My datebook tells me that the combination twenty-two units of class to attend, a flight to command, a radio show to broadcast, an undergraduate fellowship to complete, and a sanity to maintain already make for an all-too-full fall term.

But, the startling realization that I’ve already expended half the magical moments of college and the belligerent attitude that this only comes once in a lifetime led me to engage yet another endeavor last week: I provisionally joined the Pepperdine Speech & Debate team.

While the aforementioned logistical barriers dictate that my involvement with the activity will be limited, I joined just in time to compete in last weekend’s parliamentary tournament at Claremont-McKenna College on the other side of Los Angeles. Though a steep learning curve (we were shut out our first four rounds), the experience was also richly rewarding (we were undefeated in the continuing rounds on the second day). It was a fun, fair rhetorical ravaging on topics ranging from marijuana, to foreign policy, to pollution reduction.

Beyond learning the semantics of the alter-reality called collegiate debate, the experience was tremendously informative in learning how a “nuanced” worldview looks at matters of disagreement. In short, I think the experience did more in a weekend to educate about the thought process of my political adversaries than two years of classroom exploration have explained on the matter. It was also powerful a powerful realization that many of my core principles simply can’t be impenetrably articulated in five minutes.

Taken as a whole, the weekend of banter was an excellent opportunity to sharpen the skills of rhetoric and logic while indulging the abundance of free snacks and amusement of folks that took this far too seriously. Theoretically, I’ll have time to do one more tournament this semester–and as an added bonus, this evening the debate team auditioned for spots on an upcoming History Channel program. Who knows where this craziness could lead to?

With diabolical debate partner Brendan Groves

The novelty of American college life has struck me as particularly curious in this new semester. I’ve caught myself wondering, “Am I really the same person–in the same skin–that I was just an hour ago?” Perhaps it’s the diversity of this semester’s schedule that brings me to wonder.

A composite day might look like the following: shortly after rolling out of bed, I find myself shocked into morning consciousness as Pacific saltwater behemoths crash over me during a once-weekly surfing class. An hour later, I’m dry but still sneezing salt as I take furious non-English notes in my second-year Chinese course. A brief pause for lunch gives me a few moments to collect my thoughts before heading into the radio studio for a broadcast headed to the ears of the unknown. A few hours more and a costume change brings me to find myself sitting in a blue uniform discussing the particulars of the classical profession of arms. And that’s just the daylight hours.

What to make of it all? Someday, I suppose, I’ll realize just how many dimensions of education this diploma contained. And, as Andrew recently wrote: at least I had fun.

Media bonus: My journalistic stars aligned and rewarded me with two pieces in this week’s campus newspaper: a 9/11 remembrance editorial (available online or via PDF download) and an investigation of the Segway scooter’s relevance to campus (available online or via PDF download). Also, roommate Taylor turned an idle camcorder and an available evening into a tour of our apartment (7.1 MB, requires QuickTime).

As has been previously mentioned in this space, this summer’s quest for gainful employment took me to a rather unexpected nook of this great country: Lexington, Virginia.

Lexington, a slim sliver of Southern hospitality home to some 7,000 proud Virginians, is a town mostly scattered around two institutions of higher learning: Virginia Military Institute and Washington & Lee University. And, for the scorching months of June and July, Lexington is also home to the LeadAmerica military-fest-for-high-schoolers, Junior War College. (I always had to chuckle at the true “militarism” of the program when I explained to dozens of parents that, yes, in fact, their son would be staying in a sorority house while in our program. Vacant of ladies, of course.)

My position for three 10-day sessions with LeadAmerica, known to those under my dominion as their mighty Team Leader, encompassed the usual duties of a camp-counselor-type: be responsible for 16 kids, do teambuilding activities, lead field trips, supervise lectures, and keep the next generation from burning the campus down. While the 16-hour workdays became a bit tedious after 40 days of the same repetition, overall, it was a very enjoyable experience.

Despite the repetition of the session schedule, the kids kept things interesting: everything from the guy who didn’t have detergent and therefore substituted shampoo in his laundry load, to the delinquent that snuck into my room during the night and turned the thermostat down to 55º, to the young lady that assured us, with a straight face, that her Junior ROTC program was so comprehensive that she had nothing to learn from the Brigadier General on our speaking schedule. While there were a few bad apples, out of the 286 kids I crossed paths with, I’d look forward to serving in the uniformed services with just about all of them.

Even in the midst of a flashback to the high school soap opera, I found the program to be personally profitable. We heard from some fantastic speakers (such as Winston Churchill’s granddaughter, an analyst from the NSA, and numerous talented Field Grade officers), visited some meaningful sites (including the Pentagon, Arlington National Cemetery, and the National Museum of American History), and enjoyed memorable experiences (tactical road marches, all-you-can-eat cafeteria meals, and long bus rides). Not bad for getting paid to be there.

The true highlight of the experience, though, had to be the other staff members. Five other Team Leaders came from The Citadel, VMI, Norwich, and Mary Baldwin and brought with them military experience, contagious enthusiasm, and true talent in working with high schoolers (even if such acumen did involve the “Kill Them All” speech or fictional tales of the French Foreign Legion). Despite imperfect management at higher levels of the organization, I was consistently impressed with the high standards of my co-workers: these were people that knew their stuff and were tireless team contributors. Even in the craze of what seemed to be regular emergencies, we forged some terrific friendships and I left little Lexington with the thought, “Why can’t I go to school with more people like these?”

All in all, a summer well spent.

Tomorrow morning, the adventure begins anew as I set off for Tel Aviv, Israel in the company of fellow former-Peppers-House residents Chris Stieber and Kevin Mills, along with forty other recipients of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies Undergraduate Fellowship. Together, we’ll spend two weeks in the field and in the classroom learning the theory and practice of counter-terrorism in a free society. It should be quite an experience.

More Junior War College photos available in the gallery…

As previously detailed in this space, I recently enjoyed the Air Force ROTC right-of-passage tradition known as Field Training at Ellsworth Air Force Base near Rapid City, South Dakota. The rapid transition from that experience into other summer plans has left me with precious few moments to ponder exactly what “twenty-nine days of training intensity” did to my life, but the transition back into life-as-usual has highlighted at least a few attitudes that I’ve taken from the experience. In no particular order:

• I lead a stressful life.
  While it took some doing to responsibly suspend life as I’ve lived it for 19 years, once engaged in the Field Training environment, I was surprised how free my mind was. Yes, the object of the training environment is to create artificial stress and measure the response of trainees, but given that absolute and singular focus of the month, I often found myself less worried at Field Training than I am in my daily life. Don’t get me wrong–there are many short bursts of intensity (particularly around reveille) when one feels it impossible to stay afloat through a situation, but on the whole, I was struck with how calm and deliberate the experience allowed me to feel. In an admittedly twisted way, it was a paid vacation from the usual stressors.

• It’s not about the Benjamins.
  I’ll never look at spending $20 quite the same again. After all, for each 17-hour training day that we endured, cadets were rewarded with a crisp Thomas Jefferson. On an hourly basis, I might have made more making soccer balls. Such exertion for such negligent compensation quickly drew the spotlight to folks who came to Field Training for reasons that consumed less than the entirety of their commitment. I had to decide quickly that it wasn’t about the scholarship, the guaranteed job, or the prestige of a job well done–it was about fully engaging in a transformational life experience to serve a purpose larger than myself.

• A remarkable amount can happen in ten minutes.
  In my experience, “time management” in a college environment, at best, usually means rounding off to the nearest hour and having the stress of deadlines without the plan of priorities. Field Training quickly instilled in me an awe of the results of working expeditiously. As I’m not a morning person, I can’t say I ever enjoyed the hellish hurry surrounding reveille, but I remain amazed to see what 23 people can accomplish in 10 minutes: wake-up, put on Physical Training Uniform, put on shoes, make bed to inspection specification, brush teeth, shave, fill canteens, collect secured items, take accountability, fall out of building, form up outside, and march to the reveille pad. Not bad for the MTV generation.

• The human body is a magnificent, well-oiled machine.
  In line with the previous thought, I also was astonished to find how much food and beverage I could consume in 10 minutes if I really wanted to (My standing sub-eight minute record: 1 glass Gatorade, 2 glasses water, 1 full plate entree/vegetable, 1 bowl salad, 1 apple, and 1 peanut butter sandwich). Such ridiculous intake was required to scrounge the nutrition necessary for training days entailing 1-4 hours of physical training, some 15-20 miles of marching, a fair dose of physical discipline, and the occasional Physical Fitness Test. While I was initially unsure of how I would respond to such demands on, at best, seven hours of sleep, I remain humbled by just how well I observed my body rise to the challenge. I learned definitively that diet is more than avoiding obesity–it’s acting intentionally to consume what you need to achieve an energy level. In other words, what was coming out of my first try at my own kitchen wasn’t cutting it.

• Ordinary people form extraordinary teams.
  I’m incredibly proud of the team my Lima Flight became. The twenty-three quirky folks that showed up on TD-0 each brought a unique and essential spice to the dip: some were prior enlisted, some came from military schools, some were marching fiends, some were shoe polishing fanatics, and some couldn’t wipe a smile off their face no matter who was scolding them. We were a motley crew, but together, we formed a remarkably dynamic, cohesive, and effective team. One of the most difficult parts of Field Training were periodic peer evaluations in which we were each asked to identify the lowest performers on our team. While there were some folks whose initial attitudes and interpersonal skills made them an easy target, by the end of the ordeal, it was painfully difficult for me to single out any among us without whom our team would be complete.

• Live chow to chow.
  Few single moments of the Field Training experience push one to one’s limits. Taken in two hour increments, Field Training isn’t too different from what you would encounter in the weekly meetings of an effectively-operated college ROTC unit. What separates Field Training as a watershed passage–and what seems to challenge cadets the most–is the requirement of performing at a high standard every hour of every day of the entire month. Aside from the solace of weekly religious services, there is no time off. Hence, Field Training quickly becomes overwhelming and seemingly unconquerable if one tries to even envision all the challenges that lie ahead. A constantly disciplined focus on the present and immediate, however, quickly overcomes the indomitable breadth of the experience. In my case, that meant limiting my focus to life until the next meal. Somehow, I think that even made them taste better.

• True leadership isn’t taught by words.
  While the Field Training cake is covered in layers of activity icing (physical training, marching, inspections, etc), the heart of the enterprise is leadership. Hence, numerous performance metrics, instructional lectures, and problem-solving scenarios enter the experience as actors in the quest of “developing leaders.” While many of these tools were helpful, I remain most affected by the example of a single member of our training staff: Cadet Training Assistant Lyon. Upon first glance, CTA Lyon is the kind of guy that might have fit a variety of stereotypes: the high school jock, the Air Force fanatic, or the trainer that couldn’t speak without yelling. Yet, CTA Lyon’s leadership style of mutual respect, relevant instruction, high standards, and a potent combination of encouragement and correction allowed him to be remarkably effective. He was eventually recognized as one of the top eight CTA’s in camp, but I’m confident he deserved the number one spot. A sample of his leadership by example: CTA Lyon was married three weeks before his departure for Field Training. By the end, he had spent more of his married life with us than with his wife. He explained, quite nobly, that while the logistics were unpleasant, this was something he was passionate about doing. That’s commitment. Now if only I could find a woman that understanding…

• “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”
  Churchill’s words above were originally introduced to me in their inclusion as one of our daily “Warrior Knowledge” quotes for memorization, but this thought above all others learned verbatim has struck me as true. A month of Field Training gave me ample room for shortcoming; particularly troublesome were a careless security violation, questionable results on the sit-up portion of a PFT, and an exercise on the Leadership Reaction Course that quickly went from difficult to rotten. On the sunnier side, preparation, perseverance, and a divine amount of providence also blessed me with some victories: a much higher than expected performance on the graded drill evaluation, only missing a single question on our series of Field Training Manual tests, never losing my cookies on a run, reaching a goal of breaking into 10-minute run times, and ultimately being recommended for Cadet Training Assistant duty. What I learned, though, is that no inflection point–positive or negative–will determine with any certainty the outcome of the future or the results of the whole. No matter what, keep going. The good news: in America, we invented the pleasant utopia of retirement.

• It’s bigger than me.
  A month of me versus the challenge forever etched in my mind the power of our human ties on this planet and beyond. In my absence, my brother underwent an emergency appendectomy in Puerto Rico. Having only a postcard as a sluggish means of communication with which to reach out to him and my family demonstrated to me the infinite blessings our world affords us in being able to reach those we care for. I was renewed daily at the sound of mail call when friends, family, peers, acquaintances, and, most frequently, my parents, took a few moments of their time reach into my isolated world and share words of encouragement, humor, and care. They were a tangible reminder that I was not alone. And, in the grandest sense, as I recently wrote to a friend, “However strange it may sound, I found a month of marching, inspecting, pushing ground, and re-discovering who I am and who I can be to be a very spiritual experience.” All in all, I’d say it was the most fun I only want to have once.

I managed to sneak away a few photos from the experience (mostly from the night prior to departure) and have posted them in the gallery.

There’s more to college in California than just the beach, freeway backups, and the occasional oil spill.

In addition to being vanguard consumers of pop culture, California’s college students are uniquely placed to be contributors to the medium. Such was the case during March of my freshman year (yes, some 15 months ago) when Jon Borland, a fellow Class of ‘03 Mac aficionado, spent his Spring Break in Malibu.

Beyond the usual requisites for such a visit (cafeteria food, the beach, bowling with Martin Lawrence), Jon’s visit was a superb chance to cross the “Be a movie extra” line off the life list. Having nothing else filling the freshman-year-Saturday-schedule, we found a call for extras on the set of the as yet unknown Coach Carter, grabbed suitemate Scott, and jumped in the Accord to claim our share of stardom.

In the end, we ended up in the final cut as the background stooges we had aspired to be–and Scott even won a DVD player out of the deal. Proof of our big screen debut is included below. Special thanks to Jon for the patience and technological wizardry to pick out the frame.

[Click To Enlarge]

Finally, but very differently, the final stage of my summer saga was recently picked up by a local paper, The Woodmen Edition. While more blogging on the subject is sure to come, a PDF copy of the article will have to suffice for now. Stay tuned.

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal:
it is the courage to continue that counts.”
Winston Churchill

Today is Training Day 29. At 3:43 AM this morning, I stepped on a bus and marked the successful completion of “twenty-nine days of training intensity” at the Air Force ROTC Ellsworth I Field Training Unit. A bus and a bagel have never looked so beautiful.

As I depart for another adventure on a 6:05 AM flight tomorrow, my comments on the Field Training experience will have to be abbreviated for the moment. In short: it was a month of challenge and growth, tedium and excitement. I learned what I can accomplish when anything less is not an option and I learned what a team of twenty-two others can be when all they have is each other. It wasn’t always pleasant, it wasn’t always meaningful, but from this side of the gorge, I wouldn’t trade the experience for a month of anything else.

In the coming weeks, I hope to find the opportunity to individually thank all those that supported me through this experience: your encouragement, your letters, your prayers were a perpetual pillar of support.

Thank you. Life would have been lonely without your love.

In twelve hours, my world will be rocked.

At that appointed hour, I will be stepping onto a charter flight to attend Air Force ROTC Field Training at Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota. Field Training is designed to “evaluate military leadership and discipline, determine your potential for entry into the cadet officer corps, and stratify you among your peers.” Translated, that means 29 days of 4:30 AM awakening, abundant physical training, marching, standing, inspecting, shooting, testing, dorm cleaning, lightning-fast eating, parading, obstacle coursing, shoe shining, shirt folding, ironing, bed making, camping, memorizing, and much more. In short, a grand time.

Overall, I’m pretty pumped to begin this experience. Granted, there’s a healthy fear of the unknown and perpetual pondering if all the preparation I’ve done will be enough, but I think those doubts are all part of the process. I don’t expect it to be a pleasant experience, but I am planning on it being a fulfilling one. Perhaps my attitude is best described in the words of a friend who articulated his own feelings in the run-up to ROTC each and every Friday: “You hate the anticipation of Thursday night, you love the challenge of Friday afternoon.”

As I won’t be permitted to touch a phone or computer, mail would be most welcome:

Cadet Deniston, John, D.
AFROTC FTU 1, FLT L
1650 Luke Street
Ellsworth AFB, SD 57706-4609

The only mail restrictions: no food, no mail sent after 11 June, and please, nothing with an Army or Navy logo on it. I can only do so many push-ups.

More than your postal parcels, though, I’d covet your prayers. This experience is bigger than me.

That said, I hope to talk to you in a month. A brief aside: I received word yesterday that I’ve been hired for a job in Washington, D.C., which unfortunately means I won’t be seeing much of Colorado for the next two months. At least I’ll only be waking up before the sun for one of those months.

I’m diving in, I’m going deep in over my head, I want to be
Caught in the rush, lost in the flow, in over my head, I want to go
The river’s deep, the river’s wide, the river’s water is alive
So sink or swim, I’m diving in
[S.C. Chapman, Dive]

Clan Deniston is expanding.

Despite my repeated assurances that there’s no shame in the single life, my brother, Mike, last night took the plunge with Kayla, the year-long object of his piloting affection, and proposed marriage. Apparently, I was the only one surprised when she accepted (just kidding–but as the little brother, I retain the right to rib).

Indeed, this is a curious crossing of the stars. My brother went to pre-school with Kayla’s older sister, and, as our mother’s would have it, our families have been friends ever since. Some of my earliest memories include games of chase and hide-and-seek at Kayla’s family’s home and later annual dinners with both our families. It’ll be odd to slap the title “sister-in-law” on top of all those years.

The entire proposal episode was covertly documented by a family friend and is available online. Mike was certainly successful in achieving surprise, even if the backdrop was an airport gift shop. It’s a dubya for the Deniston.

Welcome aboard, Kayla.
Heck of a catch, Mike.

32 hours of being awake, 1100 miles of open road, and some hellish gas prices have yielded their promised result: I am home.

In our rubber and road culture, listing driving as a hobby is a bit peculiar… perhaps analogous to including other obvious and universal tasks like dinner and dental cleanings. Odd as it may be, though, I truly love the road trip.

The serenity of our empty Westward frontier–complemented by an occasional soundtrack of the driver’s choice–is incredible. The freedom of cramming one’s Earthly possessions into a four-wheeled voyager and aiming at the discretion of the driver–though a cheap substitute for the true explorers of generations past–is liberating. And the requirement to do nothing but watch and enjoy is intoxicating.

My roommate for the past semester and caravan companion, Adam, joined me for the miles to Colorado en route to his New York home. We stopped for the requisite Vegas-dinner at the newly opened Wynn Las Vegas. While Las Vegas’ newest $2.3 billion addition is impressive–heck, the place has it’s own Ferrari dealership–the sights of our brief self-guided tour didn’t strike me as any more brilliant than the other occupants of The Strip.

My own involvement in this exercise of American absurdity did catch my eye, though: the ridiculous wait encountered in the buffet entry line would have generated damning comment cards had the joint been Country Buffet and the price, equivalent to a tank of gas, was to serve yourself! Then again, bragging rights to eating in a billion-dollar establishment are included free of charge.

The other major excitement on the journey occurred in the miles leading to Green River, Utah. For those uninitiated to this particularly barren section of I-70, some important background: the 40 miles encompassing the eastward charge to Green River are absolutely desolate: some ranch exits, a bit of wildlife, and the descent out of the Rockies. Adam and I were both planning on a fuel stop in Green River and, mutually counting a quarter-tank remaining at the last chance for gas, believed we’d be fine. Not quite.

Apparently, the fuel economy of my fully loaded Accord had degraded more than my math allowed. Expecting to make it to 400 miles and beyond on this tank, I was a little startled when the fuel light came on at 350 miles consumed. Realizing we were still 20 miles from a fill-up, I called my ten-mile-ahead driving partner and casually asked, “You haven’t seen any gas stations, have you?” He replied what we both knew: no gas until Green River. He indicated that he, too, was running quite low, but had reason to believe the station was well within reach.

My next call began, “Adam, someday we’ll laugh about this.” If nothing else, the episode was a marvelous physics object lesson: a fully loaded Accord can coast down a mountain pass at 75 MPH for a solid 8 minutes. The added bonus is that running out of gas means vehicle power-off: no power brakes, no power steering, no more down-shifting. Thankfully dawn was breaking, and though beginning hour 24 of being awake, I was instantly rejuvenated (read: scared spitless) by the steering and braking challenge.

The conclusion of the story is far less riveting than the question of wondering how far I could maintain the speed to coast while withstanding the physics to make the winding turns. The answer, thankfully, was sputtering out for good on a straight-away in cell coverage at the base of the pass. Adam was kind enough to take the mishap with a chuckle and bring me a few precious gallons of gas. Just enough to make it to the station and smartly remark to the attendant, “I think you’ve got a great business opportunity for a station about 10 miles west of here.” 12 hours and some generous and regular fill-ups later, I was home.

Thanks to all who have put up with my scarce updates to this space during the latter weeks of the semester. I look forward to some more regular updates in the next two weeks I’ll enjoy at home… prior to departing for another grand adventure courtesy of the US Air Force.

Yesterday, March 30, was Mark Heinmets’ birthday. He would have been 21. And what a “White Trash Wednesday” it would have been.

Seven months following Mark’s exit from Earth’s stage, the fellowship of friends he impacted is again scattered across the globe. Though time and distance have intervened, it seems as though my own desire to continue to unpack Mark’s legacy is shared by a legion of others. Based on the overflow of his memorial service, perhaps I should have expected it: pages on this site with Mark’s name mentioned are the most visited and those brief thoughts continue to receive dozens of referrals monthly from search engine users. We all miss Mark.

While I want to be very careful not to trivialize Mark’s legacy, I’m also eager to do whatever I can to continue the conversation of his life among those who received his overflow of friendship. Towards such a goal, and admittedly in pursuit of my own resolution in this journey, I’ve recently asked the cheap tricks of the internet for something meaningful in the creation of an online community to continue the conversation, strengthen the connections, and temporally preserve the memories he gave us all. The site is a work in progress and more content is to come, but I wanted to mark this occasion with the launch of this project: one more gift, one more time, for one guy we won’t ever forget.

If you knew Mark, I would covet your partnership in this endeavor. Perhaps you can join me this coming week in blocking off some time to re-discover some memories and re-engage some truths. No, Mark wasn’t a “dot com guy” and he certainly preferred skiing to scrolling, but perhaps in our absence from him and each other, this is a small, simple way to stay in touch, stay processing, and stay celebrating.

If Mark wasn’t a part of your world, please feel welcome to experience this manifestation of his legacy. Mark’s life was spent reaching out; if such fellowship is extended by his absence, perhaps we glimpse his life that is truly living on.

Happy birthday, Mark. Thank you for carving friendships deep enough to withstand the weathering of time.