The last of the days

  And so the time has come when the final Monday of my summer at the USNA is upon me.  On Friday I had my mentor sign my paperwork to be sent off to my graduate advisor.  As we totaled everything up, my final hours will be somewhere just over the 300 mark.  I only needed 65 for my 3-credit class.  "Oh my soul!" Julia Beth exclaimed when her calculator showed her the number.  God bless her heart, she is one of the kindest people I've ever met.  She is too good to be working for the asshole of a director who did a fine job ruining everyone's week.  "300! 300! Why didn't you take more time for yourself! 300! You spent too much time here! 300!"  She makes me laugh, but she also makes my heart melt because she cares too much about other people.  I explained to her that it didn't feel like 300 hours.  It felt like 3 hours.  Time has ZOOMED by in the minutes I spent learning, laughing, running around, meeting people, and feeling exhilarated and absorbed in everything international.
   I have seen 3 of the 18 international Plebes since their summer training began. The Kazakhstani had issues with his paperwork so I was able to talk with him briefly.  He was still smiling his goofy smile. I passed the boy from Singapore doing a PT run as I walked to my car after work one day.  "Yay John!" I yelled.  "Thank you miss!" he yelled back and gave me a thumbs up.  And I said hello and gave some quick words of encouragement in an unfortunate situation to one of the Gabonese Plebes.  He had mistakenly eaten pork, which is against his Muslim religion, and asked to have access to his personal belongs to cleanse himself.  Upon receiving his belongings, his detailers saw that he was in possession of an illegal narcotic which is commonly used in Gabon as a method of cleansing.  Fortunately our director handled the situation and he came to understand he could not have this.
   Otherwise things have been relatively calm.  I have completely turned over the orientation I planned for August when the semester exchange international cadets arrive to the 2nd LT.  I have a lot of pride in this for all the hard work I did and I so badly want to be a part of it, but I know he will do a phenomenal job.  Our first midshipmen studying abroad have departed.  They are at the Chilean Naval Academy.  I had the opportunity to dust off my Spanish with several phone calls to the CNA one afternoon when the boys were stranded at their hotel 3 hours after they were to be picked up.  Successfully, I was able to speak with someone in Spanish and sort out the logistics.  That was quite an accomplished feeling!