Extras on John

Hello family and friends,
I received a little info about John from one of his friends. He described the first week at Ft. Jackson as spending a lot of time in boring classes on military history, hygiene, & finances. Once out of reception batallion & into Basic, he had a one day field training exercise or FTX for short.They went out to the middle of nowhere and slept on the ground with nothing but a piece of cloth & two poles for a tent, a mat and a sleeping bag. To make it worse, it was raining all night. They woke up at 3:45 am after going to bed at 2100 and packed the stuff and went on a 2.5 mile road march. After that they had to rappel down a 60 foot wall using a harness they made out of a piece of rope. John thought that was actually a blast! The next day they had first aid classes where they learned CPR, rescue breathing, how to dress a wound, how to insert a chest catheter to fix a collapsed lung, how to apply a tourniquet, how to do the Heimlich maneuver (John already knew that one) etc. They also had land navigation classes. He learned to read military maps and different terrain features and about how to navigate with an azimuth and compass. John says he feels cool knowing all that stuff but hopes he never has to use it. The drill sergeants tell them that most of them will have to go to Iraq. John is doubtful that it's true. He says you can't believe a single word the drill sergeants say. They just try to mess with your mind he says but he can see through the act. He says its tough being there with mostly 18 and 17 year olds. They act really immature, and for many, it's their first time away from home. John says he is learning things from them, like patience...it's been really tough being patient with people who can't follow simple instructions, humbleness...not coming off as a "know it all." It gets annoying to people and He understands why. Motivation...some of the guys are really pumped up about changing their lives. This keeps John going too. They march everywhere they go. John was looking forward to having a nice laid back walk to church. He really misses solitude. He likes to be by himself sometimes and they really aren't allowed to go anywhere without a "battle buddy." The only place he's alone is in the bathroom stall.
Well that's the latest.
Keep praying,
Mom