Thoughts on my career, Running, Friendship, and the Human Condition

Well, unfortunately another long delayed Blog post, and for those in the know I’ll make it a bit more erudite than “What a friggin good time”!

I started a course last Monday known in the Air Defence world as BMC, Battlefield Management Course. In a nutshell it is the course than brings me, “to the next level” of my career progression. And I get the feeling that for all seven of us on the course it arrived the same way, with relentless determination and little in the way of real warning or preparation. There were some of us who were aware of when it should happen and what it was likely all about but little in the way of real meat.

Now I say this course is designed to get us to the next level, where we take a step from junior Captain status and are expected to fill a void in the Air Defence world as (more) senior Captains. Cool eh? But here’s the kicker- we are now entering the oft maligned world of the staff officer. A level where we really don’t have troops, we may have a small staff under us, but really we are just higher paid worker bees making sure the Commanders plan works, and is viable. And for us AD types the level of job we will be doing can be described thusly, us doing our job won’t win any battles, but if we don’t do it could mean we lose the battle. Rewarding. :/

I approach the life of a staff officer with a little apprehension; I have grown to enjoy immensely the rush of command. For the past year I have commanded a small troop of gung ho, professional soldiers in the world of UAV’s. That era has come to an end, unceremoniously, as I would have it. And who knows when I will command again?
However, I don’t want to be totally misleading here. I am looking forward to the next step, more responsibility, more decision-making, and more clout. We’ll see I guess.

On a different note, the running is going well. It looks like the half, for me will happen. And to paraphrase Dicken’s “It was the best of times it was the worst of times” as Kara is still nursing a bad foot injury that we want healed for CTRR. We’ve both had to let go of the dream of running the Half together, but we will defeat the Cabot Trail together. I admire her passion about missing the half, and it really sent it home that she is committed to maintaining the positive changes we’ve both made.

The highlight of running this week was my 18km LSD with someone who is becoming a close friend. There is a lot of time to get to know someone through the “pain and agony” of the gel experiment, loose gravel, and sweaty spandex…The run left me feeling confident, happy, and totally primed for the half AND CTRR. Yesterday was a full CTRR workup, starting with the Long Slow Distance, followed by marathon power drinking with most of my close friends from Gagetown, to which all of whom Kara and I will be saying some semblance of good bye to in the near future.

Feeling uncharacteristically philosophical, forgive me this; I have been admiring my friends as of late. Particularly their resolve, determination, or their passion for life. This isn’t the place for me to go into specifics, but I am so glad I try to surround my self with positive people. You know who you are.

Why waste so much energy on ridiculous things?

Well, I’m going to sign off now, time to go get teary eyed watching Ty Pennington change someone’s life, LOL. Take care, and I yes, I will write sooner next time.