![\"U..S.](\"https:\/\/www.thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Miranda-Barnes-feature-story-photo-6-2014.jpg\")
<\/a>The former Bearcat cheerleader left the small-town life behind for an adventure on the open seas, stationed aboard one of the Navy\u2019s biggest ships: the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan<\/i>.<\/p>\n
It was culture shock, to say the least.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s gigantic,\u201d Barnes said of the size of the Navy aircraft carrier. \u201cIt\u2019s pretty much like a small city. We have more people on the boat than I have in my hometown. With a full crew on board, we have over five thousand people.\u201d<\/p>\n
Currently docked in San Diego, California, Barnes serves as a fireman on the ship, but that doesn\u2019t necessarily mean she\u2019s putting out fires every day.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe actually do maintenance on the equipment we have,\u201d Barnes said, adding that her squad performs a variety of drills during the day, including fire drills, flooding drills and toxic gas drills.<\/p>\n
\u201cBasically, if the ship would ever go down, we have been trained to save the ship,\u201d she said, adding, \u201cI really do like what I\u2019m doing. It\u2019s interesting, and people don\u2019t realize there\u2019s so much more to firefighting than just putting water on a fire.\u201d<\/p>\n
And speaking of putting out fires, she had to do some of that with her parents when she dropped the bombshell that she was leaving The Ohio State University behind to join the Navy.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy dad did a lot of talking to me then, and let me know that once I signed my name that there was no backing out,\u201d she said. \u201cI think he was a little upset to lose his baby girl.\u201d<\/p>\n
But any initial hesitations are now a distant memory, and she\u2019s both happy and proud about her decision to serve her country.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll admit when I first got here, I wasn\u2019t sure if I made the right choice,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s a completely different environment than what I was used to for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n
After a year and a half of college, Barnes wanted something different. She wasn\u2019t sure what that meant at the time, but she knew she wanted to see the world. She\u2019ll have plenty of opportunities to do just that when she sets sail for Hawaii later this year. Next year, she\u2019ll travel even farther from home when the USS Reagan<\/i> sets its anchor in Japan.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll be stationed there in 2015, and I\u2019m really looking forward to that,\u201d Barnes said.<\/p>\n
Eighteen months into a four-year commitment, Barnes is unsure if she\u2019ll make the U.S. Navy her career choice, but she\u2019s happy to be gaining valuable life experiences she wouldn\u2019t have had otherwise.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wasn\u2019t looking to get away from Spencerville, but I was looking to see the world, and the Navy has given me those opportunities,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019ve been able to work with people from different ethnicities and different backgrounds, and it\u2019s been a real learning experience for me.\u201d<\/p>\n
As was the first time Barnes got \u201cunderway,\u201d the term the Navy uses when a ship has pulled out of port and is out to sea. For Barnes, it was a moment to face a fear she\u2019s had since she was a child.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt sounds super weird, I know, but I had a really big fear of the water, so I knew I had to face my fears and overcome them,\u201d Barnes said, adding that, while she was extremely anxious the first couple trips to sea, she\u2019s now completely at ease when the ship pulls up anchor.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve probably been underway eight or nine times now, and you just get kind of used to it,\u201d she noted. \u201cIt\u2019s just so calm and peaceful when you\u2019re out there. You can feel the ship rocking, but it\u2019s just something you get accustomed to.\u201d<\/p>\n
During her first 18 months, Barnes was able to come home once, but those trips will become more difficult once she\u2019s stationed in Japan. She\u2019s not quite sure how she feels about that.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s going to be a lot more expensive to come home, so I\u2019m not sure how much I\u2019ll get to do that once I\u2019m over there,\u201d she said, adding that it\u2019s also something that weighs heavily on the minds of her parents, Tim and Stacie Barnes.<\/p>\n
\u201cActually, my mom was okay when I joined; she wanted to join the military when she was younger but she ended up having kids,\u201d Barnes explained. \u201cMy dad was more upset because I\u2019m the youngest girl in the family, but they\u2019re both extremely supportive of my decision.\u201d<\/p>\n
While in San Diego, Barnes stays in barracks located just 15 minutes from the ship. Although she hasn\u2019t gotten to explore the city much, she\u2019s looking forward to doing more of that.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe beach is my favorite thing here,\u201d she said, adding, \u201cany time I have free time, that\u2019s where I\u2019m at.\u201d<\/p>\n
Free time, though, is hard to come by. When the ship is underway, Barnes works 15-to-16-hour days, seven days a week. It\u2019s times like that, Barnes said, when she really has to dig in and think about why she\u2019s there.<\/p>\n
\u201cI do miss home, but I\u2019m getting used to it now,\u201d she said. \u201cBut I knew I was jumping in with both feet, and I\u2019m getting so many life experiences and it\u2019s taught me the responsibilities of being an adult. I\u2019m proud of what I do. I really am.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
CINDY WOOD\/independent feature writer So what\u2019s a small-town girl from Spencerville do to conquer her fear of water? Well, if you\u2019re Miranda Barnes, you join the United States Navy. The former Bearcat cheerleader left the small-town life behind for an adventure on the open seas, stationed aboard one of the Navy\u2019s biggest ships: the aircraft […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-19 16:18:15","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52346\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}