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This morn began with sorting out the laundry (drawers, tshirts, socks etc) that several members of 2 squads had to wash overnight. Took us about 41 minutes to get up, get bunks made, wash up & dress – this of course is too long but much better than day 2 on Tuesday so much improvement has been made.

The morning was pretty eventful. A full fledged obstacle course – looks easy but is incredibly difficult and ends with a rope climb. Our group really put out effort on this event. Then we went to the unarmed and armed combat arenas and watched real marines in various forms of training. After a group of media left the area, they let our youth go on two of the events, a rope jump and wall jump over. We were about to do some more events but the black flag was raised – more on that later.

Here are the rest of the staff members who remain at least as sleep deprived as the youth – more likely even a little more. Also, several of them have lost their voices for periods of time this week – lozenges we purchased at the base PX seem to work wonders. Others have been mentioned the previous days – here are the others. The Operations Director Doug Williams is the trip coordinator and in charge of all the staff, Caleb Young, certif,ied in drill and a several year boot camp veteran is his #2 & does a lot of the cadence & marching. Other members, Kevin Mattier, Ulysses Moore, Emanuel Anderson, and myself. They take turns leading drills, getting squads together and a whole lot more. Late yesterday we were joined by one more medic, a GFR firefighter Conrad Irving and Reichert Admin Director Kevin Camps who brought us up a 50th student but went back today.

Boot camp comes with its challenges. One youth remained in the hospital today accompanied 24/7 by at least one staff member at all times. A couple of bumps and bruises also occurred including one youth who fell awkwardly off one of the obstacle course bars ( I did the same thing last year and I still hear about it). Two other staff members are hurting also – remember these very small bunks are simply no match for a sleep number bed and it shows in the way we are walking and standing. Importantly, the youth who fell on his face showed great courage and kept going – a sign of character. He also has the marks tonight to show for it. And one staff member was taken to an urgent care and is now “off-line” since he is ill also. We rewarded him with Burger King for dinner. And lastly, we have 49 middle and high school youth, all young men in the making. Almost all give great effort almost all of the time. Challenges are those very few others who don’t and are more than a handful for the other Reichert youth, staff, and even many of the marines on the base including our own drill instructor. These challenges as a whole though – small compared to the overall rewards for all of us. Its very worth it.

The heat index was hotter today than any other day this week. The black flag went up at 10:41am this morn forcing itinerary changes for the entire base. Our youth benefitted big though – about 2 hours at the pool for most of them. Two bottles of sunscreen later, they emerged. At about 5pm today, the real temp still showed at 96F with a heat index of 106F. Other than to walk to and from our vans to the barracks, the chow hall etc though, we were not in it.

This afternoon was more drill but inside as result. Tonight was some clean up. Some prep for tomorrow morn leaving & some heartfelt group discussions with staff about life, mentoring, opportunities, teamwork etc. And some more work on remembering the Reichert creed. It is to be recited in its entirety by the group at graduation. The final day at boot camp begins tomorrow at 4:30am again. Thats not many hours from now.

5:00 am “PT” led by the “DI.” Consisted of jogging around to warm up then an exhausting several station physical circuit.. Then to the barracks, get ready, and chow down at the canteen. The food & cafeteria are excellent & clean. The morning main activities involved touring and hearing about the “yellow footprints,” the location where all marines start their training by arriving on base during the early morning hours. Then went to the crucible, the key point leading up to conclusion of marine training. More on this momentarily.

Alas, a black flag interrupted our afternoon outdoor activities. A “black flag” is when it is deemed too hot for any outside even Marine activity. They fly black flags around the base to let everyone know. I think it has to be about 3,000 degrees for this to occur. Drill instructor Sgt Stanley Carey praised some of the youth this afternoon for their ability to start understanding the concepts and marching. About 1/3 of the youth were able to actually swim at the base public pool as a reward for their performances thus far. Other rewards will likely come for those other 2/3 as the week progresses though today they went back to the barracks and started cleaning the barracks and themselves up.

Back to the crucible. An area of intense training for real marines. Our 49 young men were broken into 6 groups to handle a challenging physical TEAM scenario. This is similar to other team concepts such as ropes courses or challenge activities. An example of one of the team scenarios – have the entire team such as crossing a simulated mine field using a few items provided such as a 48 gallon barrel, two exceedingly heavy iron pipes, and 2 ammo cases. Other scenarios and physical activities for us at the crucible site included firemen’s carry and casualty rescues.

The four younger elementary and middle school youth I overheard said about the crucible that they liked it and today was the first fun thing they had done!

As I write this in the early evening, the temperature remains a frosty core of the sun temperature of about 2000 degrees.

Tonight, early to bed because tomorrow early to rise.