Almost-Marines Drill Families About Their Way of Life in Boot Camp

At summer camp, it’s known as visitors’ day, a chance to show Mom and Dad where you went fishing and made Indian beaded necklaces and sat around the campfire singing songs.

But this is the Marine Corps Recruit Depot, where something besides campfire skits is the order of the day. And so it went on Sunday, when privates beginning the 11th and final week of boot camp showed moms and dads where they slipped down 50-foot-high rappelling towers, climbed the 30-foot-high “Stairway to Heaven” and drilled in close order for oh-so-many-hours on the mammoth concrete “grinder” where their final graduation parade will be staged Friday.

This was the first opportunity for families to see their boys since the night they arrived in town, stood on the yellow footprints outside the receiving barracks, got their heads shaved and discovered fear in the form of a drill instructor’s bark.

Sunday was decidedly more relaxed, a day for pictures and pizza and doughnuts and McDonald’s french fries, and of some parents not being sure if they could even spot their sons in the crowd, given the sea of similarity with all the buzz haircuts and camouflage uniforms and caps.

Out from Illinois

“I was looking all over for Ronny when all of a sudden this young man standing right in front of me says, ‘Hi, Dad!’ ” said the Rev. James Thompson Sr., out from Hammond, Ill., to see one of his two sons at boot camp. Another son is three weeks into the time-honored regimen of turning boys into military men.

“This morning Ronny was singing at worship. Hell, I can’t even get him to do that at home, but I guess he saw it as easy duty,” Thompson said, still laughing.

The teen-age Leathernecks, looking simultaneously so young and so old, were presented to their families after being smartly marched to the reception area by their drill instructors.

One DI with an apparent bent for teasing brought his young charges within 30 yards of the families, then suddenly ordered his platoon to about-face. Families and friends let out frustrated moans when, just that quickly, their boys were walking away from them.

Stood at Attention

Another D.I. made his men stand at attention for 30 seconds--but seemingly more like an hour--before dismissing them so they could break ranks and scatter for family and food.

“Don’t hug me,” one private said quietly to mom and sister as they began to embrace him. “We’re not supposed to hug.” Not true, a DI said later, but for young men proudly displaying their new found military bearing, a hug wasn’t on their personal agenda.

A couple of fathers sneaked kisses on their sons’ cheeks. Privates picked up kid brothers beaming with pride. Moms looked pleased that their boys seemed well-fed; girlfriends and sisters looked at new muscles on what used to be scrawny arms.

“Don’t be shocked if I start calling you ‘Sir!’ ” Scott Padon, 19, told his mother, Cassie Padon, who flew out from Overland Park, Kan., for Sunday’s open house and Friday’s graduation.

Up Early Ironing Clothes

“I was up this morning at oh-four-thirty ironing these,” he said, looking sharp in his cammies. Mother looked pleased. “But actually,” Padon confided, “they could really use a good washing. They could sit next to me, all by themselves.”

Padon’s review of boot camp: “You do a lot of fun stuff to build your confidence, but you gotta make sure you do it quickly or you’re yelled at. The food was great, but I’m a little tired of pancakes and French toast.”

Padon analyzed the boot-camp philosophy: “First they break you down. Then they start building a foundation to put you back together again. Finally, they start polishing the pieces. But it wasn’t until the last two or three weeks that we began feeling like Marines. Yesterday I had on my service Cs (a button-front utility shirt, reserved for wear only on special occasions and more typically only seen worn by full-fledged Marines). Some new privates saw me and treated me like a regular Marine. Boy, that felt good.”

On Friday, Padon and about 500 fellow privates from six recruit platoons will graduate, and that afternoon, the young Marines will be allowed to go home for about 10 days of rest before heading for their next assignment, most likely at Camp Pendleton or Camp Lejeune, N.C., for further training.

On Sunday, the weekly visitors’ day will be held again for the class one week behind Padon’s.