<p>Our cadet told me during his phone call on Doolie Day out that I should feel free to write more than one card/letter per day--So I started to send cartoons, news articles and anything else I could think of so he would have extra mail during mail call. We also asked his friends and relatives to send cards and letters. </p>
<p>I kept all of the letters he sent home during BCT and am including them in his scrapbook for gradauation in 74 days.<br>
We have the pleasure of hosting my son and several other cadets who are in town to cheer the basketball team on. Several are friends from BCT, and I'm sure they will be life long friends. What ties them together is the shared experiences of that first summer. It's fun to listen to them at the table as they remember people and things that happened.</p>
<p>I started writing to my Basic before he ever left for BCT and started mailing so the letters would be there at first mail call. Those were some of the hardest letters to write, pre-leaving.</p>
<p>I still write notes, send newspaper clippings from home, comics from the paper, books his father reads and passes on as they are both avid readers, a few packages a month with cookies, brownies, whatever.......</p>
<p>And, I, too, have every letter written to us from BCT. I read those letters again about a month ago for the first time in a year. No dry eyes here. What truly amazed me, looking back to those BCT letters, never, not once, was there written one word of regret, negativity or desire to leave. I continually stay amazed at all these cadets and all of the parents will take that roller coaster ride with them.</p>
<p>Usafamom, just a slight correction, but every good four degree knows that there are 77 days until graduation for the Class of 2008. ;)</p>
<p>I know a couple people in my squad who are borderline commissionable because of medical issues. Both of them have the brains and passion, but they had some bad luck/weird situations. This is not that common though. DoDMERB does a fairly good job at screening people with serious medical problems...as much as I hate that process, I am glad that fewer people have to suffer through becomming medically DQed as cadets.</p>
<p>I'll admit that I did not write much during BCT. Writing would normally have taken the place of chapel services or sleep--both of which I highly valued during BCT.</p>