Family and fans, I am back to the blog after four of the most challenging and rewarding months of my life. After grad school turning out to be horrible at Baylor, I knew after two weeks of classes there I would never get a degree there, so I sought out a Navy recruiter.
Why navy? I grew up near a large Naval base and married into a Navy family… and it would give Angela and I a chance to travel while young. Plus, there are many educational opportunities available to Naval officers. Thus, the Navy would put my little family on good foundation for the future, and get us out of Waco. My brother in law is in the Coast Guard, and we pray for him continuously.
After a long year of applications, I finally arrived in Newport, RI for Officer Candidate School. The Navy began in 1947 to allow Marine Corps Gunnery Sergeants to train their Naval Officer Candidates as they realized that rigorous training produced better officers. I knew I was stepping into a tough program, but didn’t know how hard it would be. The Naval Academy gets four years to teach what we had to know in 12 weeks.
The first few weeks were extremely intense as we had to learn to rely on each other. We were sleep deprived, fed horrible food, and always kept under stress. I got to know things like the S.U.Y.A, where I got wet and sandy while performing rigorous PT. In our 4th week we had an intense room and uniform inspection that I failed the first time around.
I hadn’t sleep much, and did not fold all my clothes perfectly (6 by 6 inches!). So I got to redo the first three weeks with the next class. This was a blessing in disguise as I really liked my new class and made many lifelong friends there. I passed the inspection in this class and moved on to other phases of training. We took intense, abbreviated classes such as navigation and leadership courses.
By our 9th week of training (my 12th) we took over command of the OCS regiment, which is everyone’s favorite part of training. You get more sleep and make sure the other training classes and getting to class and chow on time. You also get to mentor other candidates and get practical training on what it means to be an Officer in the US military. The weirdest thing for me was the fact that the Gunnery Sergeants started to treat us with some respect. We got weekend liberty and had a great time in old town Newport, which had really nice bars.
We drank like Navy boys and enjoyed the free drinks given to men in uniform! I was also blessed to have Angela come up for a few weekends during this last phase, and we really enjoyed visiting the mansions of Newport. All in all, it was a great program, but very difficult at times. I relied on others’ help and made great friends along the way. If the Navy is full of the type of person I met at OCS it will be a great job experience for both Angela and I. We also looked out the window of our barracks and saw the great “victory” bridge which would take us away from Newport and “pain.”
Family and fans, I am back to the blog after four of the most challenging and rewarding months of my life. After grad school turning out to be horrible at Baylor, I knew after two weeks of classes there I would never get a degree there, so I sought out a Navy recruiter. 
Why navy? I grew up near a large Naval base and married into a Navy family… and it would give Angela and I a chance to travel while young. Plus, there are many educational opportunities available to Naval officers. Thus, the Navy would put my little family on good foundation for the future, and get us out of Waco. My brother in law is in the Coast Guard, and we pray for him continuously. 
After a long year of applications, I finally arrived in Newport, RI for Officer Candidate School. The Navy began in 1947 to allow Marine Corps Gunnery Sergeants to train their Naval Officer Candidates as they realized that rigorous training produced better officers. I knew I was stepping into a tough program, but didn’t know how hard it would be. The Naval Academy gets four years to teach what we had to know in 12 weeks. 
The first few weeks were extremely intense as we had to learn to rely on each other. We were sleep deprived, fed horrible food, and always kept under stress. I got to know things like the S.U.Y.A, where I got wet and sandy while performing rigorous PT. In our 4th week we had an intense room and uniform inspection that I failed the first time around. 
I hadn’t sleep much, and did not fold all my clothes perfectly (6 by 6 inches!). So I got to redo the first three weeks with the next class. This was a blessing in disguise as I really liked my new class and made many lifelong friends there. I passed the inspection in this class and moved on to other phases of training. We took intense, abbreviated classes such as navigation and leadership courses. 
By our 9th week of training (my 12th) we took over command of the OCS regiment, which is everyone’s favorite part of training. You get more sleep and make sure the other training classes and getting to class and chow on time. You also get to mentor other candidates and get practical training on what it means to be an Officer in the US military. The weirdest thing for me was the fact that the Gunnery Sergeants started to treat us with some respect. We got weekend liberty and had a great time in old town Newport, which had really nice bars. 
We drank like Navy boys and enjoyed the free drinks given to men in uniform! I was also blessed to have Angela come up for a few weekends during this last phase, and we really enjoyed visiting the mansions of Newport. All in all, it was a great program, but very difficult at times. I relied on others’ help and made great friends along the way. If the Navy is full of the type of person I met at OCS it will be a great job experience for both Angela and I. We also looked out the window of our barracks and saw the great “victory” bridge which would take us away from Newport and “pain.” 
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