Operation Proper Exit Link

Here are links to videos posted about the Operation Proper Exit that I wrote
about in May:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkrDP8jl81c
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XE9NjPDHNo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKDyF411DIE

Just still so moving.

Long overdue...

19 MAY 2010

I have a new interesting pastime. Bug watching. Why? No particular reason other than perhaps an overabundance of time at inconvenient hours. That, compounded with pure and simple dedication and hard work, makes them currently interesting to me. As I type, there's an ant carrying a dead bug about one and a half times bigger than it. He has constantly met with struggles, yet her perseveres. Can't make it up over that stone? Go ahead a little further. Can't climb that rock? Try a different route. Weeds in the way? Though it may be farther, up and over.

And now a bird has stolen one of my hard working bug friends and eaten him. Ah, the circle of life.

29 MAY 2010

I have reached that comfortable point on deployment. I'm about halfway through, I've got a routine, I'm present in the moment. This is fantastic for being deployed (and those people here) and less fantastic for those who aren't with me. Once you're here and settled, it's just easier to lessen communication with those not present. I think this is true of many places, but maybe especially here. There are certain things I can't talk about, there are certain things I don't want to talk about, and there are certain things that people don't want to hear about.

And here's the even more dangerous part. I fit here. I want to come back. I'm just over halfway through, and already thinking about and wanting to come back. I know what I'm doing and I think I do it pretty effectively. This is different than so many opportunities I've had in my life or will have in my life. I don't know what all this means yet, but I do know that when I wasn't here I missed it, and I didn't really remember or realize how much until I came back. Anyone of you who has heard me talk about my previous deployments can probably attest to the frustrations and joys but ultimate love that comes with deployment for me. I often wish I was a better storyteller so as to truly paint a picture of what this experience can do for a person, but alas, I am not and cannot. I try, however, to use what I've been given to portray as much as possible.

So where does that leave me? My family? Friends? Life? I haven't figured that out yet; I'm just writing from the heart. I need to do (or feel like I'm doing) good in the world in order to be fulfilled. There is no room for complacency in my life.

1 JULY 2010

I am SO done with water. Water bottles, hydration, bleck.

2 JULY 2010 Frustrations and good feelings

I have been inundated with some awful messages the past couple of nights. Not awful in content, just awful in the stretching of our limits of emergencies. Frustrations galore. Non-emergencies in abundance. It's obvious that there's a drawdown happening in Iraq and an attempt at the abuse of our system by families who want their service members home as quickly as possible.

I've also been thanked three times over the phone tonight for what I do (atypical)--and offered dinner if ever the service member that I assisted is in Balad. There's such a strange balance to life here.

Two in One Day?

May 11, 2010

 

Today I sat in a crowd of people, sleep deprived and teary eyed, and stared at ten men in wonder and awe and later was able to shake their hands as THEY thanked ME for being here. What an honor to be in the same room as these men. What courage they have. You may ask why I'm having this reaction. Three words: Operation Proper Exit.

 

For those of you who are unaware of the meaning behind those three words, I'll explain a little further. I first heard of this program via an AFN commercial (hooah!), thought it was wonderful and a little scary, and never thought much beyond that (funny how one can completely tune out AFN commercials unless the word "Iraq" is used). Anyways, this is a closure program for wounded warriors.

 

I had employed Kirsten to attend with me because I didn't know how emotional it would be. Who wants to be a sobbing basket case by herself, after all? I am happy to report that, though I got teary eyed on a few occasions, I did not once cry. All of the credit for that can be placed on the ten, though. There was not one ounce of self-pity apparent to anyone in the crowd, just a concern for and dedication to fellow service members and the mission.  They very matter-of-factly handed out information and threw in a little bit of comedy tour, too.

 

I watched each of the ten men stand individually and tell what had caused their physical injuries. Some looked physically normal and were (one will be returning to combat, probably in Afghanistan, soon), while others had lost various body parts, whether hands, legs, arms, or eyes. A few had been in comas for extended periods of time while their bodies healed. One told us that his parents were told that their son may never wake up from his coma, and if he did he'd never walk or talk again. Another's life sounded like a country song: woke up from a coma and his mama told him he lost his left arm and leg, his wife left him, and his dog had died. Someone else has had 66 surgeries thus far and has had to be reconstructed basically from head to toe, and is now enjoying the civilian world, getting an education, and wishing he could be back on the front lines. One had been through Balad before, though he didn't remember because of his injuries. When he returned this week the hospital showed him pictures of his innards from when he was med-evaced into and out of Balad.

 

All spoke about wishing they could have continued their mission, coming back to Iraq to keep promises to their troops, or the vast improvements that they have seen in the efforts in Iraq since they were last here. They spoke of patriotism, the love of their work, and faith. They thanked and encouraged those service members who are still here fighting for a cause that they feel justifies their missing limbs.

 

The floor was opened for questions and then the funny and down-to-earth heroes began talking about the real issues that the military is facing currently, not just physical ailments but especially mental ones: PTSD, suicide rates, how to help or at least try to help. There is no easy answer was the conclusion. Understand that it's difficult to seek help for something mental, especially when there's still more mission. Keep your eyes open. Always be there and willing to help.

 

How incredibly humbling.

A Month at Club Med

April 13, 2010

All trees lean in the same direction, as if beaten so often that they now must cower at the wind's howling force.

Two days ago, I was walking home from work and marveling at the beauty: blue skies, birds singing, and trees swaying in the breeze. Yesterday I walked home from work around the same time, fighting the wind that was furiously blowing dirt, dust, and who knows what else into my face. Once I reached my pod (living area), I looked over my shoulder. The far-reaching blue sky that I had enjoyed only the day before was replaced by vision limited by hazy white-yellow skies. This is not a dust storm; this is life.

Later in the day, I was awakened by a crashing clap of thunder that shook my room. Shortly after, I heard the rain commence, rapping loudly on our thin metal roof. Since previous experiences have taught me that this noise can mean either rain or mud falling from the sky, I decided to investigate. Carefully opening my door, I sniffed first: wet earth, mud, and dust storm. I then peeked a little further to see alligator-tear raindrops developing patterns on my dusty wooden steps.

When I awoke for work, I walked outside to find no evidence that there had been any precipitation. Since I work nights, my walk to work is generally dark, but tonight was different. So much dust still hung in the air that the reflection, from what I don't know, made the sky glow a dark purple. The hanging dust, sans dust storm, is truly an amazing sight to behold.

April 17, 2010

Butterflies have invaded Iraq. I don't know how or from where they come, but I'm not complaining. I've never been an overly big fan of butterflies; they're beautiful but thinking of them usually stops there for me. On my walk home from work, there is a path the size of a one lane road between a building and some tall concrete. This seems to be the butterfly hangout. As I walk, my feet disturb them from their ground perches and they climb into the air, thus creating a fluttering flurry of beautiful wings surrounding me. It's all very Disney movie-ish, but I like it.

In more grim news, as I mentally marveled about the butterflies and finished my walk home (via the bathroom, so as to prevent the almost inevitable wake up in the middle of my sleep as a result of hydrating), I had quite a scare. This was not your typical "on-deployment" scare, but probably made me more nervous than the base receiving indirect fire. Something hissed at me. There is a raised wooden path on the way to the bathroom (to prevent walking in the mud during rainy season, I presume), which is, apparently, the perfect hiding place for critters. All I saw was something dark dart back under the planks, directly under my feet. Naturally imagining this to be a snake, I did my best (purposeful, of course) hop, skip, and jump to the nearest non-wooded area. Had I not twisted my ankle twice on this deployment already, I would have leapt from the concrete, over the planks, and to the ground. As it was, I simply moved as quickly as possible in that direction and away from the offending creature.

April 25, 2010

There are some things I will never understand.

What thought processes must a child have to make him or her decide that the only way to live is to not live at all? To take one's life as an adult or even a teenager, while still beyond my realm of comprehension, seems to make more sense to me. Stress, work, bills. But a child... what overbearing burdens and circumstances must that child have felt or dealt with to instill only feelings of hopelessness? Why aren't children running away from home when they're upset, only to return by nightfall anymore (not that this is as safe as it used to be)? Why are life and society changing toward this fashion? I know there aren't really answers out there, though I'm sure opinions are plentiful. I definitely have my own. My heart aches for the stolen innocence of our children.

On a much brighter note, we just finished our 24 hours of volunteer recognition on the 24th of April, the last day of National Volunteer Week. Huge props out to Kirsten who planned and organized the whole thing!!! I think it was a success, especially for a deployment AND our first function. Granted, we didn't have as many people as we would have liked, but you never will in a deployment setting. There was a LOT of food, some volleyball and other games, some karaoke... although I missed most of the "fun" stuff so I could get some sleep, it sounded awesome!

May 4, 2010

As I type, there is a young airman in the next room witnessing the (lengthy) birth of his first child, a son. He's been in and out, checking in with us, practically bursting with excitement, power walking to the restroom, grinning like a child, waiting. It renders me nigh speechless that, although in this brown land of seeming desolation and war, something as natural and yet magical as child birth can bring families together no matter how far apart. What an honor to be part, in a miniscule way, of something so heartwarming. There is good in the world; sometimes we need reminders.

One, two, three times in the desert...

My update is long overdue.

As some, probably most, of you know, I was stationed at Yokota Air Base with the Red Cross from February 2009 (at the end of my last deployment) through March of 2010, but was notified that I would be deploying to Balad, Iraq back in January. Here, once again, are my views, thoughts, opinions, struggles, and just plain boring updates from the desert. Let's start at the beginning. It is, after all, a very good place to start.

I had to travel from Tokyo to Ashburn, VA for deployment briefings at our National Headquarters prior to flying into theatre. While there for a few days, some family of mine was able to visit, which was much appreciated after not seeing most of my family in over a year. I also met the rest of the Red Cross people that are currently deployed alongside me, yet in different locations: Baghdad, Bagram, and Arifjan. Some people I already knew from past assignments, and it resembled coming home to family once again, as a new deployment with the Red Cross always does.

From Ashburn, the entire team of 14 people was supposed to fly to Atlanta to process through CRC at Fort Benning. Here is what I quickly typed that day:

Comedy of errors. I'm currently traveling to Fort Benning from Ashburn. Our flight out of Dulles was delayed because of storms in Atlanta. On the plane. Wait. Off the plane. Hurry back. Wait. On the plane. Wait. Take off. Fly. Announcement: can't land in Atlanta. Not enough gas and too many delayed planes trying to land. Redirecting to Chattanooga, TN. Turbulence. Nausea. Woman behind me is crying. Man to my right is fiddling with his barf bag. Woman to my right is breathing heavily into hers, about to vomit. Almost everyone is either nervous or wants to throw up, maybe both. Suddenly, a loud pop and a bright traveling line of electricity above the aisle. Hit by lightning? No announcement. The engines are still running. The nausea has at least subsided and been replaced by uneasiness or downright fear. Still turbulent. Finally we land. Wait some more. Confirmation from the captain. Lightning struck the nose. Smoke in the cockpit-normal? If you say so. Waiting again. Fire trucks with bright flashing lights come to check our plane. We can see our pilots outside talking to men in shiny silver suits with large rubber boots. Can we get off? The flight attendant said we could in ten minutes... twenty minutes ago.

We made the Chattanooga news:
http://www.newschannel9.com/articles/landing-989528-plane-emergency.html

Once we finally arrived safely in Fort Benning around 0230 hours, Benning remained pretty standard. If you're reading for the first time, go back to my first posts to see what it was like. It is definitely improving, however. The hurry up and wait was not nearly as bad as it has been on past deployments of mine, and now we receive CAC cards which makes our ID process slightly easier. Not much, but slightly. It will, at least, make life easier in country. Also, more of my family was able to visit, so I got to see them and celebrate a quarter of a century of my life!

Written 3.22.2010
Ah, Kuwait at last. I had almost forgotten the stench of diesel fuel from our white Mercedes-Benz chariots as we take a short break before making our bumpy and dusty way to base. Half of the sky is filled with dust or some other kind of pollution, but soon the sun sets so we have only darkness offset by some large, generator-driven football stadium-like "street"lights. NOW I am back. Back to the flat, dusty, and hot land. Surprisingly, when we arrived the temperature was pleasant, almost cool. We were delayed in leaving Fort Benning because the deployment group was too large, so we took a much less crowded and therefore more comfortable military chartered flight. This seems to be the way to travel as this is the first time I've tried to get out of Benning without something going wrong with our plane at a stop along the way. Either this is a better way to travel or we got all of our bad "Atlanta flying" out of the way earlier in our trip. Hopefully we got ALL of our bad flying time out of the way since my least favorite flying part of deployment is yet to come: Kuwait to Iraq. We shall see... on the road again.

My team arrived with no further flying incidents. I actually got to sit in a seat on my way into country. We didn't get stuck in Kuwait and there were no sandstorms to delay us. I'm back on night shift, so I was able to jump in pretty quickly. Our office is by far the nicest one in Iraq that I've seen (and since I've been to every Red Cross station in Iraq, I think I have a leg on which to stand). We occupy an entire hard stand (i.e. not a trailer, therefore safer, dad) building. When you first walk in, there's a desk at which our wonderful volunteers sit to watch who comes in and to make sure everyone logs in if they want to use our internet and phone café or our TV room. Our internet/phone café has 5 non-military computers so people can keep up with their friends and family on instant messengers, skype, email, facebook, or whatever other means they might have of contacting their families. There are also 3 phones for that same "keeping in touch" purpose. Our office is around the corner, which is organized, well set up with everything that we need, and equipped with a DVD sign out/library. The TV room is behind our office, which has a TV, a VHS collection of movies, and both DVD and VHS players. This is also our canteen, where there is a refrigerator with cold water, a coffee pot, bread maker, snacks, a hot water dispenser, and a couch on which to enjoy it all. Lastly, we have the Legacy Room, which is by far my favorite. It's a small room with a computer with webcam, DSN phone, desk/chair, and a couple of recliners. The point is to allow people private time with their friends/families in 1 hour increments. Those people with appointments may be bumped for people with a "life event", i.e. the birth of a child or some other big event like that.

Kirsten actually received a phone call the other night from a serviceman who has redeployed back to the states from Balad. He had apparently used the Legacy Room while here to watch the birth of his first child back in Arizona. He called to thank the Red Cross for what we do and to see if there's any way that he can give back to our station. Naturally, being able to witness the birth of his child, albeit from a distance, really spoke volumes to him about our organization and the lengths that we try to go to serve our service members. As I am the blubbering type when it comes to children or the military, his story via speakerphone and Kirsten's relay definitely brought tears to my eyes.

I'm on nights again, so my sleep schedule is, of course, less than stable. Sometimes I fall asleep shortly after I get off shift, sometimes (like when there was a spider above my bed), I can't sleep for awhile. I just hung up a semi-blackout curtain over my window, so hopefully that helps. Less than a week in theatre, and already my ankle is twisted. Contrary to popular belief, I am not graceful enough to twist my ankle and remain standing. Oh, no, I think the terminology 'thrown to the ground' fits the situation well. Thankfully, I had my boots on which provided enough stabilization for it to not be too bad. Good thing, because I was at the beginning of my walk to work over a who'lotta gravel. It's pretty different to be in civilian clothes. I'm so used to being in uniform in the desert that some habits have been hard to break, such as the tight and unmoving bun and the blousing of the pants. I guess I'll adjust. It has been nice to be able to wear some color instead of being in all khaki. I'm sure by the end of this, though, that I'll swear off blue for awhile just like I swore off brown for awhile on previous deployments.

While I am not old by any stretch of the imagination, and have yet to be anything other than the youngest on a Red Cross team in theatre, I am suddenly feeling old. This isn't a new feeling, even when I was first deployed at 22. Messages that come through are almost exclusively for people younger than I, and often by many years. It's hard to remind myself when I see a birth year of 1990 on an emergency message that those people are already 20 -- or nearly there. My own youngest siblings, born in 1993, will be old enough to enlist in a little over a year. What a concept. Where is the time going?

The little things on deployment are almost always the most exciting for me. The fact that I won an argument with a command post about how our messages are delivered, that I can do my own laundry on this deployment, going to see some fixed wing aircraft at an airfield, and the sweet things that the people with whom I work (both within the Red Cross and the S-3/S-1/etc) say are the things that make me pump my fist and do a little happy dance. Well, maybe not doing laundry...

Acronyms for the non-military:
CAC: common access card - a form of ID that military and civilians receive to obtain entrance into various military facilities
S-3 and S-1: the military shops (usually personnel, I think) that often take our messages