The Army

After reading several biographies of presidents, such as T. Roosevelt, Truman, and Franklin, the thought of serving my country became much more important to me. And I wanted to investigate all of my options and enlisting was definitely one of many. At first I thought about joining the army reserves, but it seemed that doing it part time wasn’t very effective, so if I was going to do it, I would do it for a couple of years full time, serve, and then get out, maybe apply to business school, then join the work force.

I checked the Army website and contacted my local recruiting officer. Surprisingly, it took a couple of days for them to respond, and over these couple of days I started to seriously consider this as a possible option. I thought that it would be an adventure, I could serve my country, and I could give back to a country that has given me and my family so much. I also considered the serious risks but I don’t have kids, I am not married, so there is no one depending on me. It was a risk I was willing to take. One of my concerns was the mental wear, the tough time it must be to get readjusted back into civilized world, to start working in a desk job after doing and seeing some awful things. That must be very tough, and God Bless those that have gone through it.

When I did get an email back I had to fill out a quick questionnaire and one of the questions was, “have you had any serious illness?” Which I answered yes, and stated that I had had Cancer. And the officer had this to reply:

Brett,

I regret to inform you that because you had cancer you are not eligible
for enlistment into the United States Army.

Here is an option that you may consider instead. Most of these positions
work directly with or around soldiers. The U.S. Army has employed
civilians since 1776 in support of men and women in uniform. Department
of Defense is America’s oldest, largest, busiest, and most successful
“company”. Today, with over 250,000 civilian employees, the Army is the
Department of Defense’s largest federal employer.

Here is a website that can help you in pursuing a civilian career with
the Department of the Army. http://cpol.army.mil/index.html

Brett, I wish you the best in your endeavors. If I can answer any
further questions feel free to respond via email.

Respectfully,

United States Army Recruiting Command

Apparently the Army is not an option.

Work

In Seattle I met with kristin to talk about Seattle, jobs, etc. I met her through the Harvard Alumnae network called Crimson Compass, which is great. It is very helpful and the people are already signed up so when you contact them you aren’t imposing, they have already volunteered. I recommend it to anyone moving to a new place, traveling to a new place, trying to find new friends, wondering what to do next, or trying to find a job. It is an excellent tool.

Kristin was incredible helpful and we talked for more than two hours. She has just recently started a new business called Careers in Common and she hired me to make her website, Careers In Common, functional. She also linked me on linkedin.com and pointed out some places for me to look for work.

Northeast Fork

The next day I decided to fish one of my favorite spots around Missoula, the North East Fork. Two years ago I fished this spot during the famous Salmonfly hatch. It was a weekday and there were no other fishermen on the river but the Salmonflies, a fly so big that you could have five for lunch, were everywhere- on the bushes, in the river, in the air and crawling on the banks. When I shook the bushes Salmonflies dropped out all over the river and below hungry cutthroats and cuttbows swallowed them all up. It was a fishing day of a lifetime and I took full advantage, catching upwards of 60 fish, some of which were near twenty inches long.

North Folk

Sky, Ben and I went fishing up the North Fork, way up, past the dam onto the small creek that flows into the dam made lake. The creek is no more than four feet deep in the deepest spot and some pools are barely five feet wide but what it lacks in size it makes up for in numbers of fish. There were so many fish that it was almost annoying.

In the beginning I tied on a hopper pattern, one of my own design, with a san juan worm dropper. I started catching fish almost every cast. In one long, slow pool Sky and I took turns catching fish and we caught five fish in ten minutes, none of the them larger than 15 inches but it was still impressive.