Objective Writing

My physical training uniform from the United States Naval Academy Summer Seminar reminds me of the best experience that I have had so far. When I see my uniform it brings back so many memories, especially from my first two days at the Academy. When I arrived on the first day of the seminar all of the candidates (I do not remember how many of us there were, but there were a lot of us) were immediately ordered to say goodbye to our parents, grab our luggage, and report to Bancroft Hall. I did as I was told and as soon as I entered the building, the yelling began and it did not stop until the very last day of the seminar. The midshipmen (a.k.a the upper class men at the Academy) ordered us to line up and to shut up. We were then herded through the line like cattle as the midshipmen tossed our uniforms, water bottles, and bags at us. After we received all of our supplies for the summer, we were told to write our names on everything and put it all in our bags. Once we were finished with this task, all of the midshipmen (150 of them to be exact) picked up our draw string bags and dumped everything out and mixed it all together; our next task was to find all of our own items and put them back into our bags for the second time. Needless to say, I was very confused and frustrated by the fact that we had to put everything into our bags and then had to do it a second time for no reason; I soon realized that having to do things over and over for no apparent reason was a common occurrence. We were then informed about when, where, and how we were able to walk down the hallways (yes, there is a certain way to walk down the hall). Next, we were told about the five basic responses, which is all we were allowed to say when responding to a midshipman, they are as follows: "Sir yes sir! Sir no sir! Sir no excuse sir! Sir I will find out sir! Sir aye sir!" Obviously, conversations with midshipmen were not allowed. The next task was finding our rooms and preparing for the next day. Sleep was hard to come by at the Academy because it was required for our doors to be open at a 90 degree angle all night. The lights were also always on in the hallways while the midshipmen continually waked through the halls, monitoring all of the candidates. A typical day for us started with yelling at 5am, literally the midshipmen would yell at us in order to wake us all up. We were given 60 seconds to get out of bed, make our beds, and get ready for the day and report for morning the workout; believe me, you did not want to be a second late. Once the workout was complete, which was led by a Marine Officer, everyone was given five minutes to shower (five minutes for you and your roommate to shower, which actually means about two minutes per person). Next came breakfast, and then we were off to our classes. After school was over it was time for afternoon workouts, next was dinner, then we had drill practice, and we finished up with study hall. All of these memories come flooding back to me every time I see my uniform. Although being at the Academy was challenging, I discovered so much about myself while I was there. I learned what it was like to actually push myself to my limits, (I was able to hold a plank for nine minutes straight; I had no idea I could do that), how much our military does for us, how lucky we are as a nation, and what I want to do with my life which is become a Marine Officer.