Truth About Thoughts About Basic

To be honest, when I think about it, I'm terrified.

Physically, I am somewhere between average and athletic. Through the growth spurt years, yeah, I was exceptionally skinny, but since then I have clearly filled out. And I do not quite believe that I can handle all of the physical exertions that Basic will require of me.

I know I can handle five minutes at a time. Sometimes a day at a time. This is what we learned from counseling. Not covered in staff training, nor in the manual - it just comes in the hardest moments. You learn from your kids, from the toughest cases, that you can get through anything in five-minute increments. Will I be able to keep that idea? I wish I knew how.

My ego is a marshmallow. And much of Basic is verbal abuse for every waking minute. I unfortunately take nearly everything personally, and I know how well past years have primed me to doubt myself and believe that I am somehow less of a person than the other people out there.

Inside, there is still the spark. That crazy sense of humor, where the name Firefly came from. The rougher things are, the quicker I can find humor, as long as I roll with it and come up on my feet. Humor is the first response to injury, and if I can manage to be in pain before I hit a point of being afraid, it has to come out okay.

This is going to hurt.

And mentally, what exactly do I think I am doing here? Since the second grade, my talents have been pulled into strong left-brain fields. Language, expression, music, creation, dance. My job is distinctly technical, solid, unchanging information. There is no expression

And even the dance needs a steady rhythm. Look at Eastern music and try to dance to it. There will be more to my life than the Navy and this career, but it may very well be that the more artistic tendencies have rendered this brain's user unbalanced.

I can see how part of the fear is because I have to go into this solo. Since I was fifteen, the longest time I spent single was a ten-month period while one person and I evaluated whether we could get back together. Even after the final breakup, I had a best friend who would help carry every problem I brought him, and I would share his struggles. Over the summer, three girls became my closest friends. There has always been someone to share the struggle. Being alone bites.

And through all of this, I am convinced that God is using this to build my dependence on Him. Knowing that I will never be strong enough, He is. Truthfully, it was not my strength that carried those kids this summer. Knowing that I'm striking out in unfamiliar territory, and that the skills and talents that I have rested on in past challenges cannot help here. Knowing that He loves me and sees value in me, and that I need to trust Him that that value exists even when not a person around me will affirm it.

And I think He also intentionally stripped the friends I was closest to, most of them in good ways. The boyfriend whose abundant strength I relied on as a kind of protection was not the person I was set aside to marry. The best friend and I found the distance too much of a hurdle for our friendship to clear. One of the girls moved to the other side of the country, and the other two were soon engaged. New friends have emerged, but not with enough time to build the kind of shared strength that these relationships knew.

I want so much to go to one of my stronger friends, and be in their hug, and cry out the fear over this. But since early May, something shifted, and I was the strong one for everyone else. Entirely unplanned on my part - it was just that since no one was able to be there for me that way, and someone still needed to be there for them, I had to brace a little more solidly. Tempered a bit. Not a bad thing, just hard. Learning to throw more of me into God, rather than into a person whose body heat I could feel.

Less than a year after the Navy, I have a different assignment, that requires me to face other demons from my past and fears that I rarely choose to wrestle, but rather sidestep. Do I think that the Navy will teach me to handle those fears? Not exactly. I do think that God traced a lot of strings to get me into a position where all I have to go on is His strength, His love, and His humor. Anyone who tells you that God doesn't laugh, or live joy, has clearly not met God. If I can learn that kind of trust and faith, that's going to be what will get me through the next four years after these six.

And if I can learn all of that, well, I think I might be able to do just about anything God wants me to do.