cadet blogs

How Time Flies

(The Cadet Experience, Class of 2015) Permanent link All Posts

At the moment I’m sitting on a train, counting down the hours until I arrive back to the Academy. This trip was the first time I had ever been on a train and probably not my last. From inside the train, it appears I am going pretty slow; I can see the landmarks all around me and can count all of the houses I pass. We are constantly stopping at different train stations too, prolonging my journey back to the Academy. But if I stepped off the train, and looked at it as it passed, it would appear to be going mighty fast. It is kind of like the concept of time here at the Academy. These past five months have seemed extremely slow at times. Sometimes I’m sitting in 1st period class Monday morning and I can feel my eyelids becoming heavier and heavier and all I can think of is how in the world am I going to make it through this week. But Friday always seems to just sneak up on me, and I feel like the week flew by again. As everyone says around here, “the days are long, but the weeks are short”.

I know that it’s going to be hard going back to the Academy tonight, especially since Thanksgiving break was amazing and was the first time in five months that I had been back home. But at the same time, I know this week will fly by, and the week after, and soon enough, it will be winter break. And I also know that once I get back and get into the daily routine again, it isn’t so bad. Sure, there are late nights and very early mornings when all I want to do is crawl in bed and sleep, and sometimes I wish I was able to go out any night like my friends back home. But I know that even though it may be stressful at the present, the rewards are going to be far and wide. I can’t wait to go to a duty station this summer and experience the Coast Guard firsthand while also exploring different ports of the country. These next few years I’m going to be given opportunities that you would think were only possible in a story from a book. It may seem that these awesome experiences are so far away, but as I finish writing this, my train ride is closer to being over than when I started this journal entry and I’m almost back to the Academy. Time still flies, even when you think it has stood still.

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Posted by Leann Strickland at 2/17/2012 8:28 AM