Where Marines Are Made

By kellz1227

To everyone who has or has had a loved one in boot camp:

Thousands of San Diegans drive past MCRD on the 5 freeway every day
They are on their way to work, the beach or back home.
They are going out to dinner with their family,
Going for a bike ride at the bay, picking someone up at the airport.
They are bailing someone out of jail, boarding a cruise ship,
Heading to a night at the Gaslamp.
They have their radios blaring and their eyes straight ahead when they pass it.
MCRD
Some have passed it every day and have never noticed it.
The lush trees...yellow buildings jutting through.
A field of dirt and dead grass where Marines are made.
And as cars speed by and airplanes land and take off,
life as we know it stands still at MCRD.
Life stands still yet roars by.
If the lawyer on his way to his downtown office on a crisp Monday morning turned down
the talk radio show and glanced to his right, he just might see recruits drilling.
He might see recruits drilling and running and climbing the rappel wall.
He might hear their raspy shouts.
But he doesn't.
He continues to drive, a coffee in one hand, cell phone in the other.
There is an invisible wall that separates the world from MCRD.
Millions of people pass it every year and never notice it.
The thousands of young men who sleep, eat and sweat there for 3 months
are separated from the world by a thick barrier.
Maybe that barrier is courage.
But every Friday that barrier cracks.
Families and friends pour in to MCRD to see their sons, grandsons, husbands, boyfriends, brothers, uncles, nephews, cousins and best friends for the first time in 3 months.
And when each whirlwind Friday is over, when each recruit proudly boasts the Eagle Globe and Anchor and is now a Marine, these men surge through the gates of MCRD and back into the world... whether it is ready for them or not.
Thousands of San Diegans drive past MCRD on the 5 freeway every day
They are on their way to work, the beach or back home.
They are going out to dinner with their family,
Going for a bike ride at the bay, picking someone up at the airport.
And somewhere, despite the constant roar of the airplanes, a drill instructors shouts orders to his platoon.
Somewhere, a recruit writes a heartfelt letter to his mother.
Somewhere, Marines are being made.
But the world would never know it.