Sometimes You Have to Stop

So, if anyone is reading this and doesn't know, I'm a Petty Officer Second Class in the United States Navy.

As such, right now, I'm floating around out here, accomplishing precisely fuck all. And sometimes, I look out into the middle of the ocean and just stare.

It's a fairly common practice, I suppose. Some people find the ocean calming, serene. They find something in it. Not me.

The ocean just makes me uncomfortable and angry. I have no fear of water or sinking or drowning or anything like that. I don't get sea sick and I am not a claustrophobe who gets anxious in the ship's enclosed spaces.

I just look out and wonder why. Why are we out here. We aren't accomplishing anything. And not in the war on terror/war on iraq/afghanistan sense. Just in the we are literally doing nothing. The world's supplies of fossil fuels are dwindling, everyone realizes and acknowledges that. It's a nonrenewable resource, and the modern world abuses them like never before. Planes, Trains, automobiles, and yes even mighty warships.

The amount of fuel we consume is staggering, thousands of gallons and we have to refuel at least weekly. Multiply that by the hundreds of active warships out there in the world, a few of which are nuclear, yes. The carriers and submarines are predominantly nuke. But that is it. That leaves thousands of vessels if you include army vessels, patrol boats, and the ilk.

A lot of money and a lot of a precious resource wasted so we can float around and do little more than waste time and money, and waste precious resources.

I won't even take into account the personal strain on families just because of the hundreds of days of senseless seperation we go through a year, but from a fiscal and economically savvy point of view, you have nothing to lose and millions of dollars to gain, not to mention a reduction in consumption, pollution and waste.

But it makes too much sense to leave us in port when we aren't doing an official operation. You gotta train, train, train. Get qualified, participate in the endless cycle of evaluations and exercises that don't serve anyonebut the higher ups who want to put on a few more stars or trade up from a bird to a star.