I want to hear about where your interest for the military comes from!

[mwbelyea]

Hi everyone! It's good to finally sign up to this forum. I've been following it for a couple years now. Thanks for all your posts!

I've been a reservist with the 2nd Field Artillery in Montreal for the past 17 months. It's awesome. I won't complete my training, because I applied to the reg force and I'll simply start the training over again.

I'd like to get a feel from this online community. Who of you feel like soldiers? I mean that, since I can remember, the military has been the only job I've ever wanted. I've tried different jobs (I'm 28), but no matter what I do I want to be a soldier.

As a kid growing up in the country outside CFB Gagetown, I spent my days playing soldier. No weather and no cold would stop me from grabbing my pellet gun and heading outside, alone or with friends, for some experiences deep behind enemy lines  ;D

I'd like to hear your stories. I worked as a recruitment officer with my regiment and I always loved hearing about people's backgrounds. Whether you've always felt like a soldier, or if it's something totally new for you, I'm excited to hear about your experiences!

(Je parle francais, donc s.t.p. repondre en francais si c'est plus pratique)

 

[LightFighter]

I enjoy LARP’ing




Also, there is no “34th brigade” but there is a 34 Canadian Brigade Group(34 CBG). As well, your unit would be 2nd Field Regiment, RCA.

 

[brihard]

I enjoy camping and shooting guns, and was fortunate enough to cross paths with someone who offered me a paycheck to do things I truly love.

 

[mwbelyea]

True Pickle Rick, but we just identify ourselves as being with the 34th Brigade. We also call our regiment 2 Field. This blog isn't official military so I figured I wouldn't bother being formal. That being said, you're correct on both counts.

I've never LARP'd but good on you for doing it!

 

[LightFighter]

I've never LARP'd but good on you for doing it!

Every time you’ve been on an ex, you’ve LARP’d, same with all of us.  It was a joke. 

 

[mariomike]

> I want to hear about where your interest for the military comes from!

I watched, "Nightmare on the Red Ball Run".

The definition of On Time Performance.

So, soon as I was old enough ( 16 ), I joined the Service Corps! ( militia ).

 

[daftandbarmy]

Hi everyone! It's good to finally sign up to this forum. I've been following it for a couple years now. Thanks for all your posts!

I've been a reservist with the 2nd Field Artillery in Montreal for the past 17 months. It's awesome. I won't complete my training, because I applied to the reg force and I'll simply start the training over again.

I'd like to get a feel from this online community. Who of you feel like soldiers? I mean that, since I can remember, the military has been the only job I've ever wanted. I've tried different jobs (I'm 28), but no matter what I do I want to be a soldier.

As a kid growing up in the country outside CFB Gagetown, I spent my days playing soldier. No weather and no cold would stop me from grabbing my pellet gun and heading outside, alone or with friends, for some experiences deep behind enemy lines  ;D

I'd like to hear your stories. I worked as a recruitment officer with my regiment and I always loved hearing about people's backgrounds. Whether you've always felt like a soldier, or if it's something totally new for you, I'm excited to hear about your experiences!

(Je parle francais, donc s.t.p. repondre en francais si c'est plus pratique)

I liked it when keen young folks like you came back from various wars/ops and said 'thanks for kicking our asses during those weekend exercises, it helped us keep me/ other people alive on the battlefield', or words to that effect.

So, mainly, it's all about me.

 

[OldSolduer]

I was born and raised in rural Saskatchewan near Prince Albert. I spent a shit ton of time hunting squirrels and rabbits in the bush. Winters were bloody harsh. This sure helped during basic training and BIQ as its now known

 

[runormal]

I hadn't even thought about the military. I was at my Highschool's University night just for the hell of it. Every presentation was the same boring speech "Our campus has, blah blah." I stumbled across the RMC booth and was blown away by both the recruiter and concept of paid education. I eventually applied and was ultimately declined for my highschool marks. I joined the reserves afterwards and here we are today.

 

[mnmjf]

i just like cadpat

 

[Gorgo]

It's long ingrained...

Attended Robert Land Academy in Wellandport ON (which hosted 2968 Army Cadet Corps) from 1980-84.  Joined the Lincoln and Welland Regiment as an ADM CLK 831 in 1985 and served there for the rest of my Grade 13, plus attended the summer MILCON in Petawawa.  Went into the regular force that fall, had to join as a MED A 711 because no slots open for ADM CLK at the time.  Trained at Borden in 1986, but managed to get shifted over to ADM CLK due to not being able to work in a hospital ward (one corpse in the morgue at CFH Lahr did it for me).  Served two years on HMCS Saguenay after graduating from CFSAL from 1987-88, a year at CLFCSC (now CACSC) in Kingston in 1989 (where I was deployed to RV 89 in Wainwright as an extra to 1 CSR), then did my final year and a half at 1 CSR (now part of CFJSR) before pulling the pin.

Try to stay as up-to-date as I can even these days.

 

[my72jeep]

Grandfather, grandmother, 6 uncles, dad, two brothers, and a sister were all military it was the lodigical way to go.

 

[Remius]

Rat Patrol. Used to watch that show a lot.  ;D

 

[hambley92]

I just wanted the free soup at 10 o'clock.

Also my sarcasm isn't as welcome in other workplaces.

 

[211RadOp]

Family business.  Father served 37+ years then another 4+ as COTR.  Just received his 3rd bar to the CD. 

Growing up around Old Sweat convinced me that Artillery was not the way to go though.  :nod:

 

[observor 69]

Army cadets, Army reserve, graduated high school.
Just another unemployed Maritimer.
Saw the light and joined the RCAF.  :nod:

 

[ABBound]

My dad served in the British Army, and although he had left by the time I was born, he raised me pretty strictly, always relating it to how he dealt with officers and life on-base. Our family has a pretty storied military past, with my generation being the first one to have nobody serving in the military since prior to World War I.

I also have had an intense interest in aviation since childhood, and my first adult job was at Edmonton Airport.

All of this together kinda led me to this point, and now I'm trying to see if I can get in.

 

[Xylric]

To be honest, I'd forgotten that I even *had* the interest for twenty years or so. While I can truthfully say that my interest came from a visit to the Warplane museum in Hamilton when I was a child, combined with some of the stories of my paternal grandfather (as his brother was a tail gunner in a Lancaster bomber during WWII that went MIA in Italy, he lied about his age to enlist, with an eye on going to find him), as well as the fact that my great-great grandfather was a shipwright who helped build not only Royal Navy vessels, he had a hand in some of the initially Canadian-built vessels, when I eventually voiced my interest to my grandfather shortly after my mother's sister married someone who was currently serving (since retired), my grandfather extracted a promise from me.

Knowing what I was like as a child, he knew full well that I would certainly not at all be ready for the obligations when I was eighteen, so he had me promise that I would seek his blessing when I thought I was ready. In the process of making said promise, he laid out precisely what criteria I would need to meet before he would grant it. Unnecessary, I know, but this was a man in whom I had placed total respect - a man who always knew me better than I knew myself. Eventually, I grew out of the interest, focusing on my studies and various projects.

Then my grandmother had a stroke. I had been told at the time that it was a microstroke, but as time went on, we realized that it was much more severe. Papa dedicated himself to looking after my grandmother, just as Nana dedicated herself to looking after him. We spoke of duty and obligation, without a military context, and Papa quietly told me that while I had come far, there were still a few more things I needed to do before he'd give his blessing. By this time, I'd forgotten about the promise I'd made, and despite the fact that Papa had a slow-burning form of dementia at this time, he still understood that I'd never *fully* been able to drop my interest in being a pilot. After all, for once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk with your eyes held skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.

My grandmother hung on for several years, long enough to learn that my brother and his wife were expecting their first child - a child they had been praying would come since my brother's wedding in 2011, but shortly thereafter was diagnosed with an inoperable tumor. They gave her radiation treatment to see if they could shrink it, and we strongly suspect that it was this therapy which pushed her into her final decline. Two days before she passed (in October of last year), with the family gathered in her hospital room, my grandfather yelled at my brothers and I for the first time that we could ever recall, as we were getting increasingly agitated about matters, feeding each other's fears. That day, he gave his blessing.

While I had applied shortly after my grandmother finished the radiation treatment, it was because I had grown aware of the fact that something in the back of my head pushed me towards it. When I told my grandfather that I had already applied when he held the promise fulfilled, his simple response was to point to the window at the sky, and told me his favorite da Vinci quote:

For once you have tasted flight.....

I knew then that it was the right call to make the attempt. I may have given other reasons elsewhere, but that's because my grandfather passed away December 1st of last year, and it was still far too raw for me to tell the above story. I seek to join to do what my grandfather never did.

 

[commander-cb]

My interest lies somewhere between;
- I sometimes feel like killing more people
- Just want a steady job.

Also, as the years roll on it becomes progressively harder to maintain fitness.

it would, theoretically, be "nice" to be forced into a fitness program.

 

[mariomike]

(as his brother was a tail gunner in a Lancaster bomber during WWII that went MIA in Italy,

That's interesting. My uncle was in the RCAF. The entire 7-man crew ( Lancaster ) went MIA in eastern France six weeks after D-Day.

If you don't mind me asking, did your relative survive the war?