The funny thing is, when you're standing at T in the road, it feels really easy to go one direction, and really hard to go another one.
Anger comes easy.
Peace comes hard.
The other funny thing is that, whichever direction you take, the direction kind of takes over you.
Anger gets more and more intense.
Peace comes easier and easier.
I found myself struggling to do the right thing, to put aside my hurt feelings and feelings of "what do you mean, you think my work could be wrong/dangerous/too open?!??!!".
But once I made that choice, the way got easier. I found myself being more and more eager to talk, and to make sure that I was listening, as well as working on things from my own (generally fair) perspective.
It is a life lesson. The first step in doing anything is the hardest. The next step is easier, and the next easier still.
So we should choose our first little step, pay attention to our initial reactions, very, very carefully. Because easier and easier of some things is good...but easier and easier of others could be disastrous.
____________
On another note: we got a pink note.
A pink envelope arrived in the mail, with a familiar FPO return address and the name of a Gunny Sargeant many of your guys would recognize. We were SO CURIOUS! Who was writing us from there?
It was a thank-you note. "Each small kindness, like a seed, grows tall in memory." And inside, thanks for a certain picnic to which we helped contribute.
Wow. That was unexpected and treaured. I cried. The note will stay on my desk...until we get the chance to, as they say, catch them on the rebound.
This might help plan it: http://www.operationwelcomehomemd.org/
If you are emailing or writing, thank you. If you aren't...let me ask you to take a moment. Just a few words about daily life, what you're doing, gives them a precious, precious connection to home.
Thanks for checking in,
Katie
Monday, August 24, 2009
Saturday, August 22, 2009
A Surprising Turn, And An Opportunity To Live My Words
I have a saying: World Peace starts in my heart.
Think about it. World peace isn’t about what they do. It’s about what we do.
It’s all very well to talk about what we hope and want and expect them to do.
But are we willing to do it ourselves?
It gets so much tougher when we try to work at peace, with our own issues, in our own lives, with people we know!
I wanted to write this blog without any particular agenda in mine, except what is stated in the “About Me” box:
• I wanted to honor the work of HMH-463. I wanted to document what it is like to be the parent of someone over there. Lots of people have someone they love over there, but not everybody likes to write. I do.
• I wanted to do something good with a sometimes-challenging experience, and to create something of value.
My pledge to myself was only that I would be completely honest: I would not demonize or heroize war and soldiers. I would neither gloss over or glorify war, nor diminish the challenges. I would not be melodramatic, or overly sentimental, or parochial. I would not succumb to patriotism that has a hidden agenda of hatred in disguise.
I would just talk about things as they came up, and share those thoughts with others, and in some vague undefined way, to encourage peace.
It came as a complete shock, therefore, to be called on the carpet by not one but two women who also have loved ones in HMH-463, who believe this blog could endanger the lives of the people of our squadron.
This post is about the process of working through a difference of opinion with respect. I am writing about this conversation because it directly relates to the experience of creating peace. I AM NOT asking anyone to take a side. I do not want that to happen AT ALL, so please do not be tempted to do so! Keep reading!
This experience of being suggested/told what I should write about and what I shouldn’t has ranged from feeling definitely uncomfortable… to being emotionally painful . To feel accused, even in polite language, of doing something that would be damaging or even dangerous to their loved ones and my own son was hurtful. To be told that I was/had been reported to the USMC for censure was shocking to me.
I am passionate about my writing work. I write carefully, I think deeply about my words, and I sometimes work very, very carefully in working through an idea.
I do not believe that the things I have been asked to remove from this blog are in any way damaging, or could create danger, for the missions of HMH-463.
But they do. So here is where the rubber hits the road, as the saying goes. I’ve been writing this and thinking about the folks over there – the Taliban – and praying for peace in their hearts. But here is conflict, right at my doorstep, and with people on the same ‘team’.
WORLD PEACE STARTS IN MY HEART.
These women are giving me an opportunity to live my words. I have in this circumstance a chance to take my own advice about handling differences of opinion and belief to create peace instead of conflict.
I could take the distress I feel about the challenge and criticism of my words and get upset, even angry. Most big fights start over pretty small differences. But let’s think:
First: They are not trying to hurt me.
Second: They are trying to protect their loved ones.
Third: We have the same goals.
So how do we handle a emotionally serious difference of opinion?
Well.
Hmm.
I really, deeply respect the concerns of the women who contacted me. If you’re reading this, please hear the love and respect in my words.
I promised them that I would go through this blog today, and look through the entries for things that would be potentially dangerous.
I will do that.
But I will do it, not as a knee-jerk reaction – erase everything! Shut it all down! It is okay that we have different opinions. Respect for someone else’s feelings and opinion does not mean abdicating your own feelings and opinion.
So I will examine my viewpoint and my work as you have requested. And I will do it as people in deployment are expected to do things under pressure:
Calmly. Logically. With respect and intelligence.
A decision made for emotional reasons may feel right, but is almost always bad in implementation.
I have another saying.
Fear is the root of all evil. And evil cannot thrive without the presence of fear
.
So, logically, and with research and documentation to support it… what’s safe to write about, and what isn’t?
Well, here’s an example from CBS news. (I deeply respect Lara Logan’s work!)
This worldwide news coverage clearly states the soldier’s names, their company, and their mission, as well as the emotional challenges they face and the success they feel in overcoming them (skip the ad):
http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=5258698n&tag=morephotovideo
In this print piece for CBS, and in another one I didn’t link, the future strategy, albeit without details, is also clearly discussed as well by the reporter. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/08/13/world/main5239251.shtml
For the record, I don’t discuss strategy. I wouldn’t, and even if I were so stupid, I can’t. My son does not divulge anything of that nature to us.
He also told me that because of me getting reported, he has already been called in by a superior officer to discuss this writing of mine, and that basically the rule is: once it’s happened, it’s okay to write about anything. Just nothing in advance.
He does not tell us any details about flights. Despite that, I did remove some wording regarding that mentions flight frequency - even though, realistically, I'm sure the folks they fly over know the schedule.
It seems that the item of most concern is the letter I reprinted from the CO. I genuinely do not understand how it could endanger the men in any way...but it concerns them deeply. So, out of respect for the women who need their feelings to be honored, I will be removing that letter and just quoting generic parts from it.
I went through and removed numbers where I could find them, about the size of the squadron, the flight crews, hours of days, etc. Although this information can be found elsewhere, I feel good in caring about their feelings to remove it from here.
Lastly, I did a check, googling combinations that would cause this blog to come up. And I couldn’t get it to come up in Google. But I did come across several written by Afghans, who write in danger, and which express so much that I wanted to learn. It was good to read that they value the help we are giving their country. The first one I read was shut down in 2007, after writing extensively against the Taliban.
I hope he is all right.
This blog was set up from the beginning to not be translated into Arabic languages. I thought carefully about that, and while I believe that cultural exchange is a powerful tool for peace, in the end, decided against it for OPSEC reasons.
I hope, my friends, that you will know that your concerns have been genuinely heard and addressed. The changes should be finished by the end of the day. Please let me know if you have continuing concerns, and what the specifics are.
And I hope that I have lived my beliefs. It is one thing to have beliefs. It is quite another to put them into action.
World peace starts in my heart. I hope that I have been respectful, both of the concerns of others and of my own beliefs. If more is needed, please let me know.
Because in the end, often it is not as much about the result we achieve, as the process we follow to get there.
A good process which includes respect, honesty, intelligence and compassion will always end in a good result… even if it’s not the result we originally planned.
It may be even better.
With our combined prayers for the safety, health and well-being of all the people of HMH-463,
thanks so much for checking in.
Katie
Think about it. World peace isn’t about what they do. It’s about what we do.
It’s all very well to talk about what we hope and want and expect them to do.
But are we willing to do it ourselves?
It gets so much tougher when we try to work at peace, with our own issues, in our own lives, with people we know!
I wanted to write this blog without any particular agenda in mine, except what is stated in the “About Me” box:
• I wanted to honor the work of HMH-463. I wanted to document what it is like to be the parent of someone over there. Lots of people have someone they love over there, but not everybody likes to write. I do.
• I wanted to do something good with a sometimes-challenging experience, and to create something of value.
My pledge to myself was only that I would be completely honest: I would not demonize or heroize war and soldiers. I would neither gloss over or glorify war, nor diminish the challenges. I would not be melodramatic, or overly sentimental, or parochial. I would not succumb to patriotism that has a hidden agenda of hatred in disguise.
I would just talk about things as they came up, and share those thoughts with others, and in some vague undefined way, to encourage peace.
It came as a complete shock, therefore, to be called on the carpet by not one but two women who also have loved ones in HMH-463, who believe this blog could endanger the lives of the people of our squadron.
This post is about the process of working through a difference of opinion with respect. I am writing about this conversation because it directly relates to the experience of creating peace. I AM NOT asking anyone to take a side. I do not want that to happen AT ALL, so please do not be tempted to do so! Keep reading!
This experience of being suggested/told what I should write about and what I shouldn’t has ranged from feeling definitely uncomfortable… to being emotionally painful . To feel accused, even in polite language, of doing something that would be damaging or even dangerous to their loved ones and my own son was hurtful. To be told that I was/had been reported to the USMC for censure was shocking to me.
I am passionate about my writing work. I write carefully, I think deeply about my words, and I sometimes work very, very carefully in working through an idea.
I do not believe that the things I have been asked to remove from this blog are in any way damaging, or could create danger, for the missions of HMH-463.
But they do. So here is where the rubber hits the road, as the saying goes. I’ve been writing this and thinking about the folks over there – the Taliban – and praying for peace in their hearts. But here is conflict, right at my doorstep, and with people on the same ‘team’.
WORLD PEACE STARTS IN MY HEART.
These women are giving me an opportunity to live my words. I have in this circumstance a chance to take my own advice about handling differences of opinion and belief to create peace instead of conflict.
I could take the distress I feel about the challenge and criticism of my words and get upset, even angry. Most big fights start over pretty small differences. But let’s think:
First: They are not trying to hurt me.
Second: They are trying to protect their loved ones.
Third: We have the same goals.
So how do we handle a emotionally serious difference of opinion?
Well.
Hmm.
I really, deeply respect the concerns of the women who contacted me. If you’re reading this, please hear the love and respect in my words.
I promised them that I would go through this blog today, and look through the entries for things that would be potentially dangerous.
I will do that.
But I will do it, not as a knee-jerk reaction – erase everything! Shut it all down! It is okay that we have different opinions. Respect for someone else’s feelings and opinion does not mean abdicating your own feelings and opinion.
So I will examine my viewpoint and my work as you have requested. And I will do it as people in deployment are expected to do things under pressure:
Calmly. Logically. With respect and intelligence.
A decision made for emotional reasons may feel right, but is almost always bad in implementation.
I have another saying.
Fear is the root of all evil. And evil cannot thrive without the presence of fear
.
So, logically, and with research and documentation to support it… what’s safe to write about, and what isn’t?
Well, here’s an example from CBS news. (I deeply respect Lara Logan’s work!)
This worldwide news coverage clearly states the soldier’s names, their company, and their mission, as well as the emotional challenges they face and the success they feel in overcoming them (skip the ad):
http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=5258698n&tag=morephotovideo
In this print piece for CBS, and in another one I didn’t link, the future strategy, albeit without details, is also clearly discussed as well by the reporter. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/08/13/world/main5239251.shtml
For the record, I don’t discuss strategy. I wouldn’t, and even if I were so stupid, I can’t. My son does not divulge anything of that nature to us.
He also told me that because of me getting reported, he has already been called in by a superior officer to discuss this writing of mine, and that basically the rule is: once it’s happened, it’s okay to write about anything. Just nothing in advance.
He does not tell us any details about flights. Despite that, I did remove some wording regarding that mentions flight frequency - even though, realistically, I'm sure the folks they fly over know the schedule.
It seems that the item of most concern is the letter I reprinted from the CO. I genuinely do not understand how it could endanger the men in any way...but it concerns them deeply. So, out of respect for the women who need their feelings to be honored, I will be removing that letter and just quoting generic parts from it.
I went through and removed numbers where I could find them, about the size of the squadron, the flight crews, hours of days, etc. Although this information can be found elsewhere, I feel good in caring about their feelings to remove it from here.
Lastly, I did a check, googling combinations that would cause this blog to come up. And I couldn’t get it to come up in Google. But I did come across several written by Afghans, who write in danger, and which express so much that I wanted to learn. It was good to read that they value the help we are giving their country. The first one I read was shut down in 2007, after writing extensively against the Taliban.
I hope he is all right.
This blog was set up from the beginning to not be translated into Arabic languages. I thought carefully about that, and while I believe that cultural exchange is a powerful tool for peace, in the end, decided against it for OPSEC reasons.
I hope, my friends, that you will know that your concerns have been genuinely heard and addressed. The changes should be finished by the end of the day. Please let me know if you have continuing concerns, and what the specifics are.
And I hope that I have lived my beliefs. It is one thing to have beliefs. It is quite another to put them into action.
World peace starts in my heart. I hope that I have been respectful, both of the concerns of others and of my own beliefs. If more is needed, please let me know.
Because in the end, often it is not as much about the result we achieve, as the process we follow to get there.
A good process which includes respect, honesty, intelligence and compassion will always end in a good result… even if it’s not the result we originally planned.
It may be even better.
With our combined prayers for the safety, health and well-being of all the people of HMH-463,
thanks so much for checking in.
Katie
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Allied Forces + Afghan Police - Taliban = 1683 Heroes
First, personally, I am grateful to read in the news returns that
no
American
soldiers
were
killed or injured
during the election.
Take that, Taliban.
Secondly,
There's a news clip copied from The New York Times below.
There's a little number in it that means a lot.
The number is 1683.
That's the number of brave souls who,
in Taliban-dominated Helmand Province,
despite threats of death
despite threats of dismemberment
despite fear of bombings at the voting centers
despite concerns of election corruption
cared enough about freedom
to walk to the polls
openly
and
cast a vote for freedom.
We don't know who they are.
I don't know if they all were men, or if any might have been women
how many were too old to be dominated
or who had kids at home who needed them
who were young and in love
or who were just tired of being dominated
but I hope their neighbors see them walking tall.
I hope they walk tall for many years to come
and remember
that today
they looked bullying in the face
and dipped their finger in voting ink
in defiance of fear
in belief in courage.
Amen.
I am - and I know we all are - so incredibly, incredibly proud of our loved ones who supported this election, either on the ground or in the air. Well DONE, Marines!
The Taliban failed to stop the voting Thursday in this dusty town in the insurgency’s heartland, but they did a good job of putting a scare into everyone who did.
http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/20/latest-updates-on-afghanistans-election/?hp :
A total of 1,683 Afghan men cast ballots in the cement-brick school that served as the town’s main polling place, a number high enough to buoy the spirits of local officials — although no one could say how many voters were actually registered in the district, whose population is about 80,000. Those who defied the insurgents’ threats to sever the fingers of anyone caught voting were almost too nervous to talk.
“Until the day I die, I will support this government,” said Niamatullah, lowering his voice to a whisper and walking away from a crowd that had gathered outside the polling center. “But there is no security. The Taliban are still strong.”
no
American
soldiers
were
killed or injured
during the election.
Take that, Taliban.
Secondly,
There's a news clip copied from The New York Times below.
There's a little number in it that means a lot.
The number is 1683.
That's the number of brave souls who,
in Taliban-dominated Helmand Province,
despite threats of death
despite threats of dismemberment
despite fear of bombings at the voting centers
despite concerns of election corruption
cared enough about freedom
to walk to the polls
openly
and
cast a vote for freedom.
We don't know who they are.
I don't know if they all were men, or if any might have been women
how many were too old to be dominated
or who had kids at home who needed them
who were young and in love
or who were just tired of being dominated
but I hope their neighbors see them walking tall.
I hope they walk tall for many years to come
and remember
that today
they looked bullying in the face
and dipped their finger in voting ink
in defiance of fear
in belief in courage.
Amen.
I am - and I know we all are - so incredibly, incredibly proud of our loved ones who supported this election, either on the ground or in the air. Well DONE, Marines!
The Taliban failed to stop the voting Thursday in this dusty town in the insurgency’s heartland, but they did a good job of putting a scare into everyone who did.
http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/20/latest-updates-on-afghanistans-election/?hp :
A total of 1,683 Afghan men cast ballots in the cement-brick school that served as the town’s main polling place, a number high enough to buoy the spirits of local officials — although no one could say how many voters were actually registered in the district, whose population is about 80,000. Those who defied the insurgents’ threats to sever the fingers of anyone caught voting were almost too nervous to talk.
“Until the day I die, I will support this government,” said Niamatullah, lowering his voice to a whisper and walking away from a crowd that had gathered outside the polling center. “But there is no security. The Taliban are still strong.”
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Being There
What it's like for soldiers on the ground, from CBS News:
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/08/17/world/worldwatch/entry5246256.shtml
An article written by a friend of mine from college, James Rupert, who is in Afghanistan by choice:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=ajyJvwwYY.Nc
It's nearing midnight in Afghanistan. Election day is almost here.
What will happen?
Thank you for checking in,
Katie
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/08/17/world/worldwatch/entry5246256.shtml
An article written by a friend of mine from college, James Rupert, who is in Afghanistan by choice:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=ajyJvwwYY.Nc
It's nearing midnight in Afghanistan. Election day is almost here.
What will happen?
Thank you for checking in,
Katie
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Another Two Days Until The Elections Are Over
It’s raining tonight in Maryland. It feels so good, to have the humidity and the heat washed away by the storm. Now we are getting those wonderful little-stream-gurgling sounds, of raindrops dripping from heavy wet leaves, cool in the dusk. The light coming in from the very edge of sunset has colored the mist in the air with gold.
I think of how hot and dry it is in Afghanistan. The current weather for camp is: “Blowing Widespread Dust”.
I wonder what the Afghan farmers would think of rain.
I wonder what it would be like on Thursday, August 20, the day of their elections, if it rained gently on everyone.
Would they look up at the sky in wonder and delight? Or would they be afraid, because rain is not normal there? I have googled all sorts of phrases that would help me know if they have rain in that part of the world. In Bagram, they do. But in Bastion? I don’t know.
It’s a little question, but I find it comforting to think of gentle rain wetting the villages and hills, the cafes and camels, and cooling tempers and calming fear. Rain can do that.
IT IS TWO DAYS UNTIL THE ELECTION IN AFGHANISTAN. If the elections are successful, will the violence diminish greatly after that? Will people in the villages, sick of being controlled by the Taliban and in debt to them and forced to grow crops for drugs turn on the fear-mongers, and rise up against them?
Will they grow courage instead of opium poppies?
Want to hear of less suicide bombers in Thailand, in England…in America, perhaps? And definitely in Afghanistan and Pakistan and Iraq?
Then hope and pray for a strong election, one which the Taliban CANNOT say was “fixed” by the west.
Did you know that the Taliban has put up notices threatening to cut off the finger of anyone who has ink from the voting machine on his or her finger? Or just kill them?
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/17/world/asia/17taliban.html?bl&ex=1250740800&en=7d0939d85b32733a&ei=5087
In a small rural town, that’s a pretty big damned threat.
Would you vote? Would you tell your loved ones to vote?
Or would you succumb to fear?
I don’t know what I would do. I would hope that I would have courage, but would I have the courage, a woman, to walk down the street election day, or the day after, knowing any Taliban man who wants could pull my hand from where it was hidden in my burka, and look for the tell-tale stain of voting ink, and cut off my finger or my hand or stab me, right there, just for casting a vote?
Would I have the courage to vote?
President Obama has ordered US military personnel to guard the polling places.
Would that give me more courage? Or would it be the block beyond the polling place where the terror would wait?
Each Afghan person must wrestle with fear and hope, with courage and cowardice. It is 4:30 am their time as I write this. They are beginning the day before the elections.
Here is a picture of young men carrying the polling booths to a remote village on the backs of donkeys: www.guardian.co.uk/world/gallery/2009/aug/18/afghanistan?picture=351795492This is isolated.
And it creates an exercise in trust: trust and hope that each person in each dusty little town can cast their votes safely. Trust that the votes will get to the election officials safely, trust that the votes will be counted honestly.
Please offer your prayers, however you pray, that each individual of each province in Afghanistan - but especially in Taliban-controlled Helmand Province - will find courage, strength, and hope in his or her heart to go to the polls,
…and will express it in their vote.
May they find freedom, and safety and peace.
May the Afghan voters see in the eyes of the men guarding the polls the strength that freedom from fear gives.
and may they reach for that strength for their own country.
May the Taliban people, should they choose to vote, see the in the eyes of the men guarding the polls the strength that freedom from fear gives,
and may they wonder in their hearts, and inwardly yearn for that for themselves,
and may the desire for it erode the power that their fear has even over their own hearts.
May our loved ones who stand, LITERALLY, today, as representatives of freedom, stand safe.
May the members of HMH-463 fly safe.
May August 21 get here without one more life lost.
Thank you for checking in,
Katie
I think of how hot and dry it is in Afghanistan. The current weather for camp is: “Blowing Widespread Dust”.
I wonder what the Afghan farmers would think of rain.
I wonder what it would be like on Thursday, August 20, the day of their elections, if it rained gently on everyone.
Would they look up at the sky in wonder and delight? Or would they be afraid, because rain is not normal there? I have googled all sorts of phrases that would help me know if they have rain in that part of the world. In Bagram, they do. But in Bastion? I don’t know.
It’s a little question, but I find it comforting to think of gentle rain wetting the villages and hills, the cafes and camels, and cooling tempers and calming fear. Rain can do that.
IT IS TWO DAYS UNTIL THE ELECTION IN AFGHANISTAN. If the elections are successful, will the violence diminish greatly after that? Will people in the villages, sick of being controlled by the Taliban and in debt to them and forced to grow crops for drugs turn on the fear-mongers, and rise up against them?
Will they grow courage instead of opium poppies?
Want to hear of less suicide bombers in Thailand, in England…in America, perhaps? And definitely in Afghanistan and Pakistan and Iraq?
Then hope and pray for a strong election, one which the Taliban CANNOT say was “fixed” by the west.
Did you know that the Taliban has put up notices threatening to cut off the finger of anyone who has ink from the voting machine on his or her finger? Or just kill them?
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/17/world/asia/17taliban.html?bl&ex=1250740800&en=7d0939d85b32733a&ei=5087
In a small rural town, that’s a pretty big damned threat.
Would you vote? Would you tell your loved ones to vote?
Or would you succumb to fear?
I don’t know what I would do. I would hope that I would have courage, but would I have the courage, a woman, to walk down the street election day, or the day after, knowing any Taliban man who wants could pull my hand from where it was hidden in my burka, and look for the tell-tale stain of voting ink, and cut off my finger or my hand or stab me, right there, just for casting a vote?
Would I have the courage to vote?
President Obama has ordered US military personnel to guard the polling places.
Would that give me more courage? Or would it be the block beyond the polling place where the terror would wait?
Each Afghan person must wrestle with fear and hope, with courage and cowardice. It is 4:30 am their time as I write this. They are beginning the day before the elections.
Here is a picture of young men carrying the polling booths to a remote village on the backs of donkeys: www.guardian.co.uk/world/gallery/2009/aug/18/afghanistan?picture=351795492This is isolated.
And it creates an exercise in trust: trust and hope that each person in each dusty little town can cast their votes safely. Trust that the votes will get to the election officials safely, trust that the votes will be counted honestly.
Please offer your prayers, however you pray, that each individual of each province in Afghanistan - but especially in Taliban-controlled Helmand Province - will find courage, strength, and hope in his or her heart to go to the polls,
…and will express it in their vote.
May they find freedom, and safety and peace.
May the Afghan voters see in the eyes of the men guarding the polls the strength that freedom from fear gives.
and may they reach for that strength for their own country.
May the Taliban people, should they choose to vote, see the in the eyes of the men guarding the polls the strength that freedom from fear gives,
and may they wonder in their hearts, and inwardly yearn for that for themselves,
and may the desire for it erode the power that their fear has even over their own hearts.
May our loved ones who stand, LITERALLY, today, as representatives of freedom, stand safe.
May the members of HMH-463 fly safe.
May August 21 get here without one more life lost.
Thank you for checking in,
Katie
Monday, August 17, 2009
Chicory, Corn and Cicadas
Mark and I went to Florida for a convention for work last week.
Orlando, in the middle of International Drive.
Fancy hotels, fine restaurants, and days of training interspersed with some amazing, top-notch speakers: football coach Lou Holtz, and the co-founder of Franklin Covey, Hyrum Smith.
Emily Bear played the piano for us.
Pause: please check out Emily Bear. She’s, um, seven: http://www.emilybear.com/
We slept in soft beds, with lots and lots of air conditioning.
There was all the delicious food you could want to eat.
Nice people from all over the world to talk to.
I was aching to go home by the third day.
Now, our guys are not in as lovely a situation as that was. Nothing even close to that nice!
And they’re guys.
So they are not going to come out and say that word “homesick”.
Which means, to keep them from feelng that way, they need to work and work. And joke around. And sleep.
And we need to make sure that we send letters, letters, letters. Pictures.
Don’t send worries. Keep your humor strong. Support them with a great attitude.
-------------------------------------
Now, some thoughts for today:
Where ever you live, that’s home.
If you grew up on a farm in Arkansas, that’s the most beautiful place in the world to you. If you grew up in San Diego, or a suburb of Rapid City, or in rural Maine, or Florida, or whatever state…that’s home.
I might get tired in three days of your gators and your summer humidity and your palm trees, but to you, that’s home. And beautiful.
I might not like your curved development streets, one leading to another, but to you, that’s the road on which you rode your bike.
I might not appreciate your dry Arizona desert, or your treeless Montana hills, but to you, they are the loveliest sights in the world.
And that’s what you’d miss. So wherever your Marine is from, that’s what he’s missing seeing.
I’m going to write about our home, so you can see it a little bit. Maybe Zach can too, from this.
It’s the middle of August, and in the middle of the middle of Maryland, that means three things:
Corn.
Chicory.
Cicadas.
The corn is high, really it is, climbing clear up to the sky. The rains have been good this year, so it’s not curled and dusty blue-gray; it’s spiky and rich full green…and the tassels have come out.
When you drive past a field full of corn on a hot summer night, with the car windows open, you can smell it. There is no smell like that of green corn flowering. It smells rich, sweet; full of promise: the crop will come in.
On the sides of the roads that meander this part of Maryland, when the corn blooms, the chicory does as well. It only blooms in the morning. Hundreds of soft blue flowers open in the early misty morning and become a haze of soft cool blue as you drive along the road.
They are beautiful.
They are wild.
You can’t cut them for a bouquet; they will immediately droop.
As the heat of the day builds, they close up. That’s it for the day; you only get the morning. They are the more beautiful because of it.
They are my favorite flowers.
The cool sweet heavenly blue of chicory, and the sweet rich smell of corn in tassel…it means summer to us.
That takes care of sight and smell…what about sound?
Sound would be the raucous chirring of cicadas.
Zach loves them.
When he and his brothers were little, we had one of the seventeen-year cicada cycles. I let them catch dozens, and bring them inside the house to fly around. As they got older, he became expert at hearing one start it’s chirp-chirp-chirrrrrrrrrpppppppp in a tree, and locating it from the sound, and tossing a big stick high, high up at the branch to knock the cicada off, and catching it as it fell.
Yeah, he did.
I loved watching him do it. It was a kid in love with nature.
Who had amazing aim with a stick.
That’s it. Nothing big deal or special today. Just listening to the cicadas singing in the trees tonight, and smelling the corn floating on the night air, and thinking of him.
Wherever you are, send some summer love - describe in the littlest detail whatever is special this time of year - to your folks on deployment. It'll be a gift across time and space to them.
Every little word you take the time to write carries love, and makes a day there better for them.
Stay safe, loved ones.
Thanks for checking in,
Katie
Orlando, in the middle of International Drive.
Fancy hotels, fine restaurants, and days of training interspersed with some amazing, top-notch speakers: football coach Lou Holtz, and the co-founder of Franklin Covey, Hyrum Smith.
Emily Bear played the piano for us.
Pause: please check out Emily Bear. She’s, um, seven: http://www.emilybear.com/
We slept in soft beds, with lots and lots of air conditioning.
There was all the delicious food you could want to eat.
Nice people from all over the world to talk to.
I was aching to go home by the third day.
Now, our guys are not in as lovely a situation as that was. Nothing even close to that nice!
And they’re guys.
So they are not going to come out and say that word “homesick”.
Which means, to keep them from feelng that way, they need to work and work. And joke around. And sleep.
And we need to make sure that we send letters, letters, letters. Pictures.
Don’t send worries. Keep your humor strong. Support them with a great attitude.
-------------------------------------
Now, some thoughts for today:
Where ever you live, that’s home.
If you grew up on a farm in Arkansas, that’s the most beautiful place in the world to you. If you grew up in San Diego, or a suburb of Rapid City, or in rural Maine, or Florida, or whatever state…that’s home.
I might get tired in three days of your gators and your summer humidity and your palm trees, but to you, that’s home. And beautiful.
I might not like your curved development streets, one leading to another, but to you, that’s the road on which you rode your bike.
I might not appreciate your dry Arizona desert, or your treeless Montana hills, but to you, they are the loveliest sights in the world.
And that’s what you’d miss. So wherever your Marine is from, that’s what he’s missing seeing.
I’m going to write about our home, so you can see it a little bit. Maybe Zach can too, from this.
It’s the middle of August, and in the middle of the middle of Maryland, that means three things:
Corn.
Chicory.
Cicadas.
The corn is high, really it is, climbing clear up to the sky. The rains have been good this year, so it’s not curled and dusty blue-gray; it’s spiky and rich full green…and the tassels have come out.
When you drive past a field full of corn on a hot summer night, with the car windows open, you can smell it. There is no smell like that of green corn flowering. It smells rich, sweet; full of promise: the crop will come in.
On the sides of the roads that meander this part of Maryland, when the corn blooms, the chicory does as well. It only blooms in the morning. Hundreds of soft blue flowers open in the early misty morning and become a haze of soft cool blue as you drive along the road.
They are beautiful.
They are wild.
You can’t cut them for a bouquet; they will immediately droop.
As the heat of the day builds, they close up. That’s it for the day; you only get the morning. They are the more beautiful because of it.
They are my favorite flowers.
The cool sweet heavenly blue of chicory, and the sweet rich smell of corn in tassel…it means summer to us.
That takes care of sight and smell…what about sound?
Sound would be the raucous chirring of cicadas.
Zach loves them.
When he and his brothers were little, we had one of the seventeen-year cicada cycles. I let them catch dozens, and bring them inside the house to fly around. As they got older, he became expert at hearing one start it’s chirp-chirp-chirrrrrrrrrpppppppp in a tree, and locating it from the sound, and tossing a big stick high, high up at the branch to knock the cicada off, and catching it as it fell.
Yeah, he did.
I loved watching him do it. It was a kid in love with nature.
Who had amazing aim with a stick.
That’s it. Nothing big deal or special today. Just listening to the cicadas singing in the trees tonight, and smelling the corn floating on the night air, and thinking of him.
Wherever you are, send some summer love - describe in the littlest detail whatever is special this time of year - to your folks on deployment. It'll be a gift across time and space to them.
Every little word you take the time to write carries love, and makes a day there better for them.
Stay safe, loved ones.
Thanks for checking in,
Katie
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Pray
Pray for our boys
pray for helmand province especially, since it's going to be hardest to vote there
pray for a strong free election
work for peace
love, Katie
pray for helmand province especially, since it's going to be hardest to vote there
pray for a strong free election
work for peace
love, Katie
Monday, August 10, 2009
What I Pray
How easy is it, when someone wrongs you, to get irritated back? Mightily irritated, in fact. And if they do enough wrong, furiously angry. Killing mad.
It is so easy, and understandable, for us as Americans to be angry at the people who are part of the Taliban. Maybe even to hate the Taliban. They have killed people we love. They have killed innocent civilians all over the world. They have disrupted the world in many ways, made it more fearful, less free.
I think to myself about them what do you feel like when you have blown an American soldier or an Afghan bride to pieces? Do you have a sick feeling in your stomach, seeing that? Or do you rejoice?
No matter what anyone says,
I am going to choose to believe that something in them, something deep in them that they might never admit to another person, feels badly about it.
No matter how different we are, I am going to choose to believe that, being human, somewhere deep within we connect, even during war, in a way that is deeper than the divides of country or religion or hate.
So it may or may not surprise you that when I pray, I pray for the Taliban boys' peace as much as I pray for our own boys and their peace and safety.
Why?
Because their peace means our peace.
Our military people follow strict rules. In the middle of war, they are trained to follow the rules of engagement, to respect peace, and if possible, to respond without violence.
Our military do not initiate conflict. The rules of engagement are that we respond to conflict appropriately.
Our soldiers are trained to respond, and they will respond. I am not in any way advocating that they not respond. It is their duty and their job to do so, and I respect them for doing their job well.
But they will not and do not start conflict. That requires so much strength under pressure that I admire them tremendously for it.
It can be very, very difficult sometimes to walk that line. And mistakes can be made.
But it means that we will hold the line at peace if you will. We will not start it.
So if I want our boys to be safe,
I pray that the other side will not start it.
I pray, and I think of a young man in hot and dry Afghanistan. Maybe he is being taught how to wire a cell phone into a what’s-the-word, the thing that detonates a bomb remotely.
Maybe he grew up with hatred of Westerners. Maybe he was taught it from his infancy from his father, his mother, his uncle.
Maybe he didn’t, but maybe he just never fit in. Didn’t have good looks or good skin or as much money or a mother who loved him or any self-confidence because he was never good enough in his father’s eyes.
Hate societies have a way of welcoming those who feel as if the world rejected them.
Whatever the case, whether hatred of democracy and western ways and free thought were bred into him, or whether he got sucked into something that horrifies his parents…
…hate is taught.
But I believe that deep, deep inside a person,
They know right from wrong.
People know true good from real evil.
They choose.
Maybe he is afraid to disobey the orders of his Taliban leaders or his Taliban buddies or his cousin in the Taliban or his father. They are telling him to start something. Maybe he is afraid of what will happen to him. It wouldn’t be pleasant.
When I was a little, little girl, I lived in a very racist area. But before I knew the word for racism, I knew it was wrong.
We can be taught hate. But deep within us, we can choose not to hate.
We can take the tiniest little steps to something different.
And those tiny steps matter.
They are the drops that build a river of goodness.
So many times when fear comes to me, instead of letting it control me, I pray,
and I reach out to the young man of the Taliban.
Maybe not start anything today, I offer to him. Maybe when you see the helicopter fly over today, if you have a rocket on your shoulder…maybe today you will tell yourself that you are not ready…and you will let your finger relax on the trigger.
A tiny step.
A huge step.
I reach out in my heart to the young man with the cell phone is his hand. The distance is nothing in prayer.
Maybe not today, I offer, in peace and encouragement and kindess. Maybe today you will feel goodness in your heart. Maybe because if it you will not be able to finish working on that phone today. Or maybe you will drop it so that it doesn’t work right.
Or maybe when the young men in American or British camouflage are standing near the buried bomb…
maybe you will pause just the tiniest bit.
And not do it. Not start it today. Maybe just not today.
Maybe not tomorrow either. Maybe today will give you a little strength for tomorrow, and I pray for that too.
May you know peace, I pray. May you feel love. May goodness come to you and yours.
May the tiny little decision you make with your finger on the trigger or the phone
Mean a day that no one dies in Helmand Province
Not your people
Not our people
May nothing start, because of you
And your courage, your little step of peace.
And may something take flight in your heart in that moment, and soar
Towards goodness.
Believe what you want, about who God or Allah or the Universal Spirit is. Believe that some of us are going to hell and some are going to reward. Offer to anyone your way of believing.
But beyond that, please believe that
it is up to the One you believe in to sort out about
who is going to hell, and who is going to heaven,
and when
And let it go. Let the bomb go, let the trigger finger relax.
I send you love, as an emissary of peace.
I send love to them.
It is the best way I know to protect my son and his friends.
War is an event between countries. War is the nations of NATO against the Taliban. It is a big event. War has rules. War’s intention is to create peace, but it is impersonal and massive and it does not change quickly or easily.
Peace is an event between people. Peace is tiny. Peace is personal. Peace is flexible and fluid, and it happens one little decision at a time. And peace can turn on a dime. It can be created or destroyed in a moment.
The destruction of peace creates war, on a small or large scale.
The creation of peace creates peace.
Maybe the young man will feel something today from my prayers. Maybe he won’t. I’ll never know.
But what I will know deep in my heart is that I strove to create peace. I did the same good that I am asking the young man in the Taliban to do. I put aside my fear and my anger and my hate, and I offered...nothing.
I offer nothing; no advice, no criticism, no you're-wrong, no judgement. No 'start'.
And I ask for nothing: no detonation. No trigger pull. I pray for nothing to happen in that moment.
No start.
One little moment of nothing happening.
One little drop of peace.
Little by little they can wash away the war.
It is so easy, and understandable, for us as Americans to be angry at the people who are part of the Taliban. Maybe even to hate the Taliban. They have killed people we love. They have killed innocent civilians all over the world. They have disrupted the world in many ways, made it more fearful, less free.
I think to myself about them what do you feel like when you have blown an American soldier or an Afghan bride to pieces? Do you have a sick feeling in your stomach, seeing that? Or do you rejoice?
No matter what anyone says,
I am going to choose to believe that something in them, something deep in them that they might never admit to another person, feels badly about it.
No matter how different we are, I am going to choose to believe that, being human, somewhere deep within we connect, even during war, in a way that is deeper than the divides of country or religion or hate.
So it may or may not surprise you that when I pray, I pray for the Taliban boys' peace as much as I pray for our own boys and their peace and safety.
Why?
Because their peace means our peace.
Our military people follow strict rules. In the middle of war, they are trained to follow the rules of engagement, to respect peace, and if possible, to respond without violence.
Our military do not initiate conflict. The rules of engagement are that we respond to conflict appropriately.
Our soldiers are trained to respond, and they will respond. I am not in any way advocating that they not respond. It is their duty and their job to do so, and I respect them for doing their job well.
But they will not and do not start conflict. That requires so much strength under pressure that I admire them tremendously for it.
It can be very, very difficult sometimes to walk that line. And mistakes can be made.
But it means that we will hold the line at peace if you will. We will not start it.
So if I want our boys to be safe,
I pray that the other side will not start it.
I pray, and I think of a young man in hot and dry Afghanistan. Maybe he is being taught how to wire a cell phone into a what’s-the-word, the thing that detonates a bomb remotely.
Maybe he grew up with hatred of Westerners. Maybe he was taught it from his infancy from his father, his mother, his uncle.
Maybe he didn’t, but maybe he just never fit in. Didn’t have good looks or good skin or as much money or a mother who loved him or any self-confidence because he was never good enough in his father’s eyes.
Hate societies have a way of welcoming those who feel as if the world rejected them.
Whatever the case, whether hatred of democracy and western ways and free thought were bred into him, or whether he got sucked into something that horrifies his parents…
…hate is taught.
But I believe that deep, deep inside a person,
They know right from wrong.
People know true good from real evil.
They choose.
Maybe he is afraid to disobey the orders of his Taliban leaders or his Taliban buddies or his cousin in the Taliban or his father. They are telling him to start something. Maybe he is afraid of what will happen to him. It wouldn’t be pleasant.
When I was a little, little girl, I lived in a very racist area. But before I knew the word for racism, I knew it was wrong.
We can be taught hate. But deep within us, we can choose not to hate.
We can take the tiniest little steps to something different.
And those tiny steps matter.
They are the drops that build a river of goodness.
So many times when fear comes to me, instead of letting it control me, I pray,
and I reach out to the young man of the Taliban.
Maybe not start anything today, I offer to him. Maybe when you see the helicopter fly over today, if you have a rocket on your shoulder…maybe today you will tell yourself that you are not ready…and you will let your finger relax on the trigger.
A tiny step.
A huge step.
I reach out in my heart to the young man with the cell phone is his hand. The distance is nothing in prayer.
Maybe not today, I offer, in peace and encouragement and kindess. Maybe today you will feel goodness in your heart. Maybe because if it you will not be able to finish working on that phone today. Or maybe you will drop it so that it doesn’t work right.
Or maybe when the young men in American or British camouflage are standing near the buried bomb…
maybe you will pause just the tiniest bit.
And not do it. Not start it today. Maybe just not today.
Maybe not tomorrow either. Maybe today will give you a little strength for tomorrow, and I pray for that too.
May you know peace, I pray. May you feel love. May goodness come to you and yours.
May the tiny little decision you make with your finger on the trigger or the phone
Mean a day that no one dies in Helmand Province
Not your people
Not our people
May nothing start, because of you
And your courage, your little step of peace.
And may something take flight in your heart in that moment, and soar
Towards goodness.
Believe what you want, about who God or Allah or the Universal Spirit is. Believe that some of us are going to hell and some are going to reward. Offer to anyone your way of believing.
But beyond that, please believe that
it is up to the One you believe in to sort out about
who is going to hell, and who is going to heaven,
and when
And let it go. Let the bomb go, let the trigger finger relax.
I send you love, as an emissary of peace.
I send love to them.
It is the best way I know to protect my son and his friends.
War is an event between countries. War is the nations of NATO against the Taliban. It is a big event. War has rules. War’s intention is to create peace, but it is impersonal and massive and it does not change quickly or easily.
Peace is an event between people. Peace is tiny. Peace is personal. Peace is flexible and fluid, and it happens one little decision at a time. And peace can turn on a dime. It can be created or destroyed in a moment.
The destruction of peace creates war, on a small or large scale.
The creation of peace creates peace.
Maybe the young man will feel something today from my prayers. Maybe he won’t. I’ll never know.
But what I will know deep in my heart is that I strove to create peace. I did the same good that I am asking the young man in the Taliban to do. I put aside my fear and my anger and my hate, and I offered...nothing.
I offer nothing; no advice, no criticism, no you're-wrong, no judgement. No 'start'.
And I ask for nothing: no detonation. No trigger pull. I pray for nothing to happen in that moment.
No start.
One little moment of nothing happening.
One little drop of peace.
Little by little they can wash away the war.
Friday, August 7, 2009
Honor Thy Children
You probably know the saying. It goes right along in the commandments with “love God” and “treat others as you want to be treated”.
How come it doesn’t instruct us to love and honor our children, as specifically as the other rules do?
Because I’d like to do that right now.
Two days of no communications from Zach meant that a death had taken place. I have personal feelings now about the young men who are killed in Afghanistan. They are not just numbers glossed over in the news. They are part of my family's life now, because my son may be part of the team who picks up their body and begins to escort it home.
It is difficult for every single person who is part of that escorting process.
When we love someone deeply, we want to share their lives, even – and perhaps especially – the difficult parts. That is where the work of love happens. The rest of it, the easy parts, are just fun. Love looks in at the difficult parts, and even when flinching, holds out its hands to help.
So, while we learn as a family what it means to love someone who is at the front parts of a war, we are learning to look at those difficult parts too.
When Zach does not call Courtney, I know someone has died.
There is no need to turn on the television. There is a website I go to now to find out: http://icasualties.org/oef/
And there are the names, and the provinces in Afghanistan, and what the young man did, and how his death happened.
This is all so hard to write. These are human beings, loved by other people.
Zach called Courtney early this morning to talk after the communications blackout had been lifted.
On Tuesday night, they escorted the body of a young man who had been killed back to the camp. Zach spoke of it briefly to Courtney. This time, it was not a small and precious box, but a bag holding the soldier’s body to take home.
Are there gentler words? If so, I would like to know them. We must choose the most gentle, respectful words there are.
Right now it is a Friday night in the small, happy town where I live. My husband has just helped the local fire company set up an outdoor movie, and there are literally hundreds of families outside in the beautiful night air watching Kung Fu Panda from their lawn chairs, happily munching popcorn under safe, quiet, starry full-moon skies.
I am writing outside in a white rocking chair. Comfortable. Safe.
Our oldest son should be just finishing his flight duty for tonight. It would be about 4 am there.
When I was his age, I was cocktail waitressing during the night and water-skiing during the day and generally having the time of my life. Almost no responsibility what so ever.
I would like to extend admiration to my son as crew chief, and to the pilot and co-pilot of the helicopter, and the AO and the ground crew for having the presence of mind and learned skill to crew an enormous helicopter; to get that multi-million dollar bird safely maintained, loaded, up, out and back, and to watch the whole time for someone who might try to attack them.
This is why I would like us to honor our children, honor what they are capable of, so young, and so strong. As they are flying over hamlets and homes, the people looking up at the helicopter do not know the individuals flying in it, or the cargo of the plane, or how those in the plane are affected by what they are carrying in the plane.
If I saw an armed helicopter fly over my patio right now as I sit in the rocking chair, and saw Zach or Scott pointing a gun at me, would I feel safe? And what about if they looked different from me, came from another land, were dressed completely differently in battle gear? Would I feel safe?
Not likely.
But they do not know how hard these young men have trained to be able to control their emotions and assess a situation clearly and intelligently.
If my son needed to do so, he would not hesitate at all to follow protocol and fire.
But they do not know how respectful he is of human and other life. I know him. He thinks quickly. He respects life of every kind. He would not fire inappropriately.
They do not know that my son is one of the kindest, most laughing people I have ever had the privilege of knowing.
They do not know how good his pattern recognition is, how quick his eyes are.
They do not know how safe they are with him over them, even though he may have a gun trained right on them.
The mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters and girlfriends in Afghanistan worry like we do.
I wish I could say to them, who are living with this war as we are, but so much closer to it: there are two boys from Hereford, Maryland up there over you. They may be carrying soldiers to the forward bases, or food to them, or medical supplies, or Humvee parts. They may have cartons of mail to soldiers who are hungry for news from home, or reassuring mail from them back to their families here.
Or they may be escorting not mail, not supplies, but something far lighter, and much harder to carry.
No matter what the cargo, no matter how they feel about it, they will manage their feelings and do their job. And underneath all the training, all the restraint-in-response, all the readiness, are young men who have good hearts.
War is the crudest form of diplomacy. And yet, it can accomplish good every day. As they fly over, the opportunity for peace exists between you. I can give you my word that they will honor it. Our sons are strong, and good. Look up, and trust.
How come it doesn’t instruct us to love and honor our children, as specifically as the other rules do?
Because I’d like to do that right now.
Two days of no communications from Zach meant that a death had taken place. I have personal feelings now about the young men who are killed in Afghanistan. They are not just numbers glossed over in the news. They are part of my family's life now, because my son may be part of the team who picks up their body and begins to escort it home.
It is difficult for every single person who is part of that escorting process.
When we love someone deeply, we want to share their lives, even – and perhaps especially – the difficult parts. That is where the work of love happens. The rest of it, the easy parts, are just fun. Love looks in at the difficult parts, and even when flinching, holds out its hands to help.
So, while we learn as a family what it means to love someone who is at the front parts of a war, we are learning to look at those difficult parts too.
When Zach does not call Courtney, I know someone has died.
There is no need to turn on the television. There is a website I go to now to find out: http://icasualties.org/oef/
And there are the names, and the provinces in Afghanistan, and what the young man did, and how his death happened.
This is all so hard to write. These are human beings, loved by other people.
Zach called Courtney early this morning to talk after the communications blackout had been lifted.
On Tuesday night, they escorted the body of a young man who had been killed back to the camp. Zach spoke of it briefly to Courtney. This time, it was not a small and precious box, but a bag holding the soldier’s body to take home.
Are there gentler words? If so, I would like to know them. We must choose the most gentle, respectful words there are.
Right now it is a Friday night in the small, happy town where I live. My husband has just helped the local fire company set up an outdoor movie, and there are literally hundreds of families outside in the beautiful night air watching Kung Fu Panda from their lawn chairs, happily munching popcorn under safe, quiet, starry full-moon skies.
I am writing outside in a white rocking chair. Comfortable. Safe.
Our oldest son should be just finishing his flight duty for tonight. It would be about 4 am there.
When I was his age, I was cocktail waitressing during the night and water-skiing during the day and generally having the time of my life. Almost no responsibility what so ever.
I would like to extend admiration to my son as crew chief, and to the pilot and co-pilot of the helicopter, and the AO and the ground crew for having the presence of mind and learned skill to crew an enormous helicopter; to get that multi-million dollar bird safely maintained, loaded, up, out and back, and to watch the whole time for someone who might try to attack them.
This is why I would like us to honor our children, honor what they are capable of, so young, and so strong. As they are flying over hamlets and homes, the people looking up at the helicopter do not know the individuals flying in it, or the cargo of the plane, or how those in the plane are affected by what they are carrying in the plane.
If I saw an armed helicopter fly over my patio right now as I sit in the rocking chair, and saw Zach or Scott pointing a gun at me, would I feel safe? And what about if they looked different from me, came from another land, were dressed completely differently in battle gear? Would I feel safe?
Not likely.
But they do not know how hard these young men have trained to be able to control their emotions and assess a situation clearly and intelligently.
If my son needed to do so, he would not hesitate at all to follow protocol and fire.
But they do not know how respectful he is of human and other life. I know him. He thinks quickly. He respects life of every kind. He would not fire inappropriately.
They do not know that my son is one of the kindest, most laughing people I have ever had the privilege of knowing.
They do not know how good his pattern recognition is, how quick his eyes are.
They do not know how safe they are with him over them, even though he may have a gun trained right on them.
The mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters and girlfriends in Afghanistan worry like we do.
I wish I could say to them, who are living with this war as we are, but so much closer to it: there are two boys from Hereford, Maryland up there over you. They may be carrying soldiers to the forward bases, or food to them, or medical supplies, or Humvee parts. They may have cartons of mail to soldiers who are hungry for news from home, or reassuring mail from them back to their families here.
Or they may be escorting not mail, not supplies, but something far lighter, and much harder to carry.
No matter what the cargo, no matter how they feel about it, they will manage their feelings and do their job. And underneath all the training, all the restraint-in-response, all the readiness, are young men who have good hearts.
War is the crudest form of diplomacy. And yet, it can accomplish good every day. As they fly over, the opportunity for peace exists between you. I can give you my word that they will honor it. Our sons are strong, and good. Look up, and trust.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Wednesday email from Zach
It was so nice to get this email!
I’ll keep you posted, but there may be a picture of me on the USMC website soon. There was a guy from Combat Camera testing out his new night vision camera on one of our flights. He got some pretty cool pictures of us.
Dinner was good the other night. Sundays we get ice cream (which doesn’t last very long in this heat) and usually steak and seafood. The flights here are long but I’m pretty much in the swing of things now. I’m not half falling asleep by the time we land at the crack of day!
The flight crews work about a fourteen-hour day, and maintainers about twelve hours a day. I go to work in the afternoon when the sun is high and it’s halfway up the sky the next morning by the time I get to sleep.
The days pass quickly though, since every day seems the same…it’s like the movie Groundhog Day.
More folks moved in yesterday. It’s going to be nuts around here until everyone gets settled in and in a routine.
I’ve spend the last few days putting together a brief for my guys about what to expect and how things are run out here flight-wise. I catch a lot of grief from maintainers since I’ve moved up to operations because they think I don’t work. They don't really know what I do behind the scenes and how much of my time it occupies. It's okay. The experience I get managing this program will be a benefit in the real world. They also don’t spend seven hours a day in the back of the plane :-)
Everything’s going well, though. Thanks for getting that coffee and stuff, that will be way better than sugar-filled energy drinks. Give Riley a pet for me and tell everyone I said hi, and that I love you all,
Zach
Courtney relays that his predictions were correct: unloading the massive baggage that was needed to support their squadron was a huge job. Getting to work was hard because the buses were tied up with shuttling people from the airfield to their tents and bunks. And it will be meetings, and training them in the new procedures at an extremely rapid pace, and flying right away, and them getting adjusted to the heat and where to eat and how to get to work...so much, but it will, I'm sure, very neatly and quickly resolve itself, and in a day or so the whole squadron will be running the operation well. And the folks leaving can go home to a well-deserved rest.
And to welcome the new guys, the A/C broke, so everyone got to enjoy the 130 degree heat right off. Oh, and the phones went out.
Thanks for checking in,
Katie
I’ll keep you posted, but there may be a picture of me on the USMC website soon. There was a guy from Combat Camera testing out his new night vision camera on one of our flights. He got some pretty cool pictures of us.
Dinner was good the other night. Sundays we get ice cream (which doesn’t last very long in this heat) and usually steak and seafood. The flights here are long but I’m pretty much in the swing of things now. I’m not half falling asleep by the time we land at the crack of day!
The flight crews work about a fourteen-hour day, and maintainers about twelve hours a day. I go to work in the afternoon when the sun is high and it’s halfway up the sky the next morning by the time I get to sleep.
The days pass quickly though, since every day seems the same…it’s like the movie Groundhog Day.
More folks moved in yesterday. It’s going to be nuts around here until everyone gets settled in and in a routine.
I’ve spend the last few days putting together a brief for my guys about what to expect and how things are run out here flight-wise. I catch a lot of grief from maintainers since I’ve moved up to operations because they think I don’t work. They don't really know what I do behind the scenes and how much of my time it occupies. It's okay. The experience I get managing this program will be a benefit in the real world. They also don’t spend seven hours a day in the back of the plane :-)
Everything’s going well, though. Thanks for getting that coffee and stuff, that will be way better than sugar-filled energy drinks. Give Riley a pet for me and tell everyone I said hi, and that I love you all,
Zach
Courtney relays that his predictions were correct: unloading the massive baggage that was needed to support their squadron was a huge job. Getting to work was hard because the buses were tied up with shuttling people from the airfield to their tents and bunks. And it will be meetings, and training them in the new procedures at an extremely rapid pace, and flying right away, and them getting adjusted to the heat and where to eat and how to get to work...so much, but it will, I'm sure, very neatly and quickly resolve itself, and in a day or so the whole squadron will be running the operation well. And the folks leaving can go home to a well-deserved rest.
And to welcome the new guys, the A/C broke, so everyone got to enjoy the 130 degree heat right off. Oh, and the phones went out.
Thanks for checking in,
Katie
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Letter From The Commanding Officer
LtCol Christopher Abrams wrote to many of the families to tell them news. He praised the squadron's efforts to date, and noted that families would be hearing that it was HOT. But, he added that morale is very high and his Marines are ready, saying, "...as you well know, we thrive when most would be uncomfortable and they are quickly adapting.
He promised to send updates every so often to provide us with some perspective and info on how they are doing, and closed in reminding us to "be confident that our Marines are well-trained and ready to accept this challenge."
They are great.
I also told Zach to quit exaggerating. He's been saying it's 130 degrees but the CO clearly says it's a balmy 112 degrees.
Thanks for checking in,
Katie
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
So…What Are We Doing There, Exactly?
It seems so long ago, 9/11, and the beginning of the war in Afghanistan.
Over that long stretch of years, the Taliban has worked continuously to grow their influence there, especially during the time that military focus was on Iraq.
They are strong.
They bomb and hurt people, deliberately choosing civilians.
They make people afraid.
Fear is the control-choice of terrorists.
Elections are the opposite of fear: instead of curbing choices, offering them. Not telling people what they must do, but asking a people what they will do.
Elections are an example of control stemming from faith in freedom.
And so still now, as then, as so many places and times in history, it can reduce to a simple choice: will the world will be controlled by fear...or by faith in freedom?
Afghanistan is trying mightily to have elections, and the Taliban is increasing violence against those elections, and against those who will be trying to protect the people casting their votes.
Who will win? Or perhaps it should be worded, what will win? Fear? Or faith in free choice?
They are far, far from us, those bearded men in turbans walking to the polls, and their wives and children, and those running for political office. But our fate and theirs is linked in complex ways.
Our sons are over there, trying to help hold the fear at bay. The result of those elections, and the success or failure of Taliban violence at disrupting them, will feed or starve terrorism there and in other parts of the world.
Respect for survival of the fittest is ingrained in our human natures.
And in Afghanistan, respect for survival of the fittest may come down to respect for those who protected the elections…or respect for those who disrupted them.
How can we practice strength with restraint? How can we fight terrorism and not create fear?
From the webblog link below:
In his first day on the job, the new Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen outlined how he plans to prevent Afghanistan from becoming a "grand central station" of terrorism.
Rasmussen started with a pledge to ensure security for the upcoming elections.
Al Jazeera's James Bays illustrates the enormity of the task, after news of more violence in the country via a uTube video on this link: www.helmandblog.blogspot.com/
Please take a moment to click on the uTube dated Tuesday.
Thank you for checking in,
Katie
Over that long stretch of years, the Taliban has worked continuously to grow their influence there, especially during the time that military focus was on Iraq.
They are strong.
They bomb and hurt people, deliberately choosing civilians.
They make people afraid.
Fear is the control-choice of terrorists.
Elections are the opposite of fear: instead of curbing choices, offering them. Not telling people what they must do, but asking a people what they will do.
Elections are an example of control stemming from faith in freedom.
And so still now, as then, as so many places and times in history, it can reduce to a simple choice: will the world will be controlled by fear...or by faith in freedom?
Afghanistan is trying mightily to have elections, and the Taliban is increasing violence against those elections, and against those who will be trying to protect the people casting their votes.
Who will win? Or perhaps it should be worded, what will win? Fear? Or faith in free choice?
They are far, far from us, those bearded men in turbans walking to the polls, and their wives and children, and those running for political office. But our fate and theirs is linked in complex ways.
Our sons are over there, trying to help hold the fear at bay. The result of those elections, and the success or failure of Taliban violence at disrupting them, will feed or starve terrorism there and in other parts of the world.
Respect for survival of the fittest is ingrained in our human natures.
And in Afghanistan, respect for survival of the fittest may come down to respect for those who protected the elections…or respect for those who disrupted them.
How can we practice strength with restraint? How can we fight terrorism and not create fear?
From the webblog link below:
In his first day on the job, the new Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen outlined how he plans to prevent Afghanistan from becoming a "grand central station" of terrorism.
Rasmussen started with a pledge to ensure security for the upcoming elections.
Al Jazeera's James Bays illustrates the enormity of the task, after news of more violence in the country via a uTube video on this link: www.helmandblog.blogspot.com/
Please take a moment to click on the uTube dated Tuesday.
Thank you for checking in,
Katie
Monday, August 3, 2009
Wonderful Monotony
The last few days, Zach has called his girlfriend Courtney - and she’s been great about relaying information to us. Mostly he has enjoyed his work. The flights have been unexciting (that’s a very very good thing) and the days, while busy, seem to go fast.
He has flown in the couple of weeks there more hours than he would fly in a month in Hawaii. Lots and lots of flying! Still mostly at night, so it’s cooler. Not for the day guys though!
He is anxiously awaiting the first packages from home. They get mail twice a week, so I’m thinking he didn’t get our package today, and will have to wait four more days for it.
From an email:
I’m so ready for it to cool off. I took a shower today before work and the cold water was the same temp as the air...130 degrees. I’m flying nights now so it's a lot better. Still have to get the plane ready in the heat but at least the 6+ hours in the air are a little cooler.
Thanks for checking in,
He has flown in the couple of weeks there more hours than he would fly in a month in Hawaii. Lots and lots of flying! Still mostly at night, so it’s cooler. Not for the day guys though!
He is anxiously awaiting the first packages from home. They get mail twice a week, so I’m thinking he didn’t get our package today, and will have to wait four more days for it.
From an email:
I’m so ready for it to cool off. I took a shower today before work and the cold water was the same temp as the air...130 degrees. I’m flying nights now so it's a lot better. Still have to get the plane ready in the heat but at least the 6+ hours in the air are a little cooler.
Thanks for checking in,
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Sleep! !!! !!!!
Zach reported that he got the gift of straight six hours of sleep last night
It's the best and longest sleep he's gotten since they left their permanent duty station two weeks ago.
Simple pleasures :-)
Thanks for checking in.
It's the best and longest sleep he's gotten since they left their permanent duty station two weeks ago.
Simple pleasures :-)
Thanks for checking in.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Too Quiet On The Eastern Front
It is a peaceful night here. It is quiet.
It is too quiet.
I admit to being spoiled. I said so in an earlier post. We’re a close family who talks together a fair amount, so if communication channels exist, we generally touch base with each other.
When the phone is quiet, and I don’t hear from Zach or from his girlfriend, at first I worry.
Then I tell myself that I’m being stupid, that he’s just busy or tired. Or working hard and needing to rest.
And then silence becomes deafening: I remember the communication shut-down policy on the base when someone dies.
Zach has not called us all day.
That means someone may be getting an awful message.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
As a nation, we value life. We hate loss of life.
I believe that human beings feel the same all over the world.
I believe that young men of free will are at risk of being hurt from voluntary risk-taking, no matter where they are in the world.
I know we have been lucky as a family, with the risks my boys have taken, that they are all whole and sound.
When a young person is hurt anywhere, anytime, people feel compassion and sadness.
When a young person is hurt from gunfire or a bomb as part of a military campaign, something else is added to that feeling.
I am moving very carefully and slowly here. I want to choose my words with great care and great honesty.
What is it that makes military death even harder for us?
What is it?
The military efforts in Afghanistan are escalating now in Helmand province because elections are coming up, and the Taliban is promising violence to anyone who supports free choice of leadership: http://www.voanews.com/english/2009-07-30-voa16.cfm
Many Afghan people want to vote.
Some Taliban, Afghan and otherwise, oppose it.
And there we are.
I wish the phone would ring. It would mean that, even though political and religious disagreements continue in countries far to the east of us…at least everyone is going home safe, to argue for another day.
Thank you for checking in.
It is too quiet.
I admit to being spoiled. I said so in an earlier post. We’re a close family who talks together a fair amount, so if communication channels exist, we generally touch base with each other.
When the phone is quiet, and I don’t hear from Zach or from his girlfriend, at first I worry.
Then I tell myself that I’m being stupid, that he’s just busy or tired. Or working hard and needing to rest.
And then silence becomes deafening: I remember the communication shut-down policy on the base when someone dies.
Zach has not called us all day.
That means someone may be getting an awful message.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
As a nation, we value life. We hate loss of life.
I believe that human beings feel the same all over the world.
I believe that young men of free will are at risk of being hurt from voluntary risk-taking, no matter where they are in the world.
I know we have been lucky as a family, with the risks my boys have taken, that they are all whole and sound.
When a young person is hurt anywhere, anytime, people feel compassion and sadness.
When a young person is hurt from gunfire or a bomb as part of a military campaign, something else is added to that feeling.
I am moving very carefully and slowly here. I want to choose my words with great care and great honesty.
What is it that makes military death even harder for us?
What is it?
The military efforts in Afghanistan are escalating now in Helmand province because elections are coming up, and the Taliban is promising violence to anyone who supports free choice of leadership: http://www.voanews.com/english/2009-07-30-voa16.cfm
Many Afghan people want to vote.
Some Taliban, Afghan and otherwise, oppose it.
And there we are.
I wish the phone would ring. It would mean that, even though political and religious disagreements continue in countries far to the east of us…at least everyone is going home safe, to argue for another day.
Thank you for checking in.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
It’s 1:30 a.m. Do You Know Where Your Kids Are?
I’m writing that half-seriously and half-facetiously. I don’t remember what well-intentioned commercial owned that line, which was supposed to encourage improved parenting, but it sticks in our society, an imaginary finger wagging at us in admonishment.
I’ts about 6 in the evening here, which makes it 1:30 a.m. Kabul time. Zach is in the helicopter. He likes night flights.
Why? Well, among other things, it’s much cooler. The weather forecast is mid- to upper 90’s every day, but drops to the mid 60’s every night. That’s 30 degrees of heat that drifts off with the night air. Subtract warmth due to the wind-speed at which they fly, and add the heat of the helicopter, and you have a nice temperate flight.
Part of this story is about big thoughts, and part of it is about small details. The tiniest, most insignificant facts of daily life will give us a greater sense of what their deployment is like, so expect to read many little daily-life descriptions here.
One of them is about rack space. Older soldiers and environmentalists, buckle up: their tents are air conditioned.
The soldier whose bunk is below Zach’s is due to head back to his permanent duty station as his deployment ends. He is going to give Zach his bunk (rack) which is lower to the ground. So it’s cooler. Easier to get into and out of. Quieter, as it’s not right under the blower. All in all, that 3-foot change in real estate makes for a far more comfortable rack than what he has now. So he’s looking forward to that. And in typical guy style, the incoming fellow who gets the top bunk next…well, too bad for him!
Another little detail is what it’s like to mail a letter. He wanted to send a little present to his girlfriend that he bought in Bagram, and went out looking for the post office. In a camp which is rapidly growing in size, Zach apparently looked for over an hour and still couldn’t find the post office.
Was he walking? Are there buses that go about the extensive camp? We don’t know. There are so many, many things, little things, that we don’t know about their lives. I know the camp is experiencing booming growth, as the troop surges happen. The infrastructure must grow very quickly with it. I don’t know how big the camp is, or how people get around. And the phone calls are too short, too valued, to waste time asking detailed questions.
I do know that to get from “work” to their sleeping tents, they have to take a bus. I don’t know how often the buses run; I know they have to wait for them.
They have access to email, but for many it’s a long hot walk to the crowded computer center. I know that emails we send to the address Zach can get often bounce back; we’re not sure why.
And I know that to make a phone call, he must sign up for a time slot. The time slots are for ½ hour, but it seems as if he doesn’t have a whole half-hour to talk. I don’t know if all the guys there have access to the same phones, or if Zach’s office responsibilities give him easier access.
So many little, mundane-but-important wonderings. We share the same ones as other parents.
One father said he thought he hear bullet fire in the background as he was talking to his son. I would say to him that he may have heard the constant sound of chopper rotors. I may be wrong, but what an awful thing for a father to wonder about and worry over.
The proximity to phone and email does kind of give us an illusion of security. But these much-appreciated communications seem to affirm that once the adjustment to life on deployment happens, once they get to work, they relax a bit and their natural personalities show up again.
For my son, it's a strong focus on work and responsibility mixed with an easy sense of humor. It was delightful to get an email from Zach today, and to read his words. He sounds relaxed and at ease:
“I’m sitting at work with nothing to do…we are launching late tonight and won’t be back till sometime in the morning. I think I’m going to take a nap in a bit. It’s my first night flight in a while, and the first time I’ve landed in a dusty desert since Arizona in May…should be interesting.
I talked to [my girlfriend] again today. She’s doing well. It’s always so good to hear her voice even if it’s only for a few minutes a day. I’m looking forward to getting my packages from you guys and her. I have some stuff to take care of and I want to get a bit of sleep if possible before tonight’s flight.
Thank you so much for checking in.
I’ts about 6 in the evening here, which makes it 1:30 a.m. Kabul time. Zach is in the helicopter. He likes night flights.
Why? Well, among other things, it’s much cooler. The weather forecast is mid- to upper 90’s every day, but drops to the mid 60’s every night. That’s 30 degrees of heat that drifts off with the night air. Subtract warmth due to the wind-speed at which they fly, and add the heat of the helicopter, and you have a nice temperate flight.
Part of this story is about big thoughts, and part of it is about small details. The tiniest, most insignificant facts of daily life will give us a greater sense of what their deployment is like, so expect to read many little daily-life descriptions here.
One of them is about rack space. Older soldiers and environmentalists, buckle up: their tents are air conditioned.
The soldier whose bunk is below Zach’s is due to head back to his permanent duty station as his deployment ends. He is going to give Zach his bunk (rack) which is lower to the ground. So it’s cooler. Easier to get into and out of. Quieter, as it’s not right under the blower. All in all, that 3-foot change in real estate makes for a far more comfortable rack than what he has now. So he’s looking forward to that. And in typical guy style, the incoming fellow who gets the top bunk next…well, too bad for him!
Another little detail is what it’s like to mail a letter. He wanted to send a little present to his girlfriend that he bought in Bagram, and went out looking for the post office. In a camp which is rapidly growing in size, Zach apparently looked for over an hour and still couldn’t find the post office.
Was he walking? Are there buses that go about the extensive camp? We don’t know. There are so many, many things, little things, that we don’t know about their lives. I know the camp is experiencing booming growth, as the troop surges happen. The infrastructure must grow very quickly with it. I don’t know how big the camp is, or how people get around. And the phone calls are too short, too valued, to waste time asking detailed questions.
I do know that to get from “work” to their sleeping tents, they have to take a bus. I don’t know how often the buses run; I know they have to wait for them.
They have access to email, but for many it’s a long hot walk to the crowded computer center. I know that emails we send to the address Zach can get often bounce back; we’re not sure why.
And I know that to make a phone call, he must sign up for a time slot. The time slots are for ½ hour, but it seems as if he doesn’t have a whole half-hour to talk. I don’t know if all the guys there have access to the same phones, or if Zach’s office responsibilities give him easier access.
So many little, mundane-but-important wonderings. We share the same ones as other parents.
One father said he thought he hear bullet fire in the background as he was talking to his son. I would say to him that he may have heard the constant sound of chopper rotors. I may be wrong, but what an awful thing for a father to wonder about and worry over.
The proximity to phone and email does kind of give us an illusion of security. But these much-appreciated communications seem to affirm that once the adjustment to life on deployment happens, once they get to work, they relax a bit and their natural personalities show up again.
For my son, it's a strong focus on work and responsibility mixed with an easy sense of humor. It was delightful to get an email from Zach today, and to read his words. He sounds relaxed and at ease:
“I’m sitting at work with nothing to do…we are launching late tonight and won’t be back till sometime in the morning. I think I’m going to take a nap in a bit. It’s my first night flight in a while, and the first time I’ve landed in a dusty desert since Arizona in May…should be interesting.
I talked to [my girlfriend] again today. She’s doing well. It’s always so good to hear her voice even if it’s only for a few minutes a day. I’m looking forward to getting my packages from you guys and her. I have some stuff to take care of and I want to get a bit of sleep if possible before tonight’s flight.
Thank you so much for checking in.
Monday, July 27, 2009
We Are A Little Spoiled
War is different, and war is the same. Back in the day, you hugged goodbye, and longed for letters that arrived days or sometimes weeks later
It's still really hard to send loved ones there.
But it's really nice that sometimes now, they get to phone home.
An FOB is a Forward Operations Base. Closer to the bullets. The closer you are, the fewer communications options, in terms of phones and mail delivery.
But the support teams who work out of the main camp have, astonishingly, access to phones and sometimes email. We feel so very, very lucky to talk as much as we have been able to do.
Zach talked with both his girlfriend and me over the weekend. She and I have an agreement to text each other when either of us gets a call. We tell each other the news from him. Even the littlest details are important to us. We share every word.
Well, maybe not every word. I mean, she's his girlfriend. But most words get shared.
The teams on Zach and Scott's helicopter fly back and forth to FOBs regularly. Their responsiblities are to take food, supplies, and precious mail and packages from home. They take soldiers to and from the FOB. They evacuate casualties, and carry home those whose lives are taken away. Sometimes they fly other people, such as journalists.
We know a little more about how hot it is there: the thermometer near the pilots' seats reads about 130 degrees.
It's, um, hotter in the back of the helicopter.
Nobody needs Paris Hilton to say..."That's hot."
Because that's really hot.
Now put on the fifty pounds of body armor, and the helmet, and get your finger on the trigger of the gun in the plane door, and fly for hours with your eyes peeled on the ground watching for any sign of flash of gunfire.
Hot, and exhausting.
We talked about how many people in Afghanistan are welcoming to the American and Allied efforts in their country. Many are also not at all. Just like our country, people have different opinions and beliefs.
Zach said it is so strange, so foreign a feeling, to fly low over settlements and see people moving around below them. Wondering if one of them will run into a building and run out with something to shoot at them. Wondering who of the people they see below are friendly, and who are not.
Many are friendly; but who do you trust? And how do you know to trust them? We who live in peaceful places do not understand the strain that that puts on human beings...on both sides.
Zach told me today that after he flew his last mission, he came back so very tired to his tent and said hi to Scott, who went out and came back five minutes later to find Zach sound, sound, sound asleep. He woke hours later in the same filthy clothes, astonished and wondering when he'd fallen asleep.
Despite the heat and the strain, they feel good about their work. They know that there are people at the FOB who are depending on them.
For us, it felt good to pack up some small things Zach asked for, and ship them to him. It just feels so very good to help people.
It doesn't solve the problems of the world...but it makes today better.
It's still really hard to send loved ones there.
But it's really nice that sometimes now, they get to phone home.
An FOB is a Forward Operations Base. Closer to the bullets. The closer you are, the fewer communications options, in terms of phones and mail delivery.
But the support teams who work out of the main camp have, astonishingly, access to phones and sometimes email. We feel so very, very lucky to talk as much as we have been able to do.
Zach talked with both his girlfriend and me over the weekend. She and I have an agreement to text each other when either of us gets a call. We tell each other the news from him. Even the littlest details are important to us. We share every word.
Well, maybe not every word. I mean, she's his girlfriend. But most words get shared.
The teams on Zach and Scott's helicopter fly back and forth to FOBs regularly. Their responsiblities are to take food, supplies, and precious mail and packages from home. They take soldiers to and from the FOB. They evacuate casualties, and carry home those whose lives are taken away. Sometimes they fly other people, such as journalists.
We know a little more about how hot it is there: the thermometer near the pilots' seats reads about 130 degrees.
It's, um, hotter in the back of the helicopter.
Nobody needs Paris Hilton to say..."That's hot."
Because that's really hot.
Now put on the fifty pounds of body armor, and the helmet, and get your finger on the trigger of the gun in the plane door, and fly for hours with your eyes peeled on the ground watching for any sign of flash of gunfire.
Hot, and exhausting.
We talked about how many people in Afghanistan are welcoming to the American and Allied efforts in their country. Many are also not at all. Just like our country, people have different opinions and beliefs.
Zach said it is so strange, so foreign a feeling, to fly low over settlements and see people moving around below them. Wondering if one of them will run into a building and run out with something to shoot at them. Wondering who of the people they see below are friendly, and who are not.
Many are friendly; but who do you trust? And how do you know to trust them? We who live in peaceful places do not understand the strain that that puts on human beings...on both sides.
Zach told me today that after he flew his last mission, he came back so very tired to his tent and said hi to Scott, who went out and came back five minutes later to find Zach sound, sound, sound asleep. He woke hours later in the same filthy clothes, astonished and wondering when he'd fallen asleep.
Despite the heat and the strain, they feel good about their work. They know that there are people at the FOB who are depending on them.
For us, it felt good to pack up some small things Zach asked for, and ship them to him. It just feels so very good to help people.
It doesn't solve the problems of the world...but it makes today better.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
It's Not Training Any More
Zach called today; good phone reception. He said that they started work immediately upon arrival. I guess with the long delays in travel, the outgoing group needs to get them up to speed quickly.
He woke long before dawn to start work. His crew just finished a double shift. The good news is, he said casually, that nobody shot at them while they were flying.
Yes.
Now: it’s the first time I am going to use the word ‘troops’, and I want to proceed carefully here.
I have always been ambivalent about the word ‘troops’. It’s a word of respect. But it’s a word of distance. Of de-humanization.
We hear about ‘troops’ going into battle or peacekeeping or support work. We stand taller in the presence of the word. It implies trained-fighting-men.
We do not hear about sons and husbands and people we love going into battle. But they are: husbands and sons and brothers and nephews and uncles and cousins and boyfriends and fiancés.
So saying ‘troops’ is shorthand for they’re trained for this and yet, it sort of dehumanizes them. The word itself strips them of their emotional connections to us and to other human beings, and isolates them. They are a body unto themselves, connected for the time being to the rest of the troops. Removed from us and our sphere of influence.
Troops are moved around the country, and troops fight battles. Troops are deployed.
Soldiers are wounded or killed or captured, rescued, evacuated or praised or punished, and return home from deployment.
Somehow soldiers, even though a similar word, sounds more compassionate than troops.
As it is time for me to use these words for the first time in my own writing, I am squirming a little inside, wondering if I will use them, if they will become as hollow in my writing as they are to me when I hear them…or if I can find something more meaningful.
In the end, a thing has to have a name for us to begin to understand it. And yet, so often, the very word that illuminates something also limits our understanding of it, and our connection to it, as well.
So I will say to you that in the long day that Zach worked today, he helped to fly young fighting men and older fighting men back and forth to different places. I don’t know where or for what.
I am need to proceed even more carefully with the next words…because they are not descriptive of a group of healthy strong men. They are descriptive of one man, someone loved by people I do not know; a young man to whom I want to be very respectful, and people to whom I want to be extremely respectful as well.
All of the travel, fatigue, frustration, good spirits and frustration were nothing but a prelude.
How do you even say this? It is too real now.
On their first day, their crew flew the remains of a soldier who had been killed back to base. He had been hit by a bomb the day before. A small and precious box carrying his remains was carefully loaded onto their plane and flown to camp, to then start the journey back to those who loved, and still love, him.
I think this may be the story of that young man. He is exceptional. Please copy and paste this into your browser and read about him for a moment:
http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/DefenceNews/MilitaryOperations/GuardsmanChristopherKingKilledInAfghanistan.htm
Zach’s voice was more serious than I have ever heard him. Devoid of any fun at all. No joking.
With respect, and in peace,
Thank you for checking in.
He woke long before dawn to start work. His crew just finished a double shift. The good news is, he said casually, that nobody shot at them while they were flying.
Yes.
Now: it’s the first time I am going to use the word ‘troops’, and I want to proceed carefully here.
I have always been ambivalent about the word ‘troops’. It’s a word of respect. But it’s a word of distance. Of de-humanization.
We hear about ‘troops’ going into battle or peacekeeping or support work. We stand taller in the presence of the word. It implies trained-fighting-men.
We do not hear about sons and husbands and people we love going into battle. But they are: husbands and sons and brothers and nephews and uncles and cousins and boyfriends and fiancés.
So saying ‘troops’ is shorthand for they’re trained for this and yet, it sort of dehumanizes them. The word itself strips them of their emotional connections to us and to other human beings, and isolates them. They are a body unto themselves, connected for the time being to the rest of the troops. Removed from us and our sphere of influence.
Troops are moved around the country, and troops fight battles. Troops are deployed.
Soldiers are wounded or killed or captured, rescued, evacuated or praised or punished, and return home from deployment.
Somehow soldiers, even though a similar word, sounds more compassionate than troops.
As it is time for me to use these words for the first time in my own writing, I am squirming a little inside, wondering if I will use them, if they will become as hollow in my writing as they are to me when I hear them…or if I can find something more meaningful.
In the end, a thing has to have a name for us to begin to understand it. And yet, so often, the very word that illuminates something also limits our understanding of it, and our connection to it, as well.
So I will say to you that in the long day that Zach worked today, he helped to fly young fighting men and older fighting men back and forth to different places. I don’t know where or for what.
I am need to proceed even more carefully with the next words…because they are not descriptive of a group of healthy strong men. They are descriptive of one man, someone loved by people I do not know; a young man to whom I want to be very respectful, and people to whom I want to be extremely respectful as well.
All of the travel, fatigue, frustration, good spirits and frustration were nothing but a prelude.
How do you even say this? It is too real now.
On their first day, their crew flew the remains of a soldier who had been killed back to base. He had been hit by a bomb the day before. A small and precious box carrying his remains was carefully loaded onto their plane and flown to camp, to then start the journey back to those who loved, and still love, him.
I think this may be the story of that young man. He is exceptional. Please copy and paste this into your browser and read about him for a moment:
http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/DefenceNews/MilitaryOperations/GuardsmanChristopherKingKilledInAfghanistan.htm
Zach’s voice was more serious than I have ever heard him. Devoid of any fun at all. No joking.
With respect, and in peace,
Thank you for checking in.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Where In The World Is Carmen San Diego?
The camp where Scott and Zach are stationed is…well…rural.
I looked it up on Wikipedia. Loosely translated, it says that they are in a very remote desert. As in Very Extremely Middle Of Nowhere.
If you are traveling, and you’ve been traveling by jet and then propeller plane and then bus and then donkey cart and then on foot, and you’ve reached the little town of No F&#%king Where,
...you’ve still got a hundred miles to go.
The mailing address used to be Friggin’SeriouslyRidiculouslyRemote, Afghanistan…but it was too long to get on the postcards, so they changed it to Fricking Remote, Afghanistan.
I’m thinking no plasma televisions there.
Thanks for checking in.
I looked it up on Wikipedia. Loosely translated, it says that they are in a very remote desert. As in Very Extremely Middle Of Nowhere.
If you are traveling, and you’ve been traveling by jet and then propeller plane and then bus and then donkey cart and then on foot, and you’ve reached the little town of No F&#%king Where,
...you’ve still got a hundred miles to go.
The mailing address used to be Friggin’SeriouslyRidiculouslyRemote, Afghanistan…but it was too long to get on the postcards, so they changed it to Fricking Remote, Afghanistan.
I’m thinking no plasma televisions there.
Thanks for checking in.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Getting There: Getting Close!
Zach called from Bagram Airfield, which is "a militarized airport and housing complex that is located next to the ancient city of Bagram, southeast of Charikar in Parwan province of Afghanistan" (per Wiki).
He was astonished at both the freedoms the troops there have, as well as the options. "You can buy microwaves and plasma tvs... there's American fast food...!" He was also surprised by the dress code. The Marine Corps regulations are apparently much more stringent than Army ones in-country. As much as Zach chafes sometimes under the restrictions of dress, I guess he supports the underlying concept. I could tell he was not impressed by the more relaxed code at this base. But there must be a good reason, to learn over time.
Here's some about the country in which they spent the last few days: Kyrgyzstan.
Bordered by Afghanistan and China, there's so much to learn about the culture and the country: bride kidnapping, as a graceful way to escape arranged marriages. Tortuous travel year-round, impossible in winter. And much unlike our country, only 6% of the people are over age 65: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyrgyzstan
...and you have got to LOVE the headdress that's part of their traditional garb. It's a for-real Princess Hat that I dreamed of as a child from pictures of medieval tapestrys and art. I most definitely need one of these:
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.state.gov/cms_images/kyrgyzstan_girl_2006_05_18.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/5755.htm&h=381&w=300&sz=17&tbnid=PnyylAACxZ5IdM:&tbnh=123&tbnw=97&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dkyrgyzstan&hl=en&usg=__3O3vPObUkmNuhKgZLzmNL-sQ7v0=&ei=-R1nSsSRAs67lAfR17XdDA&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=7&ct=image
That was most of last week. Today is Bagram at www.bagram.afcent.af.mil/, where you can get a flavor of what's to come.
Thanks for visiting.
He was astonished at both the freedoms the troops there have, as well as the options. "You can buy microwaves and plasma tvs... there's American fast food...!" He was also surprised by the dress code. The Marine Corps regulations are apparently much more stringent than Army ones in-country. As much as Zach chafes sometimes under the restrictions of dress, I guess he supports the underlying concept. I could tell he was not impressed by the more relaxed code at this base. But there must be a good reason, to learn over time.
Here's some about the country in which they spent the last few days: Kyrgyzstan.
Bordered by Afghanistan and China, there's so much to learn about the culture and the country: bride kidnapping, as a graceful way to escape arranged marriages. Tortuous travel year-round, impossible in winter. And much unlike our country, only 6% of the people are over age 65: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyrgyzstan
...and you have got to LOVE the headdress that's part of their traditional garb. It's a for-real Princess Hat that I dreamed of as a child from pictures of medieval tapestrys and art. I most definitely need one of these:
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.state.gov/cms_images/kyrgyzstan_girl_2006_05_18.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/5755.htm&h=381&w=300&sz=17&tbnid=PnyylAACxZ5IdM:&tbnh=123&tbnw=97&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dkyrgyzstan&hl=en&usg=__3O3vPObUkmNuhKgZLzmNL-sQ7v0=&ei=-R1nSsSRAs67lAfR17XdDA&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=7&ct=image
That was most of last week. Today is Bagram at www.bagram.afcent.af.mil/, where you can get a flavor of what's to come.
Thanks for visiting.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
And STILL Getting There....
To get on an overnight jet from California to Australia or Japan... and be there in the morning...ahhh, it's the stuff of dreams of Zach's unit right now.
They are now in DAY EIGHT of transition and travel. Hanging out in one airport or another, living out of duffel bags, waiting, waiting, waiting. Putting on gear, go-time imminent, and getting The Talk, only to be delayed two more days.
Word is that today is the day they finally start the last leg, a two- or three-day trek through different places with their camp the final destination.
Phones are available, but impossible: there are too-few phones for too many people, and your calling card has to work. Zach planned to call his girlfriend at 10:30 last night but couldn't get a phone line for three hours, until 1:30 a.m. Sometimes you can hear what he's saying, and sometimes you can't. Scott called his parents this morning, and the phone line just cut out after about forty seconds.
And yet still, they respond with tremendous patience.
I have decided that my goal this year is to Just Not Complain Any More.
My life is SO friggin' much easier than what they are going through just to get to their base camp, and they are so great about it...using humor to deal with frustration, resting when they can... just managing it.
So for the next several months:
I'm not whining.
I'm not complaining.
I'm not feeling sorry for myself.
I'm going to be cheerful at best, and neutral at worst, and
I'm just going to do what I have to do.
I might talk about it honestly, and say I'm tired, or use humor and joke about it. But beyond that, I'm going to work on developing some more core strength.
We can all use a specific period of time to work on ourselves, or to accomplish a goal.
So...Game On.
They are now in DAY EIGHT of transition and travel. Hanging out in one airport or another, living out of duffel bags, waiting, waiting, waiting. Putting on gear, go-time imminent, and getting The Talk, only to be delayed two more days.
Word is that today is the day they finally start the last leg, a two- or three-day trek through different places with their camp the final destination.
Phones are available, but impossible: there are too-few phones for too many people, and your calling card has to work. Zach planned to call his girlfriend at 10:30 last night but couldn't get a phone line for three hours, until 1:30 a.m. Sometimes you can hear what he's saying, and sometimes you can't. Scott called his parents this morning, and the phone line just cut out after about forty seconds.
And yet still, they respond with tremendous patience.
I have decided that my goal this year is to Just Not Complain Any More.
My life is SO friggin' much easier than what they are going through just to get to their base camp, and they are so great about it...using humor to deal with frustration, resting when they can... just managing it.
So for the next several months:
I'm not whining.
I'm not complaining.
I'm not feeling sorry for myself.
I'm going to be cheerful at best, and neutral at worst, and
I'm just going to do what I have to do.
I might talk about it honestly, and say I'm tired, or use humor and joke about it. But beyond that, I'm going to work on developing some more core strength.
We can all use a specific period of time to work on ourselves, or to accomplish a goal.
So...Game On.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Getting There...And Getting There...And Getting There...
Getting There: Day Three (Friday)
They were supposed to have a two-hour layover in Germany before heading out again. They must have arrived about 11:30 in the morning. Was it this layover that they would need to put on their body armor and wear it from them on out? I can’t remember.
Getting There: Day Four (Saturday)
Driving to work, I find myself wondering where is he? I'm going to have to get used to that feeling, I guess!
I found out later that almost at that moment, he tried to call us – and no one picked up. It's odd, Zach and I have that connection.
Later on Saturday afternoon, he called again. Tired. Tired, tired, tired to the bone. Different country, same story. A long layover. He wants to get out of his clothes and get a shower.
There was no ground crew to unload the plane, so after all that traveling, they heaved all of the massive bags out of the airplane themselves. They were exhausted…but maybe it helped to stretch cramped muscles that had been sitting and standing too long.
Then a tractor trailer needed to be unloaded – of what? he didn’t say – and he helped with that too. It sounded as if he worked on it out of desperation to do something besides flying, or waiting to fly. They want to get to camp, and get to work.
Getting There: Day Five (Sunday)
An early morning call told us that they were leaving for camp, the final leg of their journey, soon. We don’t know what means of communication they will have. I feel lucky to have gotten the calls we did already!
The phone connection had a significant delay, and lots of the words fuzzed out. Zach sounds more tired than I have ever heard him. By the time I am writing this, they should be there…?
They were supposed to have a two-hour layover in Germany before heading out again. They must have arrived about 11:30 in the morning. Was it this layover that they would need to put on their body armor and wear it from them on out? I can’t remember.
Getting There: Day Four (Saturday)
Driving to work, I find myself wondering where is he? I'm going to have to get used to that feeling, I guess!
I found out later that almost at that moment, he tried to call us – and no one picked up. It's odd, Zach and I have that connection.
Later on Saturday afternoon, he called again. Tired. Tired, tired, tired to the bone. Different country, same story. A long layover. He wants to get out of his clothes and get a shower.
There was no ground crew to unload the plane, so after all that traveling, they heaved all of the massive bags out of the airplane themselves. They were exhausted…but maybe it helped to stretch cramped muscles that had been sitting and standing too long.
Then a tractor trailer needed to be unloaded – of what? he didn’t say – and he helped with that too. It sounded as if he worked on it out of desperation to do something besides flying, or waiting to fly. They want to get to camp, and get to work.
Getting There: Day Five (Sunday)
An early morning call told us that they were leaving for camp, the final leg of their journey, soon. We don’t know what means of communication they will have. I feel lucky to have gotten the calls we did already!
The phone connection had a significant delay, and lots of the words fuzzed out. Zach sounds more tired than I have ever heard him. By the time I am writing this, they should be there…?
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Getting There: Day Two (Thursday)
Everyone, that is, except Kathy Wilt.
While Scott spent the night with his brother and sister, Kathy stayed up long after bedtime, making cookies and black-bottom cupcakes. I can picture her, the light from the kitchen spilling out into the darkness, while she placed dozens of tiny cupcake papers into baking tins, and slid fresh cookies into a container to take to the airport.
Chocolate chip cookies…do other cultures love them as we do, or are they iconic to America only?
Kathy, I am sure, understands Pam’s gift of salmon. Making cookies late into the night, putting them into containers to take to the airport to share with everyone. It’s a gift of love that none of my words will capture. Long after the cookies are gone, the memory of her tucking them into Scott's backpack will be pulled out like a photograph, to be savored again.
The next morning, Zach’s girlfriend left at 5 am, and we all said goodbye, and then he went back to sleep. I spent the morning tiptoeing upstairs and peeking at him sleeping. What a gift, to see him in bed at home. The simplest things are the most treasured.
I worked with a database client over the internet, discussing integrating their communications database with a data warehouse. It was an improbably complicated conversation, and surreal. While I was talking, my middle son texted me come upstairs. I couldn’t go. Later he told me that I missed a great photo: three brothers and the dogs all sprawled out together, talking.
Then boys went out for breakfast, and grandparents arrived, and my sister’s family came. The flight was delayed again, and after everyone left, Zachary went into his room and closed the door and did not come out for a long time.
What is it like at twenty-five to write a “what if” letter?
Then there was a trip for a cheese steak to put in his backpack for dinner, and a trip to the local grocery for sandwiches for lunch, and back to the hotel to meet the rest of the advance team.
This time, the ticketing counter clipped right along. We all gathered in a sports bar. Five hours to wait until the flight was due to leave at 11 p.m.
Which boarded at 2 a.m.
And left at 4:30 a.m.
We said our goodbyes and hugged at about 8 p.m. Without worries, without strain. We know that the best way to support someone is to let them do their work, without them having to worry about us.
I watched Zach go through security. I could tell he was cracking jokes with the guards. the way he always does. He just likes people, and talks easily with everyone. When he took off his shirt to go through the scanner, I found throat catching.
And then the feeling was under control and gone, and he was out of sight.
Fly safe. Be safe, baby of mine.
While Scott spent the night with his brother and sister, Kathy stayed up long after bedtime, making cookies and black-bottom cupcakes. I can picture her, the light from the kitchen spilling out into the darkness, while she placed dozens of tiny cupcake papers into baking tins, and slid fresh cookies into a container to take to the airport.
Chocolate chip cookies…do other cultures love them as we do, or are they iconic to America only?
Kathy, I am sure, understands Pam’s gift of salmon. Making cookies late into the night, putting them into containers to take to the airport to share with everyone. It’s a gift of love that none of my words will capture. Long after the cookies are gone, the memory of her tucking them into Scott's backpack will be pulled out like a photograph, to be savored again.
The next morning, Zach’s girlfriend left at 5 am, and we all said goodbye, and then he went back to sleep. I spent the morning tiptoeing upstairs and peeking at him sleeping. What a gift, to see him in bed at home. The simplest things are the most treasured.
I worked with a database client over the internet, discussing integrating their communications database with a data warehouse. It was an improbably complicated conversation, and surreal. While I was talking, my middle son texted me come upstairs. I couldn’t go. Later he told me that I missed a great photo: three brothers and the dogs all sprawled out together, talking.
Then boys went out for breakfast, and grandparents arrived, and my sister’s family came. The flight was delayed again, and after everyone left, Zachary went into his room and closed the door and did not come out for a long time.
What is it like at twenty-five to write a “what if” letter?
Then there was a trip for a cheese steak to put in his backpack for dinner, and a trip to the local grocery for sandwiches for lunch, and back to the hotel to meet the rest of the advance team.
This time, the ticketing counter clipped right along. We all gathered in a sports bar. Five hours to wait until the flight was due to leave at 11 p.m.
Which boarded at 2 a.m.
And left at 4:30 a.m.
We said our goodbyes and hugged at about 8 p.m. Without worries, without strain. We know that the best way to support someone is to let them do their work, without them having to worry about us.
I watched Zach go through security. I could tell he was cracking jokes with the guards. the way he always does. He just likes people, and talks easily with everyone. When he took off his shirt to go through the scanner, I found throat catching.
And then the feeling was under control and gone, and he was out of sight.
Fly safe. Be safe, baby of mine.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Getting There: A Hiatus
We drove almost to home, and stopped for provisions. Zach and Mark went into the store, leaving me and two very attractive young women in the back seat of the Prius.
Now would be the time to say that someone special to Zach drove all the way up from the deep South for two days, just on the chance of seeing him briefly at the airport.
She and her friends rolled into our home late Tuesday afternoon. We went on a quick tour of Maryland and spent the night on the Eastern Shore, so that I could participate in a television feature about my favorite little town. Interview over, we got back in the car and headed to the airport, picking up party food on the way back.
Lots of the other guys on the plane had said goodbye to wives and girlfriends and family back in Hawaii. Thanks to the delay of the flight to Germany, we were going to get a visit with Zach before we said our fare wells.
Sitting outside the store near home, a woman getting into her car saw the three of us girls squeezed into the back seat of the car. She laughed. You all look so cute in there I would take a picture if I had a camera.
Pam had just come from grocery shopping at Wegmans. I handed her my camera. The picture was going to be part of this story, and I wanted it.
While she learned how to use an iPhone camera, she recognized me, and we reminded each other how we connected. I introduced her to Zach's girlfriend and her best friend, and I told her what we were doing, and we laughed together.
Until Zach came out of the store with his dad. Pam has a good and loving heart. Something about the story and the impromtu visit touched her. You could see it in her eyes.
Oh, just go on and hug him, I said. It's all right. And she said no, and then darn it, she did it. A big ol' hug, laughing and crying and understanding.
Mark and Zach got into our car, and she got into her car, and then she said impulsively Would you like some salmon? I just got it... and with that, she pulled it from her car and pushed it into Zach's hands. It's highway robbery what they charge for it, but it's delicious. Take it. Just take it.
It was one of the sweetest, most human moments I've ever seen. She just wanted some way to express human feelings that are difficult to sum up. Perfect, expensive salmon was the most precious thing she had to offer at that moment; and she gave it with her whole heart.
Pam...thank you.
After that, it was home, and hugging the dogs, who were delirious with excitement, and talking with brothers, and finding bedding for everyone, and more talking and a whole lot of hugging his girlfriend, who had to leave before dawn the next day.
Zach took out his body armor, and I tried it on. The idea of working in it for a twelve-hour shift is mind-boggling. We all see pictures of troops wearing it, with their helmets, but you cannot imagine how it feels. Just strap a concrete block on your chest and one on your back and put a brick on your head, and you'll get the idea. Good grief. How do they do it? They must come back from deployments with no body fat at all. It's like working with weights for an entire day. It must be exhausting.
This isn't to glamorize the military or make them heroic or support any political agenda. It's just to help myself understand what parts of their work is like for them, and maybe to help other people who want to know understand.
The job they do: yep, they picked it. But they are human just like you and me. Lots of people go into the military for reasons that have nothing to do with wanting to be shot at. Some need opportunites lacking elsewhere in their life. Some need challenge. Some like structure, but are not necessarily warlike. Lots and lots of people in the miltary do clerical work, and cooking, and maintenance, and planning, and bridge building. Zach just happened to want to learn things about flying.
I want, as a human being, to appreciate their work. Appreciate in the true sense, which implies "I understand, from a little bit of experience" as well as "I am grateful".
I appreciated wearing body armor for all of five minutes. It weighed so much that after that brief experience I was sweating profusely in the air conditioning and started a neckache that lasted the whole next day.
Then he repacked it, ready to put on when they stopped in Germany. We all said goodnight, and went to sleep.
Happy.
Now would be the time to say that someone special to Zach drove all the way up from the deep South for two days, just on the chance of seeing him briefly at the airport.
She and her friends rolled into our home late Tuesday afternoon. We went on a quick tour of Maryland and spent the night on the Eastern Shore, so that I could participate in a television feature about my favorite little town. Interview over, we got back in the car and headed to the airport, picking up party food on the way back.
Lots of the other guys on the plane had said goodbye to wives and girlfriends and family back in Hawaii. Thanks to the delay of the flight to Germany, we were going to get a visit with Zach before we said our fare wells.
Sitting outside the store near home, a woman getting into her car saw the three of us girls squeezed into the back seat of the car. She laughed. You all look so cute in there I would take a picture if I had a camera.
Pam had just come from grocery shopping at Wegmans. I handed her my camera. The picture was going to be part of this story, and I wanted it.
While she learned how to use an iPhone camera, she recognized me, and we reminded each other how we connected. I introduced her to Zach's girlfriend and her best friend, and I told her what we were doing, and we laughed together.
Until Zach came out of the store with his dad. Pam has a good and loving heart. Something about the story and the impromtu visit touched her. You could see it in her eyes.
Oh, just go on and hug him, I said. It's all right. And she said no, and then darn it, she did it. A big ol' hug, laughing and crying and understanding.
Mark and Zach got into our car, and she got into her car, and then she said impulsively Would you like some salmon? I just got it... and with that, she pulled it from her car and pushed it into Zach's hands. It's highway robbery what they charge for it, but it's delicious. Take it. Just take it.
It was one of the sweetest, most human moments I've ever seen. She just wanted some way to express human feelings that are difficult to sum up. Perfect, expensive salmon was the most precious thing she had to offer at that moment; and she gave it with her whole heart.
Pam...thank you.
After that, it was home, and hugging the dogs, who were delirious with excitement, and talking with brothers, and finding bedding for everyone, and more talking and a whole lot of hugging his girlfriend, who had to leave before dawn the next day.
Zach took out his body armor, and I tried it on. The idea of working in it for a twelve-hour shift is mind-boggling. We all see pictures of troops wearing it, with their helmets, but you cannot imagine how it feels. Just strap a concrete block on your chest and one on your back and put a brick on your head, and you'll get the idea. Good grief. How do they do it? They must come back from deployments with no body fat at all. It's like working with weights for an entire day. It must be exhausting.
This isn't to glamorize the military or make them heroic or support any political agenda. It's just to help myself understand what parts of their work is like for them, and maybe to help other people who want to know understand.
The job they do: yep, they picked it. But they are human just like you and me. Lots of people go into the military for reasons that have nothing to do with wanting to be shot at. Some need opportunites lacking elsewhere in their life. Some need challenge. Some like structure, but are not necessarily warlike. Lots and lots of people in the miltary do clerical work, and cooking, and maintenance, and planning, and bridge building. Zach just happened to want to learn things about flying.
I want, as a human being, to appreciate their work. Appreciate in the true sense, which implies "I understand, from a little bit of experience" as well as "I am grateful".
I appreciated wearing body armor for all of five minutes. It weighed so much that after that brief experience I was sweating profusely in the air conditioning and started a neckache that lasted the whole next day.
Then he repacked it, ready to put on when they stopped in Germany. We all said goodnight, and went to sleep.
Happy.
Getting There: Part One
It's been preparation for HMH 463 for weeks: close down apartments or barracks quarters, and put couches and televisions and microwaves and stereos and books and blankets and pillows...all the stuff of everyday life...into storage.
Take the fish from your fishtank to the petstore, so they can sell them to someone else, so you won't have to find someone to take care of the tank for you for eight months. Call your cell phone carrier to stop your service in two days: there are no cell towers in Afghanistan.
Clean out your car, and get it in storage as well. Get rides for the next several days, since you have to put your car into storage days before you leave.
Shots. Malarial pills. Reactions to medications you might need tested. Instructions that you can share with your family...and instructions you can't.
Then you start to pack, and you load (in Zach's case) 185 pounds of gear into four bags, plus your weapon padlocked in its case.
Call friends, chat, wait out the days that take forever and go fast. And then, on Tuesday at 4:00, report to the hangar to check in and get on the bus to the airport.
Check in at the United ticket counter with forty other guys and one female corpsman, all of whom are lugging massive quantities of luggage.
PAY UNITED AIRLINES $125 EACH FOR HEAVY BAGGAGE CHARGES. It's mostly the body armor that you need to wear, since you can be shot at nearly any time, and the heavy helmet that will protect your head. Wrap your emotions around the fact that as a member of the US Armed Forces, you have to pay to ship your own gear to war.
Then it's on the plane, and over the Pacific to Denver, and breakfast in the airport and a quick call to your family during the layover.
In our case, it was such welcome news: our son's unit would be flying through BWI, less than an hour from home, and was expected to have a several-hour layover.
It started as a simple request: can you bring me a barbeque sandwich from Andy Nelson's? A last favorite taste of home before eight months of who knows what food, eaten catch-as-catch-can. Then Scott wanted Chick-Fil-A, and Zach thought that was a good idea too.
So he added on: And an order of Chick-Fil-A?
Then maybe you'd better bring a big order. So we can share.
Then Word's gotten out. Everybody loves Chick-Fil-A. Bring a lot.
So we planned to bring a lot, and we talked to Kevin and Kathy Wilt, who were planning to bring a lot...and we ended up bringing a party.
Kevin Wilt talked to the great folks at Chick-Fil-A in Cockeysville, MD and they offered a generous discount. Together we got three big trays of nuggets and a fruit tray.
Kevin got two coolers full of bottles of water at Sam's Club.
Mark and I picked up some jumbo Andy Nelson's famous pulled pork sandwiches.
My friend Wernie donated melt-in-your-mouth cinnamon rolls from his restaurant, the Bohemia Cafe in Chesapeake City, MD.
Grandmom Leora Ritter picked up crab cakes to share, Baltimore's finest treat, and made a pound cake.
Without knowing if we would be able to visit - it varies according to the group and is totally at the discretion of the unit leader - or when or how they would be able to eat, we went to the airport,
and saw the most beautiful sight you can see in the world: your kid.
They were strong, healthy, laughing, and unloading massive chunks of luggage from the United carousel as if they weighed nothing. I mean, pieces of luggage that were bigger than bales of straw, and that weighed as much as a small Toyota.
They never even made it to the USO lounge where they could sit down and rest after the long flight from Hawaii. After a straight sixteen hours of traveling already, they went right upstairs to line up to check in to the next flight to Germany
We were lucky; the terminal was empty, and we commandeered a counter, and the good folks at BWI let us serve the boys a feast. They kept thanking us, but it was we who wanted to thank them, for letting us share even a little part of their lives and their trip.
We got to meet folks whose names we had heard, and got to hear their voices. There they were, real and laughing, joking with each other, with blond hair or dark or shaved bald.
They were remarkable. Patiently waiting, never arguing, they never displayed an iota of negative emotion during the many long hours we saw them standing on their feet, not moving, nowhere to go, waiting in line to check in for the flight to Germany, only to learn that it had been cancelled for the night.
Among other things, I'll say this for the Marine Corps: they know how to show profound restraint and patience, when the need is there. My feet and back were aching, and I had to find somewhere to sit down - and I had slept in a comfortable bed the night before. They stood without complaining, looking for all the world as if they had just strolled over to the airport.
And then, after six hours of waiting in line, they loaded those heavy bags onto a bus and headed over to the Holiday Inn Express - and we heard the best, most unexpected words:
You guys who live so close to here, you might as well head home with your families for the night.
It turns out you can fit five people and 185 pounds of luggage into a Prius. And we drove towards the Maryland sunset. Happy. Happy, happy, happy.
Take the fish from your fishtank to the petstore, so they can sell them to someone else, so you won't have to find someone to take care of the tank for you for eight months. Call your cell phone carrier to stop your service in two days: there are no cell towers in Afghanistan.
Clean out your car, and get it in storage as well. Get rides for the next several days, since you have to put your car into storage days before you leave.
Shots. Malarial pills. Reactions to medications you might need tested. Instructions that you can share with your family...and instructions you can't.
Then you start to pack, and you load (in Zach's case) 185 pounds of gear into four bags, plus your weapon padlocked in its case.
Call friends, chat, wait out the days that take forever and go fast. And then, on Tuesday at 4:00, report to the hangar to check in and get on the bus to the airport.
Check in at the United ticket counter with forty other guys and one female corpsman, all of whom are lugging massive quantities of luggage.
PAY UNITED AIRLINES $125 EACH FOR HEAVY BAGGAGE CHARGES. It's mostly the body armor that you need to wear, since you can be shot at nearly any time, and the heavy helmet that will protect your head. Wrap your emotions around the fact that as a member of the US Armed Forces, you have to pay to ship your own gear to war.
Then it's on the plane, and over the Pacific to Denver, and breakfast in the airport and a quick call to your family during the layover.
In our case, it was such welcome news: our son's unit would be flying through BWI, less than an hour from home, and was expected to have a several-hour layover.
It started as a simple request: can you bring me a barbeque sandwich from Andy Nelson's? A last favorite taste of home before eight months of who knows what food, eaten catch-as-catch-can. Then Scott wanted Chick-Fil-A, and Zach thought that was a good idea too.
So he added on: And an order of Chick-Fil-A?
Then maybe you'd better bring a big order. So we can share.
Then Word's gotten out. Everybody loves Chick-Fil-A. Bring a lot.
So we planned to bring a lot, and we talked to Kevin and Kathy Wilt, who were planning to bring a lot...and we ended up bringing a party.
Kevin Wilt talked to the great folks at Chick-Fil-A in Cockeysville, MD and they offered a generous discount. Together we got three big trays of nuggets and a fruit tray.
Kevin got two coolers full of bottles of water at Sam's Club.
Mark and I picked up some jumbo Andy Nelson's famous pulled pork sandwiches.
My friend Wernie donated melt-in-your-mouth cinnamon rolls from his restaurant, the Bohemia Cafe in Chesapeake City, MD.
Grandmom Leora Ritter picked up crab cakes to share, Baltimore's finest treat, and made a pound cake.
Without knowing if we would be able to visit - it varies according to the group and is totally at the discretion of the unit leader - or when or how they would be able to eat, we went to the airport,
and saw the most beautiful sight you can see in the world: your kid.
They were strong, healthy, laughing, and unloading massive chunks of luggage from the United carousel as if they weighed nothing. I mean, pieces of luggage that were bigger than bales of straw, and that weighed as much as a small Toyota.
They never even made it to the USO lounge where they could sit down and rest after the long flight from Hawaii. After a straight sixteen hours of traveling already, they went right upstairs to line up to check in to the next flight to Germany
We were lucky; the terminal was empty, and we commandeered a counter, and the good folks at BWI let us serve the boys a feast. They kept thanking us, but it was we who wanted to thank them, for letting us share even a little part of their lives and their trip.
We got to meet folks whose names we had heard, and got to hear their voices. There they were, real and laughing, joking with each other, with blond hair or dark or shaved bald.
They were remarkable. Patiently waiting, never arguing, they never displayed an iota of negative emotion during the many long hours we saw them standing on their feet, not moving, nowhere to go, waiting in line to check in for the flight to Germany, only to learn that it had been cancelled for the night.
Among other things, I'll say this for the Marine Corps: they know how to show profound restraint and patience, when the need is there. My feet and back were aching, and I had to find somewhere to sit down - and I had slept in a comfortable bed the night before. They stood without complaining, looking for all the world as if they had just strolled over to the airport.
And then, after six hours of waiting in line, they loaded those heavy bags onto a bus and headed over to the Holiday Inn Express - and we heard the best, most unexpected words:
You guys who live so close to here, you might as well head home with your families for the night.
It turns out you can fit five people and 185 pounds of luggage into a Prius. And we drove towards the Maryland sunset. Happy. Happy, happy, happy.
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