Pre Peace Corps

Having a parent that was involved in Peace Corps seems to leave serving as always a possibility. Sometimes more it was more on the back-burner then other times,  but it was always there as an option.  My father, being a man full of catch phrases always emphasised the importance of "preserving your options" and having a next best alternative.  In high-school, my plan was to join Army ROTC as a freshman in college and pursue a military career afterwards.  This made good sense back when the blueprints for my college years were first being drawn up.  It would graduate me as a 2nd Lieutenant, I would obtain strong skills in military style leadership, make use of an extensive background in technical mountaineering, and leave me with zero college debt and pay me along the way.  Four years of active service afterwards seemed like a very good bargain at the time. The idea was very appealing to me personally as well, given that my father and both my grandfathers were in the service.  I admired my father and it is fair to say that his time in the military was a critical milestone in his developmental.  An espre de corps was also appealing coupled with the outdoors.  The harmonious resonance of tightly lased boots stepping in sync with the collective heaving and grunts drugging through thickets and swamps is innately satisfying, for nothing else but to press forward with relentless determination.  I grew up like this.  Summers of canoe expeditions, and seasons of mountaineering nurture the love of physical challenge. In the space where your bio-mechanics are pressed to maximum exertion you grasp synapses of being connected with the larger energy around you.  Temporary yet palpable access to raw motion which urges you hence with God's speed.  A heavy oxygen debt with hellacious exhaustion is the reward and the residual effects of touching the void.  The military's offer should be clear from that vantage point.

As it turned out, there were some institutional characteristics that were less appealing then my dreams made them out to be.  Rank was of perpetual disinterest.  PT 3 mornings a week at 5:30am were also taking their toll on my grades.  Within the first semester it was plainly obvious that although the field training exercises where exhilarating, the Chinook flights were a dream onto themselves, and I was great at everything that was pitched at me, the military was clearly not my crowd of people nor could I honestly throw my full committed behind their line of work.  My thoughts turned toward my next best alternative.  There was a better way of harnessing my abilities, and maybe serve the greater humanity.  Slowly but surely, the Peace Corps grew into the next prize on the horizon with half a decade to position myself for it.