I left for boot camp with a cigarette burn on my arm and a mind full of bad memories. The past few years had been rough. In all honesty i wasn’t a very good person when i left that day. I was with a few of my friends and i got completely wasted Of course my parents found out and that was not a good way to be leaving for boot camp. I love my family more than anything and I wanted to make them proud while i was in the marine corps. but i just remember my dad screaming and my sister and my mom crying.
The ride there with good old' SSGT Rhode my recruiter it was a quiet ride my parents told him what had happened and he made it awkward to say the least. Driving to shuttle for MEPS in a mini van with him, his wife, and a can of grizzly chew. From that point on i was in a whole new world. I forgot my friends my family and myself i became all i could be i gave every last drop of blood sweat and plenty of tears on my endeavor. Well before all that even got started i ended up getting sick i had pneumonia. i spent 1 month in MRP. During this month i studied hard i worked hard at getting stronger faster everything i could do to get the edge on the competition i was in. SSgt riddle at the time was my inspiration. He asked me if i was going to be a squad leader. i told him hell no. I’m the Guide. So That gets you known pretty quick around MCRD. everywhere we would go i was always called the guide. Every DI that walked past pointed and said of look there’s "The Guide" "hey guide" "you better be happy your not in my platoon guide" so i just kept my composure and kept on marching i knew they were trying to scare me but it didn’t really work. It all just felt like a game to me. The more i put in the more i got out so i really never felt fear because i knew i would succeed. SSgt riddle told me i was inspirational to the guys in MRP and trust me that’s a hard place to be. its like being stuck in limbo land with nowhere to go but up or crazy. I chose the up path which led to me being hand picked into Delta company platoon 1075 and seeing as i had blown everyone away in the IST they made me guide. Because of this i got to call my family. This was what i was waiting for to finally make them proud and it felt so damn good. Its funny for most recruits if your parents send you a package with food its not a good thing, but i wasn’t a recruit, i was this guide. My parents sent me a box that had some junk food in it and when i opened it my drill instructor Sgt Moreno lost it. i mean he went crazy and i thought he was going to kill me when he made me go in the duty hut after lights out that night. to my surprise he quietly told me to shut the door and sit down. When i did, he turned on some music and started talking to me about life. women. military life drill, he even showed me a couple pictures of women he was "talking to". and after all tat he told me. "Listen Guide you are not like those other guys out there. You have all of MCRD talking about you. you are going to be someone." then he told me to go quietly back to my rack and forget that all this happened because it was just a dream. So i walked out and my rack was set up to fall as soon as i got in it. when i did it made a loud bang and a DI from another platoon came in and whisper itd me in my rack that was now on the floor. I just thought in me head. "well here we go again" and i did everything he said faster, louder, softer, whisper. no no no SCREAM GUIDE! "Eye eye sir" i screamed till i felt my throe was going to bleed. NO shhhh its lights out guide quiet time get some sleep guide. You are going to need it guide. Most of boot camp went on like this the DIS would always mess with me more in front of everyone. Then they would bring me into the infamous duty hut where we would relax and it was like a little oasis for me. I guess all my hard work was finally paying off. I kept my position as guide the entire time i was with platoon 1075. well except this one day when recruit flake became guide. I remember waking up to him in his boots and skivvies running in place on his cammies yelling and i quote. " I will never be one of the few the proud the marine corps". SSGT Niemeyer then made me and flake switch racks and i was actually kind of relieved to have the weight off my shoulders for a little bit. I wasn’t the guide for all of the day of initial drill. I still had to do the guide glide "as Sgt Moreno would call it" on the parade deck though. Finally that night after we showered my footlocker was back in front of the guide rack with the best damn linen ive ever seen. trust me good linen is a luxury in boot camp. The point im getting at is the marine corps didn’t fuck me and i didn’t fuck the marine corps either. i did a lot of good things for the marine corps, ive been told by numerous people that i was an inspiration to them and helped them to succeed in their goals. I was even guide in MCT. The way i see it i helped make tons of good marines better, stronger, braver, smarter. and showed them all love and compassion. Brotherhood! I went through school in Pensacola where i did well i wasn’t guide there, i just wanted to kick back and live with my brothers. i had a good time at school i loved it. after that was cnatt i was doing pretty well there. I was class leader was always up in front on runs calling cadence. everything was good up until my friend Moe back home died i went through a bad time and thins kind of fell apart. I kept having dreams of boot camp. about this one time when a di yelled frag out and threw a water bottle and when everyone else ran away i was the idiot that jumped down on it. This is when i started having panic attacks and night terrors. i was put on lunesta to help me sleep, but it would make me black out and sleep walk so i stopped taking it. I started drinking heavily instead. I finish at cnatt and went to hmla 469 when the day i got there my command took a girl over me, which is fine by me, but i got fapped out to "The Range" the most skate job around. I talked to the guys i worked with there but they didn’t really know me they never really tried to get to know me. They were all burnt out ready to get out of the marine corps. That’s where i learned to dream of life on the outside. i felt more and more trapped. the panic attacks got worse. I drank more till the day i was at my friend Jamal’s house a fellow marine we were partying and he knew i tended to drink a little too much sometimes. I left his house and walked down the street to a party with a girl i met on the street on base. That’s the last thing i remember that night. Apparently i got back in Jamal’s house though and his wife wasn’t happy about that. i was trying to make some food in the kitchen and got a little belligerent with her so she gave me my keys and told me to get out. That’s what i was told after the fact. I remember waking up to PMO at my barracks room door. I don’t know exactly how i got there but my car was totaled and the keys were still in it. This is the first time i truly deep down started to believe in god i felt like he saved me. i had some other purpose to be here. i felt like there was nothing i could do to be back with my family. I always believed in astral projection through meditation. well this effect is greatly enhanced by dxm which is the cough suppressant in cold medicine. I learned about this from a website i stumbled upon called www.dextroverse.com its really quite intriguing i must say. For any whom may read this astral projection is basically putting yourself somewhere your physical body is not. In doing this, one time i took a little too much because i forgot i took some already so i took way too many and i thought i was astral projecting but in reality it was reality and i walked off base while on restriction. this got me sent to point Loma rehab where i was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder. i played their games and jumped through their hoops. but i knew i was already on the way out. i did all i could do for the marine corps and Big brother gave back. I worked hard to better myself in rehab, and honestly i think i did pretty well. I learned everything i could, i spoke at AA and Na meetings I tried everything i could to succeed and be inspirational to those struggling around me. I made it all the way through rehab, on the last night i was in my friends room playing cards while in there, a couple of fellow marines and sailors drew on a kids face with a marker. When this kid woke up he walked into the bathroom and was seen by counselors on the camera. They started asking questions and brought me into the office to hear my side of the story. I knew i was already on my way out of the marine corps, So i took all the blame for the incident even though i was not involved. I was then kicked out of rehab and spent the next 35 days in the brig.
In the brig, I just tried to stay positive and make the most of it. There I met one of my new good friends Joe. He was in the brig for unauthorized absence and a problem with cocaine. Once out of the brig i made it an effort to hang out with Joe everyday. We had many long talks about the beauty of life, our strengths weakness, troubles with drug addiction, life experiences, and our plans for after the marine corps. While we were in the brig, Joe often spoke about how once he got out he planned on going home and starting to sell cocaine. This never happened though, me and Joe had a lot of impact on each other. He got out of the Marine Corps a few weeks before me, since hes been out, Joe has been a family man. Hes reestablished family ties and been sober ever since. We still talk frequently and he is working hard to move forward in life. He is a strong and inspirational man, and i like to think that i may have had some positive effect on his life.
After i got out of the marine corps, things went well for about a month. Then i met some new friends. One of my friends, Steve he has had a troubled life been into drugs gangs, homeless, but somehow managed to become a good person through out it all. Steve is a tattoo artist, He was giving me a tattoo one night, and his babies mother was out drinking and driving with there three month old daughter in the car. Steve heard about this and became angry as anyone in their right mind would. He called his babies mother and told her that he wanted his child and she needed to get her stuff out of his trailer. She then went there destroyed many of his belongings and attempted to burn his trailer down. She then came to Steves tattoo shop in an attempt to kill Steve. She came in trying to get to him and i saw the look of demons in her eyes. I then braced my arms on the door in an attempt to keep her out. She tried to push through me then as i continued to brace the door she pulled out a knife and stabbed me in the heart I died twice that night once in the ambulance and once in the OR and I remember being above myself thinking im just astral projecting again but i can hear my mom calling me asking me to wake up. That’s when i remember my vision slowly fading back. I was in the hospital with tubes everywhere and no clue what had happened. But to get to the point the reason im writing this is not because i feel like the marine corps owes me something, but because i am a stab wound victim and cant get on my parents insurance. I feel that if i could just have at least the bare minimum of the VA benefits my life would be a lot better. I’m at home getting stronger smarter and always looking for a way to help better the world today. My family runs a small business and they need me just as much as i need them. I have a girlfriend now that is the love of my life, She is working to become a physical therapist. Since out of the Marine Corps I have been drug free and have accepted God into my life. I currently enrolled in a program at Olivet Nazarene University where i will meet with a counselor to help keep my life going in this positive direction.
When I was in the Marine Corps, I was always working hard to motivate everyone around me, It didn’t matter who it was where they were from or what kind of Marine they were. I did admiringly use drugs in the marine corps, i did have a problem and i did seek help. I do however know that is not acceptable so i do not expect anything just a simple read of my story and consideration of some sort of help. I did not drag any of the Marines around me down with me and i feel i did help many marines to succeed in there life within the Marine corps and after separation. I still show true Corps values every day and always strive to make the world a better place. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Sincerely Brandon L. Jones
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