Andre Douglas

Well, I think it was amazing, but we were all called into Maker's office.

That's our chief, and he said, hey, come on in.

There was a few of us in person, and then there was a few online, and basically said, hey, you guys are assigned as a crew, and it was nice to have people there and talk about it and kind of give some hugs and some handshakes, and it was really nice, I would say, just very nice.

I kind of anticipated that it might come, so I wasn't too shocked, but I was still kind of like, oh, this is nice to have with the crew to get it all at once.

So that was really, really nice.

And I think for me, for the Coast Guard, my parents served in the Coast Guard.

So my dad was in the in the Coast Guard.

And then my mom, she was in the Marine Corps, the Army and the Air Force at different points.

Yeah.

At one point she was Air Force cadet and then she did the reserves for the Army and taught nursing there.

And then she was in the Marine Corps.

She got her scholarship with Penn State and went enlisted and everything.

So she did all of that.

And I remember as a kid, she used to take me to all of her nursing courses across the country.

And then, you know, growing up with my dad and having him go off to duty and just serve and not be there, like this concept of service was just kind of permeating throughout my life.

And so for me, you know, when it comes to serving in the Coast Guard, I thought, man, being in service, but for humanity, right?

Humanitarian service.

The Coast Guard was what I chose.

I thought about Air Force, thought about all the other services, and they're great, too.

But the Coast Guard was like, hey, let's go save some lives.