San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
Welcome to the depot
CHAPTER I
Most Alpha Company recruits begin the ritual of becoming Marines with a 14-day quarantine period at a nearby hotel.
Kaleb Wilson, 23, stood in formation at Marine Corps Recruit Depot alongside a disorderly group of young men.
It was June 1 and the country Wilson had signed up to defend was in turmoil. The nation logged nearly 22,000 coronavirus cases that day. A week earlier, George Floyd had been killed while in police custody in Minneapolis, sparking widespread unrest and protests. Inside the gates of the recruit station, Marine brass had just battled an outbreak. Dozens of recruits in the previous training class, known as Bravo Company, had contracted COVID-19, and the entire company had been forced into quarantine, prolonging their stay at the depot by a month.
The lessons of the Bravo Company outbreak drastically changed how the depot operated.
As Wilson and the other recruits piled off white buses into long lines with 6 feet of space between each other, they began the ritual of becoming Marines — taking part in timeless traditions during unprecedented times.
Outside a base gym, several medical tents were set up to screen each recruit. Inside, Wilson and the other recruits filled out paperwork and were allowed to make a scripted call home before surrendering their cellphones.
Wilson, the nephew of a Marine, called his father in Oceanside.
“I have arrived safely at MCRD San Diego,” Wilson recited. “I, along with the rest of my company, will be entering a 14-day quarantine period in order to safeguard us from COVID-19.” He added one off-script detail: “I love you, Father.”
It was an important step for Wilson. He never felt like he had a life’s calling, except for the Marine Corps.
Joining the military, whatever the branch, is always a life-altering decision for the young men and women who choose to do so. For Garrett Glasson, a 21-year-old from Half Moon Bay, his entry to the Marines’ boot camp was more than a year and a half in the making.
“I weighed 370 pounds, so I thought, ‘What’s the highest (goal) I can achieve?’” Glasson said. “So I worked my butt off, dropped 130 pounds and went to the recruiter’s office.”
Glasson said he looked forward to joining the Marines, even while the nation was in the throes of social unrest and a pandemic.
“I actually am looking forward to getting a break from all the chaos and having to look at that on a daily basis — the fires, the riots, the pandemic, murder hornets — all that just gave me kind of a freak-out,” he said.
In a deviation from standard boot camp traditions, these recruits did not receive haircuts or uniforms. They were given Tshirts, workout shorts and an overnight bag, but the boots, uniforms and the traditional lineup on the depot’s iconic yellow footprints would have to wait.
Most of the recruits were bused to a Courtyard Marriott where they would be isolated, two to a room, for at least two weeks. Some recruits, mostly locals, stayed on the depot in barracks.
Not quite boot camp
For 17-year-old Gabriel Rector, joining the Marines was a family affair. The oldest of nine children, Rector is a sixth-generation Marine from Brentwood whose father served with the 1st Tank Battalion during Operation Iraqi Freedom. He was Glasson’s roommate during quarantine, and the two passed the time working out, playing cards and watching “Friends” and “The Big Bang Theory’’ on TV.
Life for the recruits while isolated in their hotel rooms wasn’t quite boot camp, but it also wasn’t a vacation.
They awoke at 5:30 a.m., had meals delivered and took courses on physical training and Marine Corps history. They also had daily COVID-19 screenings and temperature checks. Kaleb Meier, 18, of Carbondale, Ill., roomed with fellow 18-year-old Colton Weidner, of Minden, Nev.
While Meier, a recent high school graduate, signed up for the Marines a year prior, Weidner’s choice to enlist was a direct result of the pandemic, he said.
During his second semester at the University of Nevada at Reno, Weidner held a job as a casino valet and was paying his rent and tuition. Once classes went online, he said, they proved to be difficult for him. Weidner began questioning what he was doing.
“I was just in that adult life already and I thought, ‘I don’t really want to be here; I don’t want this to be the rest of my life,’” Weidner said. “So I believe the shutdown — while not great for the nation or the world — I believe it helped me set my path straight, to help me decide what I really want.”
Weidner visited a recruiter in the pandemic’s early days and dropped out of college.
At the end of their two-week quarantines, recruits who tested negative for the coronavirus were transported back to boot camp and were given their civilian clothes back for a second arrival.
A step forward
The sun was high in the sky when the first busloads of Alpha Company recruits began unloading and standing on the depot’s yellow footprints. Here recruits shuffled through several stations like cattle — to make phone calls, get military haircuts, get their gear.
After more than two weeks of quarantine, the recruits were finally doing what they came to do. Immediately the pressure was on.
In their temporary barracks, drill instructors issued rapid-fire commands, demanding recruits’ attention. They’re read a series of commands and rules before filing into another room to organize the things they brought from home and surrender them. They’re given a few seconds to make one more phone call home then encouraged to hurry along to the next stations.