By coinjoe on Skatehive
2011 My retirement ceremony from the Marines after 20+ years. Nobody prepares you for the transition. They train you to be a Marine. They don't train you to stop being one. I spent over 20 years in. Enlisted at 18. Didn't know anything else. The Marine Corps wasn't just my job. It was my life. My identity. Everything I knew about being an adult I learned in uniform. You make it through several deployments. A combat tour. Training in dangerous and austere environments. You survive all of that. And then they hand you a DD-214 and say good luck. They give you a week long class on how to function as a civilian. How to write a resume. How to interview. How to translate your military experience into corporate speak. Like that's the hard part. Like learning to format a resume is what's going to fuck you up. It doesn't prepare you for the mental mind fuck to come. You spend decades in a world with structure. Clear mission. Clear chain of command. You know exactly where you fit. You know exactl