In the civilian world, waiting feels like hell. Soccer moms throw a fit if they wait more than three people for a coffee, that asshole driving behind you honks if you don’t accelerate sooner than 0.003 seconds after the light turns green, and some teenager out there is claiming that their life is ruined because a selfie is taking too long to upload. God knows what would happen if these same people if they had to wait out an enlistment. It doesn’t matter what position you were, what branch, what rank, what era, or anything like that — if you’ve served, you know the true pain of “hurry up and wait”.
1. Arms room
It finally happened. You’ve left the range and the last thing you have to do is turn your weapon in to the armorer and then you can take your boots off. The entire platoon is ready, they cleaned their rifles for the last of many times that day, and they stack on the tiny window to give it to the armorer.
Aaaaaaaaand now it’s time to wait for the armorer to get their ass up from playing Call of Duty doing whatever they were doing to come open the arms room. Bonus points if they have a drink or snack that they picked up at the shoppette while they were on their way.
2. Close of business meetings
At the end of every military day, officers and NCOs gather to talk about what happened that day and plot out what they will do the next day. To the uninformed lower enlisted who’s waiting on the sidelines, the pain is just as excruciating for everyone in the meeting except for the Gung Ho PowerPoint Ranger.
The lower enlisted wait on their cellphones that have a sliver of battery left and the NCOs nod off listening to how whatever will “improve combat readiness.” Then, the officers wait their turn to say, “Yep. Things are good on my end. Let’s get out of here.”
3. Convoy Ops out of anywhere
It’s probably for the best that the actual SP (Start Point; when the convoy heads out) time is kept on a need-to-know basis.
Every single time: Troops wake up at 0200, arms room by 0300, leave the arms room at 0600 (because #5.), meet at the motor pool at 0630, and then… Sunrise… Eventually, you realize it’s almost lunch time and the vehicles are still lined up to leave.
4. Getting any paperwork done
Swinging by S-1 to get that one award you told them twelve times to add to your record is a pain.
Swinging by the civilian office to get that divorce paperwork finalized after you’ve told them twelve times to remove it from your record is a nightmare.
5. Literally any kind of ceremony
Oh, cool. Your commander’s commander got an “Attaboy” award for existing that is more prestigious than any award you brag about. Nothing builds genuine support for the commander’s commander like waking 300 troops up at 0200 to stand in formation for seven hours to hear about how great that person’s “Good Idea Fairy” was for three hours. Good going, sir! You’re being awarded for improving morale. Look how high morale is after ten hours of hearing how awesome you are…
If it’s a change of command ceremony, you can tell immediately what kind of leader you’re getting by if they keep their word after uttering the phrase, “Alright, I’ll keep this brief…”
*Bonus* Just… everything before deploying
This is the catch-all for all of the waits you’ll endure before deploying. Finance? Sixish hours. Dental? Eightish hours. Medical? Tenish hours. Central Issuing Facility? All day. Waiting to get that one signature from that one office that’s only open for four hours a week for some reason and only half an hour each day? An eternity.
