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Published On: Jul 15, 2008 11:16 PM
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Published On: Jul 15, 2008 11:16 PM
Boom! Boom!
So I'm lying here on my bed, watching Doctor Who
(the really creepy ones set in World War II where the little kid and all the
other people wander around in gasmasks saying "Are you my Mummy?") and suddenly
I hear booms, off in the distance and getting closer.
War has changed me. I know I talk about this way too often, but it suddenly occurs to me that this is the fifth anniversary of the day I first arrived in Iraq. What better time to look back on everything?
On June 9th, 2003, I flew from the APOD at Camp Wolf, Kuwait, to Balad Iraq. We walked off the airplane and slept on the floor of an old diplomatic terminal building, less than two miles from where I'm lying right now, but millions of miles away in every other sense.
We had no showers and only wooden outhouses. There were air conditioning units in place, but they weren't hooked up (we found out why when we tried hooking them up and fried the generator).
Now I'm lying in a trailer with shower and toilet, a refrigerator, television, and DVD player. I have an antenna on the roof which collects 10 or so satellite stations from a nearby tower. I have cell phone service, should I choose to use it.
The next morning we rode by convoy up to Tikrit. I was assisted by a Lieutenant Colonel in getting on the convoy. We would stop by the side of the road for piss breaks. We rode into downtown Tikrit, and stopped for rotisserie chicken and ice from little shops.
Now I'm forbidden to travel by road, or even leave this base from the time I arrive until it's time to leave. Convoys certainly don't stop like that, and IED's make such travel extremely dangerous. I have been told that Lieutenant Colonel is dead, victim of a helicopter accident at Fort Hood.
We thought the war would end soon, then. Now we don't know when it will end, if ever.
This is bumming me out, ya'll. Sorry. I'll close off that part by saying that then, I had 4 more deployments in the future. Now, so far as i can tell, I have no deployments left to do.
Dr. Who's over, and the rocket attack is long since over. It's high time for me to hightail it off to bed.
War has changed me. I know I talk about this way too often, but it suddenly occurs to me that this is the fifth anniversary of the day I first arrived in Iraq. What better time to look back on everything?
On June 9th, 2003, I flew from the APOD at Camp Wolf, Kuwait, to Balad Iraq. We walked off the airplane and slept on the floor of an old diplomatic terminal building, less than two miles from where I'm lying right now, but millions of miles away in every other sense.
We had no showers and only wooden outhouses. There were air conditioning units in place, but they weren't hooked up (we found out why when we tried hooking them up and fried the generator).
Now I'm lying in a trailer with shower and toilet, a refrigerator, television, and DVD player. I have an antenna on the roof which collects 10 or so satellite stations from a nearby tower. I have cell phone service, should I choose to use it.
The next morning we rode by convoy up to Tikrit. I was assisted by a Lieutenant Colonel in getting on the convoy. We would stop by the side of the road for piss breaks. We rode into downtown Tikrit, and stopped for rotisserie chicken and ice from little shops.
Now I'm forbidden to travel by road, or even leave this base from the time I arrive until it's time to leave. Convoys certainly don't stop like that, and IED's make such travel extremely dangerous. I have been told that Lieutenant Colonel is dead, victim of a helicopter accident at Fort Hood.
We thought the war would end soon, then. Now we don't know when it will end, if ever.
This is bumming me out, ya'll. Sorry. I'll close off that part by saying that then, I had 4 more deployments in the future. Now, so far as i can tell, I have no deployments left to do.
Dr. Who's over, and the rocket attack is long since over. It's high time for me to hightail it off to bed.
Posted: Mon - June 9, 2008 at 02:57 PM |
