The First Week
February 1, 2013
I want to acknowledge that I know that I am not the first mother, nor am I the last mother to go through the experience of having a son in the military. I know many fine women who have gone through all of this before me and have lived to tell about it. These posts are mainly for my own therapeutic purposes....a sort of catharsis if you will.
My youngest son joined the Marines back in October, and this past Monday he left for basic training. It will be 13 long weeks before we see him again. The first few days were hard, waiting in anticipation for his phone call to let us know that he made it safely. Well, the phone call never came, but I am assuming that in this situation no news is good news. In reading various Marine mom websites, apparently it's not unusual for the phone call not to get made for various reasons. However, I received a special surprise at work today towards the end of the day. There was delivered a beautiful arrangement of flowers with a greeting card sticking out of it with "MOM" written big and bold on the front. (This apparently is something he had arranged to be delivered prior to leaving.) In order to hold the words written in the card in my heart forever, I would not dream of sharing them here, but just know that there has never been a mother more proud and full of love than I was at that moment reading his heartfelt words directed to a mother who he knew would be in distress over his leaving. I hope the Marines know what a wonderful young man they have in their midst. I realize boot camp is to tear down these young men to build them up into the man that lives inside that recruit. Becoming a Marine recruit has been something at which he has worked very hard and looked forward with anticipation towards the weeks of basic training.
My son was born and raised in a small town and there will be more people in one building than lived in our entire town. His high school graduating class was less than 60 people, and most of those were people he had known his whole life and attended kindergarten with. I hope that after the initial culture shock of the first few weeks of boot camp that he has a blast. Good luck to you son! Your dad, brother, Mandi and I are so proud of you. - Love, Momma Richter
I want to acknowledge that I know that I am not the first mother, nor am I the last mother to go through the experience of having a son in the military. I know many fine women who have gone through all of this before me and have lived to tell about it. These posts are mainly for my own therapeutic purposes....a sort of catharsis if you will.
My youngest son joined the Marines back in October, and this past Monday he left for basic training. It will be 13 long weeks before we see him again. The first few days were hard, waiting in anticipation for his phone call to let us know that he made it safely. Well, the phone call never came, but I am assuming that in this situation no news is good news. In reading various Marine mom websites, apparently it's not unusual for the phone call not to get made for various reasons. However, I received a special surprise at work today towards the end of the day. There was delivered a beautiful arrangement of flowers with a greeting card sticking out of it with "MOM" written big and bold on the front. (This apparently is something he had arranged to be delivered prior to leaving.) In order to hold the words written in the card in my heart forever, I would not dream of sharing them here, but just know that there has never been a mother more proud and full of love than I was at that moment reading his heartfelt words directed to a mother who he knew would be in distress over his leaving. I hope the Marines know what a wonderful young man they have in their midst. I realize boot camp is to tear down these young men to build them up into the man that lives inside that recruit. Becoming a Marine recruit has been something at which he has worked very hard and looked forward with anticipation towards the weeks of basic training.
My son was born and raised in a small town and there will be more people in one building than lived in our entire town. His high school graduating class was less than 60 people, and most of those were people he had known his whole life and attended kindergarten with. I hope that after the initial culture shock of the first few weeks of boot camp that he has a blast. Good luck to you son! Your dad, brother, Mandi and I are so proud of you. - Love, Momma Richter
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