OBLC- Weeks 7 & 8

Yesterday I graduated from OBLC (Officer Basic Leaders Course). I still have another week to go of Dietitian-specific training, but the basic Army skills portion is done. It seems like just yesterday I was scrambling to pack up my apartment in San Diego and finish up projects with the USOC so I could come out here to San Antonio to start training. With the blur of last weeks' classroom instruction & this weeks' graduation, time seems to be in fast forward!

I tend to only make it home to see my family about once or twice a year, so my parents took advantage of my close proximity to Louisiana and drove out here for my graduation. The ceremony itself was short and anti-climatic. We wore ACUs (essentially a working uniform) instead of our dress Blues which we wore the day before for an inspection. Undeterred by the lack of emphasis, my parents maintained the streak of attending all my important graduations (Navy boot camp, undergraduate and masters degrees). It was great to spend a little time with them before I head out to Ft Bragg next week. In the pic above in ACUs is myself and Goguen in front of the AMEDD school static display after the graduation ceremony.

I thought this side by side comparison of me from my "boot camps" would provide a chuckle for those of you who have known me through the years. The one on the right is of me as an E-1 in my whites during a liberty pass at the end of Navy boot camp in 1989. The one of me as an O-3 in my Army dress blues is of me during the OBLC inspection in 2009- twenty years later! I was way skinnier from the smoking & drinking back then, but I am much healthier now! I remember asking Mama Babin (my maternal grandmother) once before I left for boot camp if she felt old. Of course, to a 19 or 20 year old, 60-something seemed ancient. I'll never forget her smiling and relating to me that although her body had aged, she still thought of herself in her mind as being my age. Although 41 is not old, I'm just now starting to appreciate the truth in that statement all those years ago. I may look different, feel different and have experienced so many different things since that picture of me on the right was taken, but I still think of myself as being that age. To be sure, I have days where I feel the weight of my age physically or the weight of my experiences emotionally, but for the most part, I'm still the same! I'll continue to move toward the next big adventure!!

Not sure how next week will flow with the move, but I'll post when I can. Have a great week!!