Stahlke Adoption

Paul saved up all the questions that Jonathan had asked in previous correspondence, and answered them all in one letter:

Dear Dad,

I’m glad to hear your guys’ trip [to Virginia] was good.  I’m glad that Sarah and Rachel like their gift.  It was something that I actually wore. 

So just to answer some of your questions, the whole nicotine, caffeine thing isn’t a big deal, we just can’t do it while we are here at basic, not sure why, we just don’t get to ask.

Also shooting is all in itself, I will explain it to you when I get a phone call.  There’s a lot more than just aim and pull the trigger.

The medal of honor thing, I don’t even know, about all they told me was they gave my name to battalion for shooting really good, for a chance to get the medal.

The church services are kind of like any other service but there’s a chaplain.  I go to Protestant but I’ve gone to Catholic, didn’t like it, but Protestant is like the youth group services when we went on retreats (guitars, drums, etc.).

The Bible study is still good, me and that guy get together and plan it out, see what people talked about the most from last week, and we plan off of that, but there are about 45 people that come to it. 

I will not be coming home with you guys [after graduation], I really want to but I have to report to my duty station right away.  I think it’s because they are deploying soon.  I think they are going to the Middle East. 

Also the second language thing [Russian], I didn’t tell them at first, then they found out, and I told them I forgot it because I would have had to stay here and get deployed to Europe, which I didn’t want.

Also safety is a huge thing here, so nobody has been shot even though it wouldn’t hurt to get rid of some of these guys, but you know otherwise there isn’t that much injury, mostly people faking.  The thing is that if you miss 72 hours of training then you fail basic training and have to start all over.

Also I am wanting deployment first because I can come back with a sergeant rank for me from it.  I’m going to wait till I’m maybe like 25 or so.

Another thing in the infantry is the army’s prized possession, and they train us like the Special Forces (SF) Reaction Force, and it’s the same exact training that the SF guys get, that’s why there are so many guys quitting and trying to run away.  We have this thing that gets people to quit really quick, it’s called Full Battle Rattle, which is full battle gear like everything we own and they wake us up at like 2 am and we go outside and get smoked till someone quits, fun I know. 

Well that’s all I got for now but I will call you guys over family weekend because I will get my phone back then.  I will keep you posted on what I do here.