JAN 2024 - Officer Candidate School with the USCG

in

Officer School Process,

  1. Meet the coolest people ever at airshows, talk to flight crews and personnel. Get inspired, do the research.

  2. Find a recruiter

  3. Start your packet

  4. Get letters of recommendation from mentors, peers, and so on.

  5. Volunteer!!! Make friends in your communities of interest, give back when you can and be a good member.

  6. Put together your resume, tailor it. Find a mentor, have them review it.

  7. Once you’ve put together a draft packet, write your personal narrative. I personally recommend doing that last. You want your packet to work cohesively and tell a story. Your narrative is where you bring everything together and elaborate on it.

  8. Practice for your interview. As yourself some serious questions, because they certainly will. Why the Coast Guard? Why an officer and not enlisted? What makes you think you want to lead?

  9. Wait for the results.

  10. If at first you don’t succeed… try again! Your board will give feedback, take it and apply it for next time.

Best of luck!!

Hello friends,

Let’s catch up. I’ve been working over the past two years to complete my private pilot’s certificate with the intention of applying for military officer programs. I’m very excited to share this journey with you. Please let me know what questions you have about the process, as I am more than happy to share my knowledge.

The Truth About Becoming a Pilot.

in

It’s exhausting, defeating, and expensive.

Like many rewarding things in life, waking up everyday and making the choice to pursue flying is challenging. You really, REALLY have to want it, because you’ll have to make sacrifices to get it done. You’ll go broke before you get rich, and you’ll have days where you don’t want to make the drive to the airport because the debt, the stress, and the feelings of self-doubt will be lingering in your mind. When your friends and family introduce you as a pilot, you might feel some mixed emotions about the title, because you know the community doesn’t see you as fully fledged yet. You’re working odd hours and jobs you don’t like. You’re getting support from people and maybe that makes you uncomfortable to lean on them. You’re just trying to make ends meet like a lot of people, and know you aren’t special nor entitled. You’re doing your best with what you have and working hard.

It’s empowering, validating, and solidifying.

As soon as you walk up to your plane, you feel good. You know your routines, the checklists, the weather. Even if you weren’t feeling it on the way there, suddenly all that stress melts away because you get to leave it behind on the pavement. Those wings give you freedom, give you focus, make you feel on top of the world… even if you’re only a few thousand feet in the air. You’ve got everything down to muscle memory and your landings are soft and smooth. Your instructor is just a passenger at this point, and you’re ready for check-ride. It feels real. Once the nerves pass and you hit that 50, 100, 250 hour mark, you can hardly believe it. Flying over the coast, cloud surfing, seeing the most beautiful sunrises and sunsets. Sharing all of it with loved ones and friends. It’s such a privilege. The community you’ve grown to know over the years is so incredibly supportive. The most unsuspecting people you’ve met along the way have helped guide you, are your mentors, are your friends. Aviation connects and inspires in a way that nothing else can, because we rally around our own. An aviator is family. You belong.

photo by Jordan Li

New spot in the Ancient City

Hey friends!

Long time no see. :) As a lot of you know, I recently made some big changes in my life and moved to Florida! The weather is great and I’m surrounded by some wonderful folks.

With life changes come new opportunities. I’m very excited to announce that my work is now available locally in St. Augustine! If you’re in the area, you can find a selection of local artisan works at First Look Artisans Market near downtown. There are a lot of talented artisans who have set up shop, and I’m proud to be included among them. :)

Come by and check it out!

https://www.firstlookartisans.com

162 San Marco Ave, St. Augustine, FL

CBS 42 Birmingham Video

in

Good morning, friends!

I made it onto the local news recently thanks to my partnership with Printful and the support of you all, so I wanted to post a link to the news story. The link features a brief segment and a short video clip. Check it out!

Samantha Davis is training to become a pilot and currently has around 25 flight hours under her belt. Her mother’s career at NASA first inspired her to look up to the skies and after she started attending airshows in college, she decided she wanted to learn how to fly. 

However, she noticed a lack of fashionable, aviation-inspired clothing designed for women and launched her own clothing line.

Through a partnership with Printful, Davis started Blue Skies Apparel in the hopes of helping women feel inspired in a male-dominated industry.

- Ariana Garza, CBS 42 Birmingham

A Fresh Look for 2020

The last few years have been a little crazy.

If you’ve followed my journey, you’ll know that I went from being a business student interning at a Software and Systems Engineering firm in a tech city, to becoming a lead Aircraft Paint Scheme Designer in the middle of the country. What a leap of faith that was!

Many of you know me from the airshow and fly-in scenes as a scheme designer, campfire comedian, and student pilot. Even more of you who’ve known me since childhood know me as an artsy, awkward geek who loves to create and work with my hands.

For those who don’t know me, let me introduce myself. I’m Sammy! I’m an animal-loving millennial who enjoys the simpler things in life and surrounding myself with amazing people. You can catch me bicycling around the local airport, sketching at a museum, camping at a backcountry fly-in, or even in the water on the occasional scuba trip! Documenting these adventures is part of the fun, and I hope you’ll come along for the ride! I’ve made a lot of great friends through my travels, and hopefully I can get to know some of you, too!

Now, with that out of the way, I’d like to announce that I will be combining all of my media platforms onto this one site… if you hadn’t realized that already. Ha. My old sites, STRNFIVE.com and Empyart.com, will no longer be active, and my body of work will now be represented here. There are quite a few reasons for this change, the main reason being that I’d like to make my different creative outlets work to complement each other, instead of compete with each other. This site will be the nexus for all of my bodies of work, including this journal, my shop, and my comprehensive art portfolio.

As for my social media, I will be combining my two accounts into one. If you are following my @strnfive Instagram account, please know that I will be deleting this account and posting all new works onto my main account, which I’ve rebranded to @brushpilotsammy. I’m also combining my Facebook pages to a page of the same name.

Anyway, thanks for visiting the site and taking a moment to catch up on everything. I appreciate you guys very much, and look forward to creating some new content for 2020.