Photo By Sgt. Danielle Rodrigues | Pfc. Darryl Garner, a native of Belleville, Ill., and the driver and administrative...... read more read more
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FORT STEWART, Ga. -- Pfc. Darryl Garner, a native of Belleville, Ill, and the driver and administrative assistant for the command team of the 26th Brigade Support Battalion “Challengers,” 2nd Armored Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, became the 3rd ID Soldier of the Year here, March 26.
While competition was stiff at the Division Board, Garner stood out above everyone else as an example of what a Soldier should be.
Garner’s win seems to be just one more step in a path that will lead to an illustrious and exemplary career. However, to be able to see which direction a path leads, you need to know where the path originated.
In this instance, Garner’s current path began with his familial up bringing. Garner was raised by his single mother, and grew up with 3 other siblings, an older brother and a younger sister and brother.
“There were always challenges, but I like to focus on the positive,” explained Garner.
The biggest positive aspect Garner had to focus on in his younger years seems to be the positive role model he had in his mother. Even at his current young age of 23, Garner has the maturity to understand how large a role his mother played in his life.
“Growing up my mother always told me, ‘You are going to be somebody,’” Garner said. “She always put the motivation, purpose and direction into me to never give up, never quit.”
It was this drive that was instilled in Garner that saw him through the more difficult times he had in store for himself after graduating high school.
Eager to make something of himself, Garner enrolled in college. However his mother had to follow a job in Texas, and soon after he found himself struggling to make ends meet.
“I was working three jobs, trying to go to school, staying in my own apartment -- I was having a really difficult time finding ways to maintain that,” said Garner.
Garner had set the bar high for himself from the very beginning, as he had fostered aspirations of holding political office at the national level. Due to his fierce determination, failure simply was not an option.
“I didn’t want to be a bum, or a nobody -- I wanted to be somebody,” Garner said.
Sheer determination only gets a person so far though, and something had to change. His grades started to slip, so he quit a job to make more time for his studies, which in turn caused him to begin having difficulties making rent.
It was a vicious circle he found himself in; one that did not seem to be about to let up.
“It got to the point where I knew I couldn’t do it anymore -- I knew I had to find another way,” Garner said.
That’s when Garner turned to enlistment in the Army as a lesser of two evils. Despite it not being his first option, soon after enlisting, his outlook on the Army began to change.
“At first [my enlistment] was just a means to an end; a way to finish school and get me in to politics,” Garner explained. “Now I think it was one of the best decisions I ever made.”
Indeed it does seem to have been a good decision for Garner. With a little less than a year here at Fort Stewart, he has impressed many. He has been selected as the command driver for his battalion, a role in which he competed with numerous Soldiers for. He has also been submitted to higher for early promotion to Specialist, and has won every board he has been to, to include his battalion, brigade, and division quarterly boards, as well as his most recent victory at the Division Soldier of the Year board.
“Garner is one of those Soldiers that you only see in every 20,000,” said Command Sgt. Maj. Richard Harris, senior enlisted leader of the 2th BSB. “In Garner you find a Soldier in which there seems to be no limit to what he can accomplish; he achieves everything he sets his mind to.”
Despite all this Garner seems to have kept a level head, and a clear eye set to the future.
“I’m not perfect, I make mistakes … [but] I continue to work hard and strive to better myself,” said Garner.
In fact, always striving for more, Garner continues to grow as a Soldier and a man, and his aspirations have grown as well.
“I did not look at the Army as a career before I came in, it was just a stair-step for me to get where I wanted to go, but since I’ve joined I’ve grown to love the Army, and plan on staying in,” Garner said.
Garner intends to kill two birds with one stone, by putting in a packet to participate in the Army’s Green to Gold program. The Army’s Green to Gold program is an opportunity for enlisted Soldiers to go to college and earn a degree on a full scholarship, with the promise of commissioning as an officer upon graduation.
If selected as a Green to Gold participant, Garner would be able to finish his degree, and also have a promising career as an officer to look forward to. This, in theory, would be even more of helpful in paving his way into the national political scene.
“Garner has goals and dreams of becoming an officer and being a congressman, and never in my 30-year career have I seen a Soldier more suited to advancement like that,” said Harris. “The only thing though is that I’ve had to tell him ‘I think even [those goals] are a little low for someone of your potential, aim higher.’”
In the meantime though, Garner has not taken his most recent success as a reason to become complacent. He continues to study and work had. He has also made a personal goal of trying to set the example for other young Soldiers.
“I feel it’s easy to progress in the Army, just extend a little bit of effort and you’ll move up,” Garner said. “I want to show my peers you don’t have to just sit back and take what comes to you -- you can go out and get it.”
Ultimately though, Garner continues to live his life by one simple principle, one that he learned long before the Army, yet has only been affirmed and reinforced since joining.
“We control our own destiny,” Garner explained. “This was ingrained into me as a child, and it still holds true even in the Army. We can achieve whatever we want to, if we put our minds to it.”
| Date Taken: | 03.31.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 12.09.2014 19:05 |
| Story ID: | 149869 |
| Location: | FORT STEWART, GEORGIA, US |
| Hometown: | BELLEVILLE, ILLINOIS, US |
| Web Views: | 30 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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