowing that, because I couldn't do any.PHYSICAL TRAINING...
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