I shipped to Basic Training on November 5th of 1984.  Boy was I nervous!  It seemed like they started yelling at us the second we stepped off the bus and it didn't let up for hours.  Our first night was very busy and I don't think we got to sleep until about 2am.  At 5am I was awakened by a 55 gallon metal trash can careening down the middle of the compartment and more yelling.  The first thought through my head was "Screw this, I'm going home."  But then I realized that I was better than that, and I wasn't going to let them win.  After my haircut, I realized that I had never seen my own scalp.  I don't think it was this short when I was born.  The hardest part of Basic was the first few days- I was thrown into an environment with 79 other guys and I knew next to nothing about either of them.  I had to be shown the Navy way walk, talk, write, sleep, eat, and wear clothes.  After the first week I started to get a grip on what was going on and life wasn't so hectic.  I started to make friends, started to help those that weren't as good at things as I was, and to accept help from those that are better.  It's all about teamwork.  I could make my rack (bed) tight enough to bounce coins off of but couldn't fold a pillow for squat and my bunkmate was the master at pillow folding, so we made our respective racks and then I tightened his up and he folded my pillow.  Together we never failed.  In about our 4th week, I realized that we pretty much ran ourselves.  We also looked out for each other.  I knew that if I saw someone who wasn't squared away then I had better take care of it, because if he failed, the team failed, and the team is punished.  That seems dumb until you put it in the perspective that someday my life may depend on someone else in my team.  Is that someone fails, the team may die!  So it's best to correct problems in a training environment.  I thought that the physical part would be a problem, but it really wasn't.  Sure there were plenty of times I thought I was going to drop from exhaustion, but they know you aren't a triathlete the day you start out and build you up.  On the flip side of that- if they never pushed you, you'd never get better.   Today they want 15 pushups and you want to die at 10, tomorrow they want 20 pushups and you want to die at 18, pretty soon they want 50 pushups and you can do 50.  Overall I would have to say that Basic Training wasn't that bad.  I made some good friends, learned some valuable lessons of teamwork and doing more than you think you can, and came away with traits that have helped me become a productive member of society and a good American.  Graduation was a great day.  It was almost beyond words.  To know that I went through the grinder of bootcamp, saw friends not succeed, had some push me beyond what I thought my limits were, and to have come out the other side a winner.  Proud!
 

Coming into the Navy I knew very little about electricity other than to keep my fingers out of a wall socket.  I went through the first part of my technical school (A-school) in Millington Tennessee from January to December 1985 and that changed.  My first few classes taught me about basic tools and their uses. I never knew there was a difference between a phillips and a reed and prince screwdriver.  The following classes started at basic dc and circuit components and took us all the way to transistor theory and wave propagation.  I then had further training at North Island in San Diego California from January to May of 1986.  This is where I learned about the S-3 Forward Looking Infrared (FLIR) turret and its systems.  This was to be my specialty in the Navy.

From May or 1986 to Dec 1989 I was what is known as ship's company on board an aircraft carrier, the Ranger.  She was what we call a conventional carrier, meaning she burns fuel oil and is not nuclear powered.  During this time I learned about the A-6 FLIR as it ran on the same bench that my S-3 turret did.  Since I could not run any S-3 gear while the A-6 guys where using the bench (the A-6 gear broke far more often than mine), I figured I might as well do something.  I also made 2 cruises to the western pacific or westpacs.  I had the opportunity to go to Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Thailand, Australia, Canada, Hawaii, and Diego Garcia.  I'd have to say that Singapore was by far my favorite.  It is a beautiful place, very clean, a shopping mall on every other corner, and the hotels are inexpensive.  Of course I also went to all the beaches in the area and up to Los Angeles quite often.  I learned how to Bogie board and thought myself quite proficient until I got to the North Shore of Hawaii where the waves were so strong that I couldn't get past the break.  During my time on the Ranger, I had friends in GSE or Ground Support Equipment and the Photo lab.  Ground Support Equipment consists mostly off the tow tractors, so most of the GSE guys where navy trained mechanics.  This is where I learned how to turn a wrench.  From my Photo buddies I leaned the proper techniques for taking pictures from film speed to the f stop.
 

I was at Cecil in Jacksonville Florida from Jan 1990 to Jan 1999.  That's right nine years.  I really enjoyed it down there, Jacksonville is a great city that still has a small town mentality.  During this time I went back and forth between Shore Duty and SeaOpDet.  SeaOpDet is where I was assigned to a ship and when the deployed with her planes, I flew up and went out with her, and, when she was in port, I worked in Jax.  This was the best of both worlds- I got to go on deployments and travel but work almost like shore duty in between.  My first deployment was onboard the U.S.S. Kennedy, CV-67, for Desert Shield and Desert Storm (the Persian Gulf war).  I remember coming into work on a Friday afternoon and being told to go home because we were deploying on Sunday with no confirmed return date.  That's enough to make you want to drop a bomb on the head of the country making you leave.  I made 2 detachments with the Kennedy to Boston and to New York.  I also made 2 cruises on the U.S.S Roosevelt, CVN-71.  This was my first nuclear carrier.  Not too much different, just much larger and with more hot water.  On these Med Cruises, I visited the United Arabian Emirates, Egypt, Israel, Turkey, Greece, Crete, Italy, Spain, France, the Bahamas, St. Maarten, St. Thomas, and the Virgin Islands.   I've also done a few small detachments on the U.S.S. Eisenhower.   I would have to say that the Rosy has been my best carrier so far. 
 

During my time at Cecil, I started working on F/A-18 FLIR and its bench known as EOTS.  After 4 years of actually working on it, I finally got to go to school for it.  The school was also at Cecil, so I didn't have to go far.  I spent most of the time doing crosswords.  With my experience in F/A-18 FLIR, I spent my last 2 years at Cecil as the Navy's design rep for the off load to the new CASS bench.  This entailed flying from Jax, to Orlando, to St. Louis, staying in very nice hotels, and talking (sometimes arguing) with design engineers from Boeing and Lockheed Martin.  Those men are smart and knowledgeable, but haven't too much idea of what will work on a ship.  That is where I came in to help them understand things like limited storage space, that sailors are rough with gear and equipment, and the book doesn't always apply when it comes to crunch time.

From February of 1999 to February of 2002, I was a Navy Recruiter.  While not the best recruiter in the world, I'd like to think that I was definitely among the top.  Truth be told, while I did learn some good lessons and sales tools, I did not enjoy my time as a recruiter.  I missed working on electronics, getting the instant gratification of finding a fixing problems.  The job is very stressful, the hours are long, and your career depends on a 17 or 18 year old kid saying yes and meaning it months down the road.  And I know how scared one can be just before leaving for bootcamp.  I remember trying to think of every excuse in the world next to jumping off a building.  I had the opportunity to talk to a lot of young people that reminded me of me.  I mean after all, I knew that the military was not the lifestyle for me.  Right?  Projectn't realize is that except for the deployments, it's not too far from civilian employment, just the Navy's benefits are better.  While it's true that you can't quit (the number one complaint I heard), the Navy teaches you to deal with momentary emotional stresses and continue on.  Before I joined the Navy, I quit my fair share of jobs when something ticked me off or I got bored and I never got anywhere.  I had no seniority, so it seemed I was constantly working under someone that I was better than.  It seemed unfair, but I eventually realizes that this person had put in the time at the company that I had not, and, while I might be better at the job, they know they can trust him.  There is very little yelling after bootcamp.  In the real Navy, supervisors realize that the natural human reaction to being pushed is to push back.  That why they call us leaders not pushers.
 

Having help design the CASS bench for the F/A-18 FLIR, I went to school for it from March to May of 2002.  It appears that many of my ideas have made it into the production version of the bench, and some have not.  I have also come across a few things that might have been some of my good ideas that the engineers have bastardized over the years.  Oh well, now for the real growing pains.  While going to school, I bumped into some old friends and coworkers.  There are even 2 instructors that I taught as junior guys out in the fleet.  I also met a couple of the people that I recruited.  They didn't even call me names.

In may of 2002 I check aboard the Rosy (again), only this time I will be ship's company as the FLIR shop supervisor.  It was funny going onto the boat again (the last time I was on her was 1997) and seeing little things that I remember.  The tool check out log is still taped to the top of the toolbox where I put it so long ago.  Going back some pages I can see my old signatures.  I see the benches and it brings back memories.  There is a CASS bench in there along with the EOTS.  The S-3 bench (AAM-60) is slated to be removed this next yard period and replaced with another CASS.  That will seem weird, seeing a FLIR shop without the AAM-60.  It is where my career started and knowing it's going way makes me feel somewhat nostalgic.  Again, I have met people that I already knew.  I guess when you've been in an organization as long as I have, no matter where you go, you're going to meet people you already know. 

I will be eligible to retire in July of 2004.  I will have been in the Navy 20 years.  20 YEARS!  Not bad for some know it all punk with a smart mouth, huh?