{"id":39371,"date":"2014-01-19T08:22:18","date_gmt":"2014-01-19T13:22:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=39371"},"modified":"2014-01-19T08:22:59","modified_gmt":"2014-01-19T13:22:59","slug":"sgt-steven-lyzenga-52-year-old-basic-trainee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=39371","title":{"rendered":"Sgt. Steven Lyzenga; 52-year-old basic trainee"},"content":{"rendered":"

Beretverde sends us a link to an article from the Waynesville, North Carolina Daily Guide<\/a> about SGT Steven Lyzenga who began his military career in 1981 as a Marine, then transferred to the Air Force to be a pilot and now he’s in basic training at Fort Leonardwood as a soldier;<\/p>\n

“I wanted to finish my term as a guardian of freedom. I am concerned with what is going on with terrorism. Before I got too old, I wanted to do my duty \u2014 and finish my 20,” Lyzenga said.<\/p>\n

“Personally, doing this at 52, I’m raising all kinds of eyebrows. I don’t know if a fighter pilot, or a major for that matter, has ever gone through basic training. I’m still scratching my head a little bit \u2014 wondering why I am here,” he said.<\/p>\n

His road to the Army began when somebody challenged him to finish his time in the military.<\/p>\n

“I said, ‘No. I’m too old.’ Then, I ended up in the Air Force recruiter’s office where they told me I was too old to fly. I prayed about it. Then, the Army recruiter said I could go in as enlisted, but retire at my highest rank. So, the door was opened and we prayed about it some more. The answer was keep walking forward as long as the door stayed open. It was a year-long process for me. It wasn’t easy, but every door stayed open, so I kept walking through it,” Lyzenga said. “I’ve traded in my F-16 for an M16.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But, even better than shooting a rifle has been the fellowship he has felt being back in the military.<\/p>\n

“It’s been a good experience. I love the camaraderie. In my Christian humanitarian work with the church, and now I’m a Christian business owner, even in the midst of both of those, I missed the camaraderie that came from my military service. Even with these young adults,” Lyzenga said. “They are all here to grow up and become adults. I came here to stay young and feel like a kid again.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Much luck, SGT.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Beretverde sends us a link to an article from the Waynesville, North Carolina Daily Guide about … Sgt. Steven Lyzenga; 52-year-old basic trainee<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[130],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-real-soldiers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39371"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39371\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}