"Recollections - #2 Boot Camp"

My first full day of boot camp was spent receiving and collecting the wardrobe I would wear for the next four years. They outfitted me from head to toe with everything I would need along with the "seabag" to store and transport everything from dungarees, chambray shirts, white hats, underwear, socks, even the heavy wool dress uniform with the famed Navy peacoat. I loved it all!
That first afternoon we endured more physical testing, completing endless forms and sitting through a long lecture about what it means to be a "shipmate". I just sat there for several hours absolutely mesmerized by the opportunity to actually be part of something very special that I had hardly paid attention to up to that point in my life. Some of my "shipmates" seemed to be mostly bored with it all. Over time I also learned that several of them were there because a judge had given them the choice to join the military or go to jail.
That night I began to get acquainted with some of my "shipmates" as we sat around the barracks playing cards, writing letters or whatever. Some were more easy to talk with than others because we came from such varied and opposite backgrounds. That night was the first time I ever met a human being with the name "Jesus". He was a very brown, skinny kid from Spanish Harlem in NYC and I was intrigued with his name. He didn't seem to mind too much that a country boy from Kentucky was curious how he got that name. I asked him how it made him feel to be named after the Son of God. He told me he never really thought about it because his name was common in his heritage. Getting accustomed to calling him by that name was kind of awkward for me at first but after a few days I got over it.
Two guys stand out in my mind because both of them were married and every night they lay in their racks and cried because they were homesick for their wives. We all could hear them sobbing and trying to cover it up and I felt kind of sorry for them. I never really experienced any homesickness until I went to sea several months later and even then it wasn't a big thing. But those two guys just got worse and I learned about two weeks later that they had gone AWOL one night when we all were asleep. I never heard what happened to them but the MPs came and packed up all their gear the next day so they probably were caught somewhere and arrested.
God blessed me with some really good friends early on so my time there wasn't very hard at all. Learning to function together as one unit was a great lesson for all of us that has impacted all of my life in some critical ways.
Even today, when I see men and women wearing the uniform, I feel a special kinship with them because some of them may have sat in that same seat I did on my first day of boot camp.
David wrote - "Remember, O Lord, your great mercy and love, for they are from of old. Remember not the sins of my youth and my rebellious ways; according to your love remember me for you are good O Lord." Psalm 25:7 NIV
Today I can look back more than half a century and definitely identify specific days and moments in my youth when God disciplined me, chastened me, comforted me, trained me and forgave me. His mercy and love are truly greater than all the "sins of my youth and my rebellious ways." I am grateful to David for reminding me. HALLELUJAH!