Originally published by the New York Times on May 7th, 2006
I am not a creature of habit for the most part. I thrive on change. I embrace it. I love change so much I plan for it. I seek it out. In my 34 years, I have resided in New Orleans, Georgia, Utah, Montana, Tennessee, and North Carolina. I have visited almost every state in the country, and have been to London, Canada, Puerto Rico, Ireland, Iraq, Kuwait, Germany, and Panama. I have rented countless apartments and houses. I have had countless jobs. I have made countless road trips, sometimes from Montana or Utah down to New Orleans several times a year.
It is said that change is the only constant. Even though I believed that already, the last year and a half of my life has really driven the point home. My attitude about American life has changed. I now cherish it more than ever. My understanding of war has changed. My feelings toward the Iraqi people have changed. Before coming to Iraq, I didn’t know much except that some Muslims were terrorists and many of them were afraid of their own government. Now I have images of Iraq burned into my memory that I don’t think I’ll ever forget.
And the family I conjure up in all my childhood memories has changed dramatically.
When I left for Iraq, my mother had been diagnosed with breast cancer. I arrived in Iraq in June 2005. In November I received a Red Cross message that my presence was requested, and “death was imminent.” When I arrived in New Orleans, my mother was fading fast from this world. I spent a few weeks caring for her, supporting my emotionally broken family, and then regretfully returned to Iraq knowing I would never see her gorgeous brown eyes again. Five weeks later, a member of my unit was killed by a suicide bomber. I knew him well. Two days after that, I received another Red Cross message. My mother had passed. So one muddy day in January, I attended Lieutenant Colonel Mac’s memorial, and that same night I began the second journey from Ramadi to New Orleans by climbing aboard a helicopter under cover of darkness. This time I flew home to attend my mother’s memorial service. My hometown, that place of rich memory and life experience, has changed as well. A cruel mistress named Katrina altered the city forever.
My marriage has changed. Leaving for 18 months made it difficult. My daughter is six. I’ve missed kindergarten. My son is three. When I left he could speak just a little. Now he won’t stop. I hardly know the little guy. And although I talk to my children frequently, I’ve pretty much been only a voice on the phone, a picture on the fridge. Because of all this and more, I have changed. I won’t know exactly to what extent until I spend some time back in my life, between those walls of privacy and among the sounds of children’s laughter and cries. I’ve lost my capacity for clear comparison. I’ve been eating, sleeping, working, thinking, dreaming, crying, laughing, and wondering under these Middle Eastern skies for over ten months now. I have been away from home for sixteen. This is more than an extended vacation – it has truly become a way of life. I am reluctant to say I have hardened my heart, but my heart is perhaps a bit darker than it was some sixteen months ago when it was brightened every morning by the awakening of two wonderful little people, voices raspy and hair all askew as they wiped sleep from their eyes.
I am not a soldier who goes out every day and gets shot at by the enemy, engaging him in the heat of combat. I can only imagine the mindset of an infantryman, or any who spend a year in Iraq fighting the enemy in close urban combat. I feel for them, and I will support them in any way I can. But I’m still right here with them. I hear the suicide vehicles when they explode, and feel it in my chest. I’ve gone out on combat missions. I have had to face my fear.
It is very surreal here, like on a recent day when the sunlight battled with clouds, cousins to the extended family of dark thunderheads that had been hovering over the F.O.B. for days. One minute, it’s 100 degrees. The next, it’s raining so much that you can watch huge patches of earth turn to pudding. Two hours later, it’s humid and hot again, and only puddles remain. And in the evening, as a strange glare covers the F.O.B., the rain comes down even as the last rays of sun shine warmly upon the moist, thirsty desert. And in the midst of all this, explosions ring out. You run inside for cover. You find out where the impact was, check your map, and pray nobody was hurt. Then the day is over, and you go over to the room that is not your room and sleep in the bed that is not really your bed. And you dream of home.
Many veterans suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. This is understandable. War is traumatic. And life is chaotic enough. Put a man or woman in a deadly environment 10,000 miles from home, and have them talk, think, plan, and consider mortality and violence and constantly practice ways of fighting it, and you obviously add stress to that chaos. But there is also a little discussed phenomenon called Post Traumatic Growth. I’d like to think that I can take this experience, embrace this change, and learn from it, teach from it, and share my stories with those who want to read them. I like to think that I can turn this experience, this global adventure, this season of personal loss, into something very positive, a chance for growth, a swift kick to the momentum of my own evolution. At least that is what I like to think.
As I said, I embrace change. I am a traveler, a thinker, a writer, a dad who is proud to serve his country as a soldier, but even more proud to stay home and raise his children. I am the eternal optimist, and I can’t wait to live and love once again on American soil. Sure, I have changed, maybe more than I want to admit. I have been living in a combat zone. And I know I still have a lot of work to do. Please do not think I am complaining. How could I? I wasn’t even in this unit when they received the alert to deploy to Iraq. I was asked to join them, and I accepted. I am simply telling you some of what one lieutenant has gone through, which I think is at the heart of blogging from a combat zone. And my story, while unique, is like countless others. Post Traumatic Growth? Sounds like a plan.
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Your writing is a pleasure to read, Sir. Best of everything to you on your
return home. I hope all the changes are good ones.