M E P S

When people tell me that being a Marine is one of the toughest jobs on earth, I'm beginning to think that most of challenge is just getting into the Corp. Even the recruiters, who try to gloss over most of the paperwork as "simple" put the fear of fire and brimstone into recruits before going to MEPS. Military Entrance Program Stations are where the doctors make sure everything is working before drill instructors break it all down. As nervous as I was, the process wasn't as bad as I had anticipated. The doctors are actual people with skewed senses of humor (like: Why are there Marines on Navy capital ships? Well, the Army uses guard dogs for secure bases and the Army got to pick first). So the worst part was trying to track down paperwork that didn't exist (got shredded after 7 years of doing nothing). Of course, it was odd to leave my lovely wife all alone in our apartment, but she did get her best night's sleep without me rolling over her in the night. Imagine that.