Here's a depiction of me as a new U.S. Military recruit of the early 1980's.
TBH, unlike most of the other recruits, I actually enjoyed bootcamp.
Why?
Because nothing in bootcamp came close to the fear, paranoia, fatigue, hunger and other miseries I experienced as a teenage runaway living on the streets.
Instead of playing that dangerous game of survival hide-n-seek (a chaotic lose/lose game with no set of standard rules) on the streets of Southern Florida, from day one in bootcamp, I was guaranteed food, a rack, dedicated sleep time and knowing specifically how to play this new game successfully; mainly because the rules were already written down and applied to everyone.
Just by quietly observing, quickly following simple orders, learning as much as I could about military structure and of course, keeping my nose clean, I graduated as the Honor Recruit of the Honor company and given an instant, early promotion.
That began a military career spanning close to two and a half decades; culminating with retirement at full pension+.
That's because every year that I served beyond 20 slightly increased the base of the "perpetual until death" retirement benefits.
Submitted FYI.
Enjoy the Original Art.
Hope you and yours are well and loving life today.
In Lak'ech, JaiChai
*A rare, signed, higher resolution and non-watermarked NFT version of "Recruit" is available for download at:
https://creary.net/digitalart/@jaichai/jaichai-recruit-plus-original-portrait-art-of-the
(JaiChai 16 Jul 2022. Simultaneous multi-site submissions posted. All rights reserved.)