SGT Alyssa Vasquez's Journal

SGT Alyssa Vasquez is with the 105th Personnel Company, Tennessee Army National Guard.

People join the military for different reasons. Some join the Marines for the uniform, the Navy to be at sea or the Air Force to fly, but I chose a part of the Army. The Army is a unique branch of service because there are three different internal branches of the Army: the United States Army, the United States Army Reserves and the Army National Guard. Each of these internal branches has its own unique features, and the three combine to make the United States Army the largest service branch within the Department of Defense.

When I was 16, I started speaking with recruiters from each branch of the military. I grew up with a single mom raising three young girls, and being an ambitious young lady, I decided it was in my best interest to find a way to pay for school myself. I made decent grades, played sports, did plenty of community service and could easily have gone to a community college. However, I never felt that was the life for me. I needed to pave my own road, and I knew the National Guard was the way to do it.

I pleaded with my mom at the age of 16 to sign the papers allowing me to enlist. I explained to her all the benefits of the National Guard: tuition assistance, bonuses, the Montgomery GI Bill, job experience and more. After a few hours of persuasion, my mother agreed the National Guard was a good choice for me, and she signed her name, allowing me to enlist on my 17th birthday.

A few months later I graduated from high school and went to Basic Combat Training (BCT). Basic Training came naturally to me. I remember walking with my rifle on long road marches thinking, “There isn’t anywhere in the world I would rather be.” Advanced Individual Training (AIT) followed Basic. At AIT I learned how to be a Human Resources Specialist. I graduated and was in Recruiting school within seven months.

I loved the National Guard so much that I wanted to share it with everyone. I spent a few years recruiting young people like myself to join the National Guard. The more time I spent in the Guard, the more I realized that people join the military for many different reasons: adventure, money, education and training. When the time came for me to make the decision to stay in the National Guard or take what I had learned and move on, I decided to stay in for one more year while I figured out what I wanted to do. In that year, I ended up on a voluntary deployment to Iraq.

It was not until I found myself in another country, with thousands of people who all believed in one common cause, that I realized why I belonged in the National Guard. I joined the Guard because of what I wanted from it, but I stayed in the National Guard because I found a home in my fellow Soldiers. Finding that home gave me the strength to want to give back to my community, country and comrades. Serving in the military unites Soldiers. It is a powerful bond that is unbroken, and I am eternally grateful I had the honor of standing beside my fellow Army National Guard Soldiers when I was needed. Citizens join the National Guard, and Soldiers stay.