This Recruit

Today was “pre-qual,” which is basically the last practice run before Qual Day. You do everything as if it was qualification day, but your score doesn’t count. You can shoot expert or you can UNK, but it doesn’t matter either way. Pre-qual is, however, a good barometer of how you’ll do on Qual Day. This is the first time a score was kept for us. On the previous three days, I had an idea of how I was doing, but not a concrete number. Still, we were not told what our score was, although the DIs knew. A lot of guys were getting bitched at for UNKing pre-qual, but I was not among them, so I figure I shot at least the 190 I needed to qual. For the past couple of weeks, I’ve had nightmares every night about qualifying, or more accurately about not qualifying. As Qual Day approaches, the pressure has increased. Relaxation is an extremely rare commodity on this island, but there are a few opportunities when a recruit can sort of decompress, like right when the lights go out at the end of a hard day. Early in training I felt a soothing calmness when the lights shut off because it signified another day was over and I was a day closer to getting off the island. Recently, the quiet of the night has left me in a constant state of dread over the whether I will qualify. After you graduate from boot camp you get 10 days of leave and then you have to report in to a school to learn your MOS. Since I am going to be a grunt, it means I’ll go to the School of Infantry or SOI. I’m not exactly sure how long SOI is. I heard it’s about two months. Anyway, if I get dropped two weeks, I won’t start that until late October, which means I won’t be done until late December so getting dropped not only means spending more time on this island, but it also means I’ll miss my annual Notre Dame football road trip and probably Thanksgiving and possibly Christmas with my family. To make matters worse, I received a letter from my parents last night. I always thought they might come to graduation, but it’s a long trip and I’m not a kid, so I was never sure. I remember my Dad saying before I left that they wouldn’t be able to make it. I didn’t really care then, because I thought I was too old to have my parents come. Well, according to the letter from my mother today, they are coming. They booked a flight, rented a car and are all set to come for Family Day and graduation, September 28 and 29. I can’t even fathom the humiliation if I had to call and tell them to cancel their plans because I can’t shoot straight. If I don’t qualify, I’ll get dropped, which would keep me on the island for two weeks longer which would be unbearable. If I failed once, the pressure to qualify would multiply. With each failure, the pressure would crush me a little more. I heard they will drop you twice for a total of four extra weeks and if you still can’t qual then they give you an “other than honorable” discharge and send you home. Imagine if I had to go home and face my family and friends saying I couldn’t shoot a damned rifle well enough, so they kicked me out. I would be too embarrassed to go home. Tomorrow is for all of the marbles. Tomorrow will make or break me. Friday August 25, 2000 -Rifle Qualification Day– (5 Weeks Until Graduation Unless I UNK) Early this morning we began shooting in hopes of qualifying. About half way through there was lightening, so we had to stop for two hours, which was pretty much hell. My last two shots before the lightening were fives, the most you can get. I was starting to feel pretty confident and think I was getting into a groove. Then the heavens conspired against me. When I’m shooting, there is less time to think about how much is hanging in the balance. Having to sit there, watching the rain fall, gave me time to think and made the pressure unbearable. I was not keeping score in my head, because that only messes with you mentally. Plus, we were told not to, so why risk getting in trouble to do something that I know is counter-productive? Another recruit sits on a box behind you and keeps the score on a clipboard. We were not supposed to discuss how well or poorly we were doing, so I’m not sure what my score was when we got interrupted. The guys in the butts keep the official score. If there is a discrepancy, you defer to the score in the butts. After the lightening stopped, we resumed shooting. I felt like I was shooting as well as I could. Although I didn’t know my exact score, I felt like overall I was doing better than in pre-qual which I think I passed based on the fact that nobody bitched at me. When we got to the 500-yard line my rifle coach, who is forbidden to advise or instruct on Qual Day, said “I hope your good from the prone.” I didn’t know what this meant but I assumed it meant, I was mathematically still capable of qualifying but had to get fives on a majority of my last 10 shots from the prone. In the previous four days, I usually got about half the possible points from the 500-yard line. Today, my first five shots from the 500-yard prone were 2, 2, 4, 4, and 3. My last five shots however were 5, 5, 5, 5, and 5. If I had shot like that the whole time, I’d be in the running for high Expert instead of fighting for my life to be a Marksman. When my last shot was fired I felt good, but I knew it could go either way. The recruit keeping the score was my buddy Ryan. I asked how I did and he said, “Too close to call without adding it up.” I knew Ryan pretty well and had a handle on his mannerisms. I noticed he seemed to have answered the question a little strangely. Then my range coach arrived and in a very pissed off manner asked, “Well, don’t you want to know what you got?” He had added up the score on the card Ryan had been keeping on the firing line. Oh God, I thought. Ryan is acting weird. The coach is all pissed off. This is not good. Then the coach told me my score. 188. Two points shy of qualification. I UNK’d. I was crushed, distraught, heartbroken and embarrassed all at once.