I joined the U.S. Coast Guard right out of high school, as one does. At least as one does if your father is a tax cheat and you don’t want his lies about his income on your financial aid forms. So while every student in my New Jersey high school class went to college in one form or another, I and one other senior joined the military. (We weren’t friends, he was kind of an asshole and I heard he joined the Marines.)
