Home?

So, I was home for thirty days.

Every day I tried to do as much as I possibly could to make up for everything I had missed, and everything I was going to miss. In the end it was impossible, but I tried. The best part of being home was being able to sleep in until 11 in the morning, which I did almost every day. In the Army, your lucky if you get to "sleep in" till 0600, usually those are the weekends, otherwise you'll be up at 0430. Next to being able to sleep in was the food. Pizza, burgers, candy and soda are all non-existent at Ft. Benning, and the only time I ever heard "All you can eat" was when Pigs Feet were being served... All in all I had a good time, but my ankle was giving me alot of trouble and the cast was incredibly itchy towards the end of the month.

The only other thing that bothered me was that every day that went by, the fact I had to go back to duty loomed over my shoulders more and more.

About a week before I had to go back, I was looking at my leave authorization papers and noticed something I hadn't seen before: my return date was about 4 days earlier then what I thought it was, which was a very big problem since that meant my plane ticket was useless to me now. I called my Company immediately and told them the problem, one of my drill sergeants, who wasn't even at my unit any more told me to buy the ticket for the day which I had, since that was 30 days after I left, but my papers cut that short to 26 or so days. My CO (Commanding Officer of a Company) got on the horn and told me that if I might as well come back on the date on the paperwork "just to be safe" so I didn't accidentally go AWOL.
"Great..." I told myself. I had to schedule a new flight, and on top of that I had planned to spend almost every minute that I could have of that week with my friends.

I was able to re-book my flight at no cost, but it was at 5:00 in the morning. The night before I left was pretty horrible. I remember getting on my knees and praying to God to not make me go back, to make it all go away, to take me back 5 years so I could fix every fuckup I ever did, I'm not going to lie, I cried... You see those commercials on TV of Soldiers, Marines, Airmen and Sailors and say to yourself "Damn that looks cool, I could do that!" but you don't understand that there's a price much greater then getting shot at, nobody who hasn't been in will ever be able to understand what I'm talking about in full contrast. If you have served, and your reading this then you already know what I'm talking about and you don't even want to remember what it felt like, the feeling of what its like to be stuck thousands of miles away from everything you care about and watch in silent horror looking through a barred window as everything on the outside forgets you even existed, as your friends fill the hole you made with a new Girlfriend or Job, as your Girlfriend or Wife goes about her days normally as if you haven't left, not even writing. As your family packs all your belongings in your room into boxes and lets one of your sisters or brothers have the space... But the images are all lies at the same time, distorted by human nature and stress. None of these things may be happening, or if they are then 90% of the time there are good reasons. A warrior walks through a dark cloud of uncertainty, he can only go with what others tell him, that and the images and fantasies he conjures in the dark recesses of his mind.

Regardless of what really is truth and fiction, it doesn't matter, because you'll never know. What you do know beyond doubt is your job, the life of a soldier is a life of sacrifice. Right now there is a soldier 6000 miles from his home. He's walking in a torrential downpour of rain completely soaked, even with his poncho on. He's marched 17 miles wearing 80 pounds of Full Battle Gear plus his weapon and ammunition in this weather down a muddy road, which he's most likely fallen into more then a few times. His Battle-Buddies are in no mood to talk, they're as pissed and uncomfortable about their situation as he is, a few have probably gotten into fights. Moral is low. The wind is strong and cold and there seems almost no protection from it's bite. As he looks skyward for some answer to a question forming in his head, his neck pains him, his 8 pound helmet is starting to weigh heavily on his head. The order comes down the line to stop and eat lunch, the time is 12:00 and they've been marching since 04:30 in the morning with few breaks, but it's nothing new to him. He opens his ruck and pulls out an MRE, a true Champions breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He pulls out the package within labeled "Salisbury Steak" and begins eating it cold, there's no time to heat it up. The guy next to him offers $10 for the M&Ms still within the container, Salisbury Steak MREs always have them, but his offer is turned down, today, the Soldier wants to enjoy the finer things in life, after all, 10 Dollars is pretty useless out there unless it comes in singles, then at least you have toilet paper. 15 minutes later the order comes to get moving again. As he gets back up his back muscles strain, the weight of the rucksack his made him sore, he picks up his pack and slings the straps over his shoulders and continues on.

He does what he does so that you don't have to, so you CAN continue as if nothing extraordinary has happened and so that you never have to live in fear. Those are the true pains of a soldier, the fact that you fight for the very reason you are so quickly forgotten, a paradox explainable only by the intense patriotism, love, and excellency exhibited by such fine people, whether they accept the praise or not. To them it is not a duty to serve their country, it is an Honor. Nobody ever truly forgets a soldier, not his family, not his wife, not his friends, but as a soldier walks through that dark cloud, he often looses his way. Consider it an honor to help one find it again, say "thankyou", and mean it, it does more then you could ever imagine.

I stepped on the plane with the weight of a mountain on my shoulders, but I was ready for what came next.

The Second Sojourn

The next day I went to the Hospital to have my ankle checked out by a Podiatrist. He sent me for an X-ray and a CT scan, which revealed that my ankle had a fracture right inside the joint. Apparently this particular type of fracture may never heal on its own, and it's also a possibility that I may never be able to run again. He consulted with another doctor, and they both decided to see if it could be healed by Casting in lieu of Surgery. So he had a cast put on my leg, which was supposed to stay on for 6 weeks. I had never had a cast on before, I had NO idea how annoying it was going to be.

So that was it. I was getting restarted for sure. My doctor kinda saw how I was down, so he asked me
"Have you ever heard anything about Convalescent Leave?" I looked at him and said
"No, what is it?"
"It's where you go home for 30 days to heal following an injury, you need a doctor's recommendation, and approval from your Company Commander, I'm recommending you."

Thirty days of free, paid leave back at my home, over a thousand miles away from Fort Benning. Why not? The only two catches were that I had to get approval from my CO, and I had to pay for the plane ticket. Money was no problem, I had enough. The biggest Hurtle was getting my CO to sign the leave form, he was always busy with training the Company, and didn't have alot of time to spend on Medical Holdovers like me. He had already proven that by waiting two weeks just to act on another soldiers Con Leave paperwork, and those two weeks came out of his 30 days.

So I left the hospital and went back to my unit. My Drill Sergeants took my paperwork and submitted it, and two days later I had my leave approved, I guess having two cases on his desk put alittle more power behind the paper.

I went online to US Airways, selected a flight from Atlanta to Buffalo, put my Credit card number in, and clicked submit.

It told me my credit card was denied.

This being the first time I had ever used the damn thing, I was kinda annoyed. I went to the ATM to check my funds, and it told me my Credit Card was "Invalid". I got the Con Leave recommended by a doctor, submitted to my Drill Sergeants, and approved by my Commander, I had contacted my Mom and I had a place to stay, I was sure I had the money to buy the ticket, but, I had no means to access it. You couldn't possibly believe how frustrated I was. I Called up my bank, and when I told them the ATM said my card was Invalid, they looked up my account and told me that I never had a Debit Card. I said that was kinda hard to believe, as I was holding it in my right hand. I was told to go to the Bank's branch the next day, which I did.

The Drill Sergeants Drove me back to 30th AG, so I could visit the Personal Affairs Office (which is ironically where I now work until further notice) and go to the bank inside of it. They said my card was never "loaded" when they gave it to me, in other words, they handed me a useless piece of plastic with no purpose or value. So I had them "load" it, which was a chore all of itself as they had to look up my account number, contact various people, go through several breaks, etc, etc.

Phew, SO, I walked out with a "Working" Debit card. Great! I got back to my unit, hopped on the Drill Sergeant's Computer, and clicked "submit" one more time. Your account has been locked, please try again. WTF. I seriously felt like I was being asked to jump through hoops of fire just to get a working Debit Card.

So I called them back up, talked to a customer service guy, and had them Unlock my card..... What else could POSSIBLY go wrong? Thankfully, nothing did, I bought my ticket online without further trouble...

So the next day a Shuttle Bus picked me up from Sand Hill (The BCT area of Ft. Benning) and took me to the Atlanta Airport, roughly 6 hours later I stepped off of a plane at Buffalo.

I told everyone I was coming back, except my Girlfriend, I wanted it to be a surprise so I just told her a "Big Package" was coming in the mail, well my mom and her boyfriend picked me up from the Airport, and took me to her house (which is also where my best friend, her brother, lives). Her parents had her go into this little TV room with her back to the door, I walked in, we had her turn around with her eyes closed, and I hugged the crap out of her :D . My friend's Birthday was only a few days prior, so we combined it into a big Welcome Home - Birthday Party. I was kinda sick with Laryngitis at the time, and didn't eat much, but even so...

It was one of the best days in my life.

Mark, Autumn, Everyone, Thankyou...

WTF

4 days, NO SLEEP. SAME THING FOR TONIGHT AND ITS A F-ING FRIDAY... I'm seriously ready to just pass out for like a month, BUT WE CANT SLEEP. This better not continue past sunday...

The Eye of the Storm

Where was I.... Okay,

We Qualified, spent an extra night in the woods, then the next day the pain finally got the better of me, I went on sick call, only to find out that I had an appointment with the Podiatry clinic at MACH the next day. So they gave me some Tylenol for the pain (it cures everything in the Military dont cha know) and sent me off. That night, me and Smith had CQ duty. We were both on crutches at this point, he sprained his ankle back when we spent the last night in the woods. We used to call ourselves the Sick Call Rangers, he was Crutch Master 1, and I was Crutch Master 2, there were also other rangers, by that time there were almost 20 people on medical profiles in my company. When Delta Company (the guys next to us) started to get a sizeable force of Sick Calls, we decided to form the DADADADADADADA SICK CALL SPECIAL FORCES - 5TH PLATOON "BLUNT DAGGERS!!!!" It even caught on, our Company Commander started calling us by it, but, I digress.

We had CQ duty that night, and eventually we got onto the topic of Girlfriends. I told him about mine, how I loved her and missed her, how we had known each other for years, and I showed him a picture of her. When I was done, he looked down at the ground, smiled, and asked me "Do you want to see a picture of the most beautiful girl in the world?" Well, I doubted that he had a picture of my girlfriend, but I decided to amuse him lol. "Sure" I said. He pulled out his wallet and took out a small pocket photo of a girl in her early 20s, he started telling me about how they had met in Highschool and fell in love, he told me how she liked the outdoors, how she could bring a smile to anybodies face, he told me about his plans to propose to her on Christmas.

And then he told me about how she killed herself in our second week of training.

You could have heard a Pin drop. It was like a bunch of puzzle pieces came together, I suddenly understood WHY he stared off into the distance all the time, WHY he liked to be alone, and why he always seemed on the verge of tears. I wasn't sure what to do, what do you say to something like that? Nothing I could tell him would change what had happened and by then he had had plenty of time to collect his thoughts so it's not like I could tell him anything he didn't know. I paused and said "Wow... I'm sorry for your loss man..." and we just sat in silence for a good half hour...

SIGH..........

Still no sleep... They found EVEN MORE DIP, AND somebodys Cell Phone... I got half an hour of sleep last night, that was it... I'm really irate right now, so far the only good thing about today is me comming in for work, I have an hour so I'll try to continue my story as much as I can.

The MQU, Pt. 2

This is a continuation of my previous post, The MQU, Pt. 1

After spending the night in ER, I was taken back to the MQU. When they started to issue medication in the morning I found out alittle fact about my cough syrup: The whole purpose was to MAKE you cough, that way you can get the stuff in your throat out of your system, well, seeing as how I was already coughing day and night, I decided to stop taking said "Medicine". That day someone else from my unit (C co, 3/47th IN) came in, for reasons I wont state right now I can't list his name, so we'll call him Private Smith. Smith wasn't in my platoon, but we still knew eachother, we had been bunk mates back at 30th A.G. and we got shipped to the same training Company (a Company usually has around 160-200 soldiers, broken down by platoons, usually 4, with about about 40-50 people in each one.) We also spent alot of time together at our Company Staff desk (Also called the CQ desk) back when I was on crutches for that 1st week afer the german wall because he sprained his wrist that day also, and if you can't train, they stick you with extra duties.

So anyways, he came in around my second or third day in the MQU, he caught the FLU. Smith was a cool guy, he was from a small town, he played DND, listened to heavy metal, liked guns alittle too much, and we even shared a passion about Zombies. We spent alot of time together and talked, he reminded me of my friends back home. He almost always had a smile on his face, but sometimes his eyes would gloss over and he would just stare into dead space for a few minutes, I could tell he was fighting a war in his head. Regarding what, I didn't know, I figured he would tell me if he wanted me to.

After 5 days in the MQU my temp went down to 100.7, and they discharged me and Smith. It was near the end of week 3, when I went on sick call for my ankle they gave me crutches, but no medical profile. Without a profile to state otherwise, to the Drill Sergeants I was completely able to train. So for that week I participated in mile long battle rattle marches out to the range and got some trigger time, plus, the drill sergeants kept hinting that there might be a chance that they wouldn't restart me if I could keep up with the pace. Every step hurt like hell, and I had an obvious limp, but I never gave up. At the end of that week, we spent two nights in the woods and on the next day we marched back to the barracks, polished our rifles, and qualified.. I'm not gonna lie, I've been around weapons my whole life, for me, qualifying was easy, I got a 39/40, expert rifleman. The last target, a 300 Meter one, was so far out I didn't notice it till it went back down.

We spent one last night in the woods as punishment since close to 20 people in our company failed to qualify. That evening, two Privates went out in the woods to take a leak, the rule was you had to go 20 meters outside the camp's perimiter. Let me tell you alittle about georgia wildlife: The Mosquitoes are so big they can carry away small children, and they have 18 gauge needles for noses. The Spiders are the size of small tangerines, and if you get bit, expect that area to be liquified within the hour. The Snakes blend right into the ground, and have a habit of getting really pissed when you step on them. There are more cockroaches then people, if you look away from your MRE even for a second, expect to have a new battle buddy swimming in your BBQ ribs. And lastly, the Boars... These things are f-ing nasty, they're not stupid either. The two privates went about 20 meters into the woodline, and while they were pissing, a Boar flanked them from the direction of the camp, it knew that would be the direction they would run, so it cut them off before they even knew it.

I should point out that these privates made two very big mistakes:
1) They forgot their emergence ammo, ten blank rounds which could have been used to call for help or scare the boar.
2) They forgot their bayonets and their E-tools (Small folding metal shovel).

So, they turn around to go back to the camp, and the Boar charges them, this thing was huge, like 400 pounds and 6 feet long. They turn around and go screaming into the woods, exactly what it wanted. They kept running and screaming, and the Boar kept chasing them, eventually they started to run out of breath, and they decided to turn around and fight it. Well... The m16A2 is a rather light weapon, made primarily of polymers, its great for long range encounters, but in hand to hand combat its about as usefull as a wiffle ball bat. They started rifle butting it in the face and head, and the boar goared one of them really bad in the leg, but the other was able to hurt it enough that it ran away. They limped back into camp, and the private who got goared had to not only go to the hospital, but get rabies shots, which really, really, REALLY suck.

Lesson of the story: NEVER GO INTO THE WOODS UNPREPARED.

SIGH...

The Drill Sergeants Haven't let up, last night we continued with the half platoon on/off every hour, and tonight it's gonna be both platoons on the floor... Last night they found Dip hidden in the boiler room, Some Dumbarse actually brought in MORE CONTRABAND... I mean WTF, they always find it, it's not a matter of if but when, especially considering that half our Drill Sergeants are also MILITARY POLICE and search for contraband for a LIVING. It wouldn't be so bad if whoever did it fessed up, but they obviously have zero integrity so that's not likely to happen. I got 4 hours of sleep last night, better then last night's 3 at least. I'm just hoping that this ends soon, we're all seriously tired.