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One day some friends and I were ragging on one of our buddies who was a Machinist Mate and worked in the engine room cause he was always pulling 12 on 12 off shifts and didn't have time to hang out with us. He made a very good point when he said "I didn't know what I was signing up for when I joined. Did you?"
I enlisted when I was 17 because I wanted to. Being a poor hillbilly from Kentucky it seemed like a good way to see the world, and it was. I've visited a lot of places and met a lot of people that I never would have been exposed to if I had stayed in Kentucky. I don't regret enlisting at all. But the way it was done was not entirely honest.
Like I said, nobody forced me to join, I did it with my own free will, but this is how it was done to me and I would imagine countless others.
My recruiter told me that I needed to go to the MEPS station in Louisville and take my ASVAB to see what kind of job I could get in the Navy. So I boarded a bus with about 25 other fellows and headed down the road. ALL of us were under the impression that we were just going to take our test and get a physical. We represented potential recruits for every branch of the service except the Coast Guard.
Well I get to Louisville, take my test, take my physical and meet with a career counselor. He asked what field I wanted to go into and I told him I wasn't sure yet. He offered me Signalman, which in hindsight I should have taken because I honestly never met one in four years active duty that participated in a working party. But I told him I needed some more time to think about what I wanted to do and would talk it over with my recruiter. That's when he told me that I had to make a choice right then because I had already enlisted.
I looked at him and said "When?"
He told me that I signed a form and had indeed enlisted. I didn't remember signing any form to enlist because they make you sign dozens of forms and don't give you time to read them. Yes, I know it was my fault for not fully reading every form, but I trusted these people since they had told me that the only reason I was going to the MEPS station was to take a test and a physical. Lesson learned. Read every form and don't trust salesmen.
On my way home I found out that every other person had the same experience. Now mind ya, we wanted to join, but it wasn't done in an honest way. So all this talk about people being recalled does not surprise me at all because quite frankly you just can't trust the government. You know how the old lie goes "Hi, I'm from the government and I'm here to help you."
The bottom line is this: Read everything before you sign it because with the way things are going you too may end up in the military when all you really wanted was a car loan.
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