Quote of the week

"Gotta love em, they talk in grunts and curse words, yell to speak, and sometimes smell funny but by God when it's time to step up they [Marines] sure as hell do it right. "  
~ Commenter on Blackfive




Sure got that right!  

Empty Seat

Recently I had a birthday.  I had a great time with friends and family.  Enjoyed a lunch and dinner at two of my favorite places to eat.  Mostly I felt blessed by all the people I get to share life with.

However, the worst part of deployments are the empty seats where your loved one should be.  It is the second birthday that Bestie has missed because he is in a war zone.  He's missed several more being stationed across the country.  At the dinner and when we were goofing off and telling stories that night, I had fun.  I enjoyed myself.  But I still felt like his presence was missing in the whole affair.

I wish he could have been there to share in our fun and have some of the AMAZING cake that Sandy baked for me.  But he did what he could.  My heart was lifted by a slightly garbled phone call from far away and a energetic birthday wish from him.  Getting to here him and have him sound good is an excellent birthday gift, if he cannot be here to share the fun.

I am also aware in these moments, of those families whose empty seat was never filled.   My heart hurts for them in the knowledge that they won't get even the phone calls any longer.

Again, I am reminded of how blessed I am.

Happy 235th Birthday, Marines!

10 November, 1775, the greatest fighting force in all the world, the United States Marine Corps, was formed.

Happy 235th Birthday to all Marines, past and present. A special Happy Birthday wish goes out to Bubs, D, Smity, Kelbs, Hernadez, Capt. Cal, the Colonel, Sgt. D, and all the rest of my favorite Marines. No better friend, no worse enemy.

WE STOLE THE EAGLE FROM THE AIR FORCE, THE ANCHOR FROM THE NAVY AND THE ROPE FROM THE ARMY.

ON THE SEVENTH DAY WHILE GOD RESTED, WE OVERRAN HIS PERIMETER, STOLE THE GLOBE AND WE'VE BEEN RUNNING THE WHOLE SHOW EVER SINCE.

WE LIVE LIKE SOLDIERS, TALK LIKE SAILORS, AND SLAP THE HELL OUT OF BOTH OF THEM.

WARRIORS BY DAY, LOVERS BY NIGHT, PROFESSIONALS BY CHOICE, AND MARINES BY THE GRACE OF GOD.

"Exactly" Moment

I was reading the fabulous Kanani Fong's blog The Kitchen Dispatch today and had one of those moments when someone else says something that you've been wanting to articulate, but you didn't know how or even exactly what it was.

People ask why I do all the military support work that I do and why it affects me the way it does. She said it perfectly. There is a bond there and once it is established you cannot look at war or those who fight them the same way again. You cannot go backwards.

They will always be a part of you. War will always be a part of you. You will always feel it.

"But the truth of the matter is there's a bond between those in the military, as well as with our supporters. It doesn't matter whether or not we have met. It doesn't matter whether or not we will ever meet. We will always be happy for one another; we will grieve for one another as well."

The Junior Officer's Reading Club- Patrick Hennessey

I knocked out Patrick Hennessey's The Junior Officer's Reading Club: Killing Time and Fighting Wars in 2 day. Couldn't put it down. I think it could be fairly described as the British counterpart to Craig Mulanney's The Unforgiving Minute.

There was so much I loved about this book, from his humor to his battlefield descriptions peppered with pop culture and classic references. He tells a captivating story about the journey through young adulthood with stops along the way at Sandhurst, Iraq, and Afghanistan.

He talks a lot about his time as a trainer of Afghan forces and the connections he makes to those men and their officers. I think sometimes we forget when we talk about the wars and standing up an army or the deaths of Afghan soldiers that they are brothers in arms as well. Those that stand and fight forge bonds with our military men and British allies. Sometimes I think we underestimate that bond.

I am also fascinated by points in his story where the war and the outside world combine. A lot of people are so numb and/or ignorant of events that I always find it interesting when they are jolted out of their complacency.

The best example of this is a story in which Hennessey relates the aftermath of an attack and the evacuation of casualties:

The Chinook which comes thundering into the hastily prepared landing site turns out not to be the air ambulance but a diverted R & R flight, and I'll never forget the look of horror on the face of the young, possibly pretty journalist who's sitting in the back in gimpy blue helmet, unsure why her flight home has just dropped into the Green Zone, where the air is still a-rattle with fire form the ANA on the cordon, when suddenly the reality of Helmand charges on to her lap as four sweating, swearing, emotional soldiers drop a bleeding, naked, morphine-babbling black man on her brand new hiking boots.

I find myself wondering what her side of that story is. What did she take away from that experience? What were her thoughts and emotions? Did it change the way she reported on the war? Did it change her reactions, emotions, and relationships to soldiers? Did she see war in general with new eyes?

There probably are no answers to these questions but I think they are important to ask anyway. What do we do with the war when its realities are brought home? How do those realities fundamentally change us?

Those are questions I've thought about for a long time. I still don't have answers for them.

But I love this book for sparking my interest in searching for them again.

Where War Lives: A Photographic Journal of Vietnam

I've been reading Where War Lives: A Photographic Journal of Vietnam by Dick Durrance. It is a collection of his photographs during his military service accompanied by an introduction by Ron Kovic of Born on the 4th of July fame.

The Vietnam war is, in many ways, the military history I grew up on. Stories from Vietnam were told by relatives who served, passed down in family legend. Its pictures, patches, and maps covered the walls of the VFW where we had so many family gatherings.

Yet its jungles and aging warriors seem far removed after so many years of the wars that have become my own.

Through Durrance's photographic journey of his service, I am reminded once again of the commonalities of war and of the men and women who fight them.

A war is a war is a war. A warrior is a warrior is a warrior.

The future photojournalist captures the humanity of his compatriots. In the black and white photographs of training I can see Bestie and a hundred friends reflected in the bearing and attitude of young men now thirty-plus years their senior.

Take the trees out of his helo shots and the door gunner could be the one that sits in my hard drive, flying over an entirely different battlefield.

Flipping through the photographs, I am drawn to their eyes. Eyes that reflect too many hours without a decent sleep. Young men burdened with the weight too much gear and too many memories. Eyes with a certain hardness and sureness of attitude.

I have seen these eyes before. I will see them again soon.

I find it interesting that Dick Durrance waited twenty years after he left Vietnam to publish this book. I wonder what we will learn about our wars and from our warriors in twenty years.

"Nothing can repair the damage caused by war, but returning to the memories and pictures has connected me to those experiences, which, in spite of my efforts to ignore them, have done so much to shape the rest of my life (143)." ~Dick Durrance

Continuing and Beginning Again

Bestie is back is the sand.

The weight that I felt lift when he called and said he was out of the country and on his way home for leave has settled again on my shoulders. I am sad that he is back there, away from his wife and all of us who love him. I am already miss not being able to pick up the phone and harass him with the the trivial details of my day.

War is freaking painful.

I spend a lot of time trying not to think about the possibilities and the emotions. I want to ignore risk, fear, and the ache that settles somewhere in my heart. The one that will persist until he leaves Afghan airspace for good and touches down on US soil.

At the same time, it is easier this time than other times. Maybe I have toughened up. Maybe it is just a internal protection mechanism that makes me think that. Maybe it is because I know he has more support this time around and that makes a substantial difference.

What I do know is that even if it is easier, it still hurts.

The lump in my throat as I told him to "travel safe" as he prepared to reenter bad guy land was the size of a softball.

That hasn't changed.

He is my best friend. My brother. I love him and want him to be safe. To be happy. To not carry the weight that I hear in his voice.

We are halfway done.

So much time has passed.

Yet so much remains before this one comes to a close.

Miss you brother bear.

Be safe.