Recently free.

Well, so much for those regular postings. Should have done them every other week so they would have lasted longer. :P

No project this week, just some thoughts. I've had a lot of life changes recently.
I moved back to the United States. Spent some time in California at Camp Pendleton for outprocessing.
Collected my DD214.
Moved to CT, where my husband is.
Helped him finish moving apartments, before he left for two weeks of training.

Did I mentioned I got my DD214?
For the non-military folks out there, that is one of the most important documents a servicemember will ever recieve from the government. You recieve it at the end of your contract, it is your one and only proof that you are no longer in the military, and under what honor you got out under.
So here I am, taking my first steps back into the civilian world.
I'm technically still active duty, until July 20th. Then I'll be in the inactive ready reserve (IRR). So I do nothing military, but I'm still on call.

Four and half years of being in the Marine Corps....It's crazy to think about. And since I've had nothing but free time recently, I've done a lot of reflection.

There are things I am going to miss about the military. Quite a few actually.
There are more things I won't miss though, hence why I didn't stay in the military.
I've done enough complaining and ranting in the past four years that I won't start that up here.
I suppose I'm really just feeling weird.
My first several weeks at bootcamp I felt like the whole thing was a bad dream. None of it felt real. I honestly expected to wake up at any moment. And here I am, reliving that feeling. It's so different from what I've been living the past handful of years that it feels surreal. I haven't accepted that I've entered a new stage of my life.
Probably because it scares me. I joined the military for a hundred different reasons. One of the big ones was that I felt trapped in my current life and it was an escape. It was a life changing learning process.
I don't know if I regret doing it or not. There are a lot of things I lost and missed out on while I was active duty. But the things I've done, and seen, and learned are great themselves.
One of the biggest things I got out of the Marine Corps was learning about myself. I was forced into situations and my actions and reactions taught me things I never knew...about who I am and how I view/do things.
Everyone has a self image in their head, of how they are, and how they want to be viewed.
I did, but it was conflicting, going back and forth. I didn't really know myself.
And now I know myself a little bit better.
There are a lot of things I could have done better and excelled more at.
But honestly, there were a lot of times when I didn't want to. There were times where I knew I could be strong, but I chose to be weak, and there were times where I did my best to be as strong as possible and I crumbled.
There were times when I knew I was being a failure, but I'd rather play it off as "I don't care" attitude then admit my own struggles with things I wish I had a natural affinity for, because I can't bring myself to change who I am fundamentally.
But I stayed true to myself, and my personal feelings and beliefs. I didn't try to become something I'm not. Even though I would pretend.
And whether anyone will ever truly grasp this, but I did care.
I cared about a lot of things more than anyone who ever worked with me will ever know.
I would think the greatest thing I learned, the greatest gift the Marine Corps could have taught me:

I like me.

It took me quite a while to come to this realization, and I went through a lot of struggles dealing with an image of a person I was trying to become. And I realized why I couldn't, because I actually like who I am. (Or at least a majority of myself)
A lot of people have issues accepting who they are, or trying to be something, or someone else. I can't do that.
Honestly, I'll never know what those who I worked for thought of me, or what those who worked for me thought of me. I set some pretty poor examples of leadership sometimes, but I also had times where I felt like I kicked ass at my job.

A SSgt once said at a NCO Call (Non-commisioned officer's get together and have discussions about things). "Some of the worst moments in your military career turn out to be some of your best memories."
While I don't think this is true, there is some truth to the statement. The hardships I went through, I can look back on the fact I still did it, I can talk about it with an attitude of ease. The people who where there, or weren't there but did the same thing share that understanding with me.
It's hard to explain in writing I just realized. But after the shit is done and over with, it's another memory, another experience. For Marines the crap you go through brings you together and tightens your bonds to each other (I think its why they drag us through it sometimes).

My time as active duty is over, now I have to focus on the anxieties of "real" life.
College, finding a job, affording things, having a place to live.
But in the same sense, I know after my time in the Corps, I can probably tackle any challenge.

sore muscles.

Played soccer today. Something that I haven't done in forever. I can't remember the last time I played to be exact. It was a bit windy, so at first everyone tried to be pussies about it, but SSgt was not about to let that go down. Though volleyball would have been fun too. I am glad I went outside and played soccer, I can't remember the last time I had that much fun playing a sport...with the office even. :P I didn't get the ball a lot, but I did enough to throw people off their game to get them to make sloppy kicks. So I was proud. And I discovered sprinting back and forth isn't so bad when you don't think of it as sprinting. I definitely ran myself into the ground for no real reason at all other than to make sure I got a good workout during this. And I did, I'm sore all over. Even my back is sore and that confuses me. My arms are okay, you don't use those during soccer. (haha) So playing a fun sport I enjoy is something I'd like to do more often. I think if I did play soccer more I'd be better at running, because I do take bigger steps and move pretty quickly up and down the field. But when I'm running just to run I tire out way more quickly and take tiny baby steps. It's gay. Taking big steps is just tiring, I feel like I'm in a constant sprint, which I don't sprint far or for long. It's a losing battle every time.
Though I've decided I want to play badminton. I don't know why, but that's always a fun game. I'd like to try tennis, but that's only because I've been watching this anime (Prince of Tennis) and it makes tennis look like the most epic thing ever. So I need to try it so I can break through this delusion I have in my head about it. I know, I'm pathetic. But it's awesome. :P
I didn't really have a true topic for this post, I just want to keep to the once a week update thing. I took the time to make this, might as well post on it.
Though a thought I did have about soccer...people who showed up, who knows why, maybe they felt obligated because their peers would be there (and by peers I mean the people they live with), but hardly played at all. And then left! I was actually disappointed, but I guess like basketball isn't my thing, maybe soccer isn't theirs. It was a good game in that everyone was able to get involved at some point or another, and definitely more than once. But those who don't bother to play and give up are the ones who don't even try to get involved, who make it a waste of time. If I'm there I want to get something out of it, even if it is stupid basketball and all I do is sprints back and forth on the court.
I did discover there is a raquet ball court here though, so that might be worth investing some time into. I've played it a few times. I sucked horribly, but it was fun. Worth playing some more to better myself at it.
On a side note: Being here still sucks. I miss being on leave. I dread every minute I'm at work because I'm waiting for the Marine Corps to do something to add to the unhappiness of my life. Like give me unnecessary orders, or send me to stupid courses. I don't like the build up to every work day is dreading what I might be walking into. It's dumb. Life shouldn't be like that. Unfortunetly that's how people make it. *sighs* At least I work a weekend shift this time. I'll probably try and do some weather studying. I feel like I'm forgetting a lot of the finer facts I used to know and just do everything the easy way as of recently. Probably has something to do with my resolution of "Don't care" attitude. But I still want to be good at my job and be that one step above the majority. I don't know why. I just don't like to be looked down on at work. No matter the job. I'm here and I'm going to do it.
The end.