iraqistan

Well, today was a milestone:

My husband is officially on terminal leave. Five and a half years of service when he signed up for four, three deployments, a host of medical problems, and a year together with his wife spaced around deployments and moves and courses and time playing in the woods.

And yet his message, left on my phone while I was in class, went nearly verbatim:

“Well, I guess I’m officially out. I got my Dragon Stamp, I cleared Fort Bragg, I’m out…

…pause…

… I hope I made the right decision.”

My husband and I are vastly different. I love to travel, he hates planes and boats and long car rides and countries where he has to learn how to ask for a cup of coffee. I love to climb mountains, he would rather be on the beach. He loves to fish, I scare them away because I’m too entertained by the sound the rod makes when you cast and haven’t the patience to wait for a fish to eat a worm just to hear it again. I got a six year degree in four years, he vaguely remembers high school. The ways in which we are different are too many to be counted. Most people just look at us together and shake their heads.

But we are similar in many ways as well, though more subtle. We both love music, pasta, and when he cooks on the grill. We love animals (the fuzzy, inedible kind… and when it’s a bug larger than my fingernail I make him dispose of it for me. Sure, I shoot guns, but I am unwilling to put a hole in my wall every time I see a bug and so help me will not go near a living cockroach), friends, and family. We respect each other and our differences.

And we both love our jobs.

I am not surprised that my husband is already having regrets about leaving the military; I suspect I will feel the same way when I go get whatever they call the final clearing stamp wherever I am. And it isn’t a poor economy or a frightening job market that is making him worried, it is the genuine concern that he might really be leaving what he was meant to do.

He doesn’t really want to go back to build sandcastles or rock sculptures, and his health isn’t really the best for it anyway. But he will miss his job. He might miss the structure, the cameraderie, or even just the general silliness of the way things are run that provide enough excuses to come home at night for a beer. But really, he will miss the job.

I think if he is affiliated with some way to the military, he will be okay, be it contracting or government work. If he goes back to the things he did before he joined, that is where I think he will start to fail himself. He is strong, but he is someone who was lucky enough to find himself in what he did. Not all people get that opportunity, finding their calling. He is tired, he is frustrated, really most people are in this Big Green Machine, but he has found what he is meant to do, and when he got that stamp today I think he saw what it meant.

Is it freedom or no? I have no idea right now, as I’m not in his head. All I know is that I have a feeling that within the next few years I will be standing where he is right now, feeling whatever it is he is feeling. I can’t imagine there are too many ways to feel when you close a chapter in your life, and possibly when you walk away from what it is you were meant to do.

I don’t think he is done. I know I won’t be. He keeps rank for two years, and there will always be a recruiter around the corner looking to make quota.

But at least he gets a vacation for a bit, and calling or not, we could all use a vacation once in awhile.

I suppose, it being Veteran’s Day Eve and all, that commentary is somewhat required. Parades, a day off for some if not most, and an excuse for a four-day weekend for some.

Several friends of mine just arrived back in sunny, humid Kuwait, sending me emails asking when it is I can join them for another round of fun in the sun. They are being facetious, I know, because they are well aware that could I join them, I would.

There are some things people are just meant to do in the world, and some things people aren’t meant to do. Regardless, I believe that everyone, regardless of social status or situation, should be required to do some sort of community or country service, be it volunteer at a food shelter, help build homes for natural disaster victims, or get shot at for the pay of a diner waitress. It raises the awareness of people, makes them realize that there is a bigger world out there than their little bubble, and forces people to acknowledge that no matter how bad things are, they could always be worse, so quit complaining and apply yourself. Make your own life better while helping someone else, and don’t wait for some handout when you haven’t done anything to help someone else.

That jazz doesn’t always fly, I realize, but in the absence of such requirements there are still those that volunteer for service, regardless of the type of service they provide. To some, such as myself, they end up seeing it as a career, a calling, what they were meant to do. It provides fulfillment. To others, it is a time-filler or just a way to pay for an education or because it pays something and the job market is awful. But the service is there, and no matter the reason it still changes everyone who performs.

To continue my diatrabe, then there are also the people out there who deserve the thanks from those whom they helped, wittingly or unwittingly. Those that send care packages, those that send emails or even regular letters, those that just answer the phone even when it is some strange hour because they know it can be hard to keep time zones straight when you have been overseas for too long. Those that acknowledge what it is that someone else is doing that is helping them, and in return help the helpers in whatever small way they can, they deserve recognition as well.

So really, Veteran’s Day shouldn’t really need to be a special day marked off on the calendar, though I admit the four-day weekend is always a lovely perk in my schedule so it’s nice to have it around. Every day should see people volunteering, people thanking each other for whatever part they play, and people being greatful for things around them.

All that happiness, were it to be worldwide, might very well put me out of a job. However, I have enough confidence in the human race that we could handle at least a little more kindness without threatening my livelihood.

So, in general, thanks.

I suppose one of the nice things about being in such a small field is that no matter where you go, you are bound to run into several people you know.

I also suppose, however, that one of the terrible things about being in such a small field is that no matter where you go, you are bound to run into several people who know you.

Arizona is a mandatory retreat for those of us in my job, so every time I come here I never have to worry much about what I am going to do on a given weekend, only how I am going to be able to do everything that everyone wants to do on Army per diem rates. I have friends that are fellow students, friends that are instructors, friends that are looking for jobs, and friends that are just passing through. I make new friends with each visit, but a simple trip to the bar yields two more friends I didn’t know were in town with whom I now get to catch up.

The trouble is that in addition to those you might be happy to see again after months or years, there are always those you might not have wanted to cross paths with again. Make that ever again. Actually, maybe make that ever, ever again. Those tend to float around as well, and the town is small and in the middle of the high desert, so it is not as though there are many places to escape short of holing up in my hotel. While they have improved the hotel gym recently, there is still only so long I can go without human contact beyond the front desk.

So it becomes a game, as many things do for me. I try to anticipate or elicit information on where those I wish to avoid might be heading for the evening, and try to convince others that the little Mexican joint on the other side of town is much better for dinner than wherever they wanted to go, which always seems to be the exact same place the undesireable sort are dining. I find it keeps me in practice for my job, somewhat, and the motivation for successful operations is very high. I get to learn more, practice my skills, and have as good of a time as possibe with my limited alcohol allocation.

Really I can’t complain much. I never get jet lag despite my 18 or so hours of travel, I have already made new friends, I am doing well in the class as of day two of being back after four months, and am about to have lunch with a friend I haven’t seen in about five years.

Now if he will just agree to go to a little sandwich shop I heard about in the next town over…

Nothing says “Long Day” like trying to teach 18 people who don’t speak your language which end is dangerous on a rifle introduced in Vietnam. While I will grant that these people all fire rifles of their own, it is nonetheless a tiring adventure in futility particularly when your interpreter doesn’t much like to interpret.

The Bundeswehr, translating roughly to Federal Army, are a fun bunch. Their Sergeant Major, who runs a company similar to our First Sergeants, is a friendly and outgoing individual with whom we sometimes have cultural exchanges involving various forms of German and American alcohols. He is an expert marksman and a true company enlisted leader, yelling at his Soldiers when they tried to use a foam mat to lay on when firing from the plywood platform. He also found my frustration with some of his Soldiers mildly amusing, and told me that I was free to have them do push-ups should the need arise.

Since I happen to be one of the few people in the area qualified to run the electronic range trainer, these meetings with our German counterparts are fairly frequent. Both my office and his company enjoy getting out of the usual setting from time to time, and I am always happy to oblige with a day of weapons instead of a day figuring out why talking to one person suddenly necessitates five reports.

The hard part, it seems, is that the Germans can’t seem to get used to the concept of how to fire without a scope mounted on the weapon. We, as it turns out, are not allowed to qualify with scopes, so this always proves a challenge that involves a lot of me muttering under my breath and the person who is supposed to be my interpreter insisting that they already know when they clearly don’t because they are having trouble finding the broad side of a barn, much less hitting it. My muttering only increased as he refused to translate some things that I was saying, insisting that they knew when even the German Company Commander didn’t speak much English. He was very lucky on that day that he is a civilian. The Sergeant Major, who speaks English, was most entertained. I am glad someone got amusement out of it. I felt my brain throbbing, so perhaps Xenu was also having a lovely time.

Overall, however, the day went well. I gave up on the rifle after awhile, switching to the pistol which is much easier to train. My Soldier, meanwhile, was putting them in a mock HMMWV and then simulating attacks to teach them how we run convoy drills. Disaster imminent as they almost fell off the platform a few times and one somehow worked her way out of the vehicle backwards, we finally called it a day by putting the Sergeant Major, Commander, a Lieutenant who had a birthday that day, and a newly promoted Sergeant into the HMMWV and having the simulator operator give them rollover training, which involves at least one rotation of the vehicle to the delight of their subordinates.

Despite the possible swelling of the egg in my head as I tried to control myself from strangling various nationalities, it did beat a day in the office. There is something to be said for that. What that is, I leave up for interpretation.

It’s a good thing that the doctors left at least some of my brain intact; if I had to rely only on the opinions and decision-making abilities of others at this point, I would be in serious trouble.

One doctor, an Air Force Major, thinks I have no business doing this Army thing anymore. Something about being extra salty. I reminded her that I am, after all, a non-commissioned officer and therefore supposed to be a little salty. She said it was the wrong kind and that comments like that made her want to send me back over to the neurologist, the Army Major.

I would not have minded heading back down the hall, as the neurologist is a little more accommodating. She maintains a full understanding that there are still a few things I would like to do in the Army before departing to the recession-filled civilian world, such as another course or two and maybe a last deployment. The endochronologist gave me the all too familiar “Are you out of your mind” look when I mentioned the deployment, but the neurologist thinks I could at least try out a six-month stint to see how it goes.

So back and forth they go again. Everyone has decided that I can return to the States to finish my course, and have promised to leave me alone for the duration this time. It gives them about two months to sit in their offices near the French border and argue about whether or not intergalactic battlelords are really grounds for dismissal. Meanwhile, other friends of mine who happen to be in the medical field are pointing out that perhaps I shouldn’t be considering new high-altitude climbs for awhile and keep asking questions like of what Xenu is made, and somehow disappointed in my response of “Two parts soul of Tom Cruise mixed with three parts tumor goo and a pinch of salt.”

So it appears that everyone has an opinion, and as usual few are interested in mine. Officers, particularly when they are from different branches of the military, tend to do that. I have enough medication to get me through another few months, so I don’t have to worry about it until after the new year.

That should give me enough time to decide if I want to side with endochronology, the paranoids, or neurology, the crazy. I’m not really sure how I can win either way, but I have been in the Army long enough that I am used to such conundrums by now.

Did it ever occur to Microsoft Windows Vista that someone might be in the middle of doing something when it decides to randomly restart because of random recent updates that probably only made things worse anyway?

The computer is about to follow my Soldier right out the window. I wonder which bounces higher…

A rough week, to say the least. One day left, to be spent on the road as most of the days have been this week. Not for saving the good of the nation or even for tasty enchiladas that I hear are somewhere on the other side of the country, but because of the usual examples of ineptitude in Army decision-making. As paraphrased from the Jewish Passover Seder, why should this week be different from any other week?

It was a short week, thanks to Columbus getting lost and finding the Carribean a few centuries back. I would like to point out that I am particularly grateful on that holiday, as they make very good rum on those islands. Moving along, Tuesday saw the Department of Public Works wandering into our office and blowing up half of our equipment, mumbling something that sounded like a German “Oopsie…” and then darting off again. Secure connections be damned, the telephones are finally working again two days later, and eventually the general magnitude of destruction will be discovered and hopefully remedied with some duct tape and a few paperclips.

Wednesday, after such a delightful time, I had to leave my house at an hour not usually seen by those accustomed to light in order to drive all the way across two or three German states in order to reach the only American hospital left in the region. Wednesday appeared to also be the day the Germans decided to rip up every road between the post upon which I work and the only American hospital left in the region. In order to mark the detours which sent me exploring far reaches of the country I never had a desire to see, the Germans put up signs which may be quite clear to them, but at 0545 in the morning I am not looking for a 6 inch by 6 inch sign directly at the turn I would have to make that tells me that I in fact want to go three miles out of my way because ahead the entire road has been ground into dust. My appointment was at 0930. My brain doesn’t hold much data these days so I thought it was at 1000, but knew I wasn’t going to make that, either. I almost threw the GPS out the window as she told me to turn around and go back to the blocked exit for the ninth time while I continued to yell at her. My Soldier, who was trying to get in touch with the hospital to tell them I would be late, had to remind me on more than one occasion that he was the one on the phone and the human and that yelling at the GPS probably wouldn’t do me much good, and that calling her those names really wasn’t very nice.

I get to the hospital. No surprise, they had cancelled my appointment. Roughly five hours in the car, no more need to be there. They could not reschedule before I left for the States. Try again in January. This is the only doctor in country that will do this type of analysis, sorry, better luck next time. There are OIF patients to see.

This is, actually, the real problem with hospitals such as the one to which I found myself all day Wednesday. It is woefully understaffed, having at last count one neuropsychologist, maybe three neurologists, one endochronologist, and that is just a rough sample. Then the Army, in it’s efforts to save money, closed every other major health facility in the country, so every Soldier that needs to be seen for something a clinic and the Germans can’t treat has to find an appointment. But they get bumped for anyone coming with an Iraq or Afghanistan injury. Schedules are usually full a month out or so, and the endochronologist is so busy even telephone consultations are not made.

I understand priority going to Soldiers coming from downrange, though I thought the hospital here was only supposed to be a staging ground to get the Soldier back to the States anyway. However, I do admit that it is much more difficult to understand when another Soldier feels penalized because even though at last count four doctors confirmed an injury was sustained in Iraq three years ago now, since the Soldier didn’t fly on the medical transport there they now get shuffled to the back of the line though they still have to drive anywhere from one to four hours without traffic to get treatment. Something about that is not fair to the tens of thousands of Soldiers in country who really just want to get someone to look at whatever malady was bad enough to get referred to arguably the most overworked hospital on the continent. It is not these Soldiers fault that the Army opted to close every major facility closer to their place of work, and then didn’t hire enough doctors to staff the one place it left open.

But tirade aside, I finally did get to see my neurologist, who was kind enough to squeeze me in since she knew I had driven several hundred kilometers to get turned around because of National German Road Work Day. She offered to take a needle, put some chemicals in it, and shove it directly into the back of my head to numb a stubborn nerve that she thinks might be bothering my brain. Having a nice, long drive back ahead of me, I declined her tempting offer and instead gathered two more perscriptions and instructions to see her Friday if the pills don’t work so I can get shot in the skull. Something tells me I will make those pills work.

Aside from all of that, I still have Soldiers, who are always just bundles of fun and joy in my life. I have now requested to relocate my office to a first floor setting just in case I decide to make good on my threats to toss subordiates out a window. I am not convinced that if they land on their heads it would do much damage, but a first floor option gives me more chances than upper stories to try my theory. Unfortunately, it is just too expensive to move the office. We will see how that works out for some people.

Tomorrow is another day back to the hospital, to see the one endochronologist in country. An honor, really. I should ask for an autograph. It will be an interesting visit, since they neglected to call me and tell me to get my lab work done a week or two back so I have a feeling tomorrow will consist of me wandering into an office to get the response of, “Hmm. Labs just went in. So… uh… how you feeling? Good? Not so Good? Gee. Too bad. Well, try to come again later so we can look at the labs! Have a fun drive home!”

The building doesn’t go higher than a few stories. If I can just find the roof access…

Miracle of miracles. My unit approved funding for me to return to complete the course I was so rudely removed from at the beginning of the summer. Not without some pushing and shoving from my command, surely, who are probably tired of my whining and complaining and might rather send me to the United States for seven weeks rather than listen to me.

I am not one to count my chickens before they hatch, however. I still have to wait on the course NCO to put me into the system so this elusive funding can be allocated and I can, say, get orders and a ticket. Then I have to wait for someone to realize that I am in the system and officially approve the funds. Then I have to wait for the travel office, operated by Germans, to be open to cut my tickets. It is holiday season in Germany… they can rival the Army for functionality this time of year.

But provided all goes smoothly, I should be able to head back and get at least a piece of what I reenlisted for, which would be nice. I have already informed the doctors that the stunt they pulled last time of waiting for me to get there and get settled before changing their minds will not work again, and that once I am there I hope they will leave me alone like they promised to do last time. I have no intention of seeing a doctor while there, not even for a headcold, to ensure they forget about me. I am still kicking myself for going to the clinic for some measly headache medication that didn’t even work last time. It is so easy to disappear in the Army, and I intend to do just that. Then I can return just in time to make sure my Soldiers don’t gain too much weight over the holidays and start pushing for the rest of my reenlistment drug deal.

With this miracle going through, I hope to be pleasantly surprised with future offers. Only time will tell… past experience has not increased confidence. But I am an effective whiner, and I have learned to save correspondence regarding what has been promised. I hold my trump cards close, ready for the game to begin again upon my return. Stakes are high, but it finally looks like the game is running in my favor, so hopefully I can ride out the streak before it comes crashing down like it usually does once someone realizes that they might actually be helping a Soldier.

It’s all part of living the Army dream, I suppose. With two and a half years until I can wake up, I will take whatever small wonders I can get.

If there is a lesson to be learned at this year’s Oktoberfest celebrations down in Munich, it is that officers can make terrible, but terribly amusing, travel companions.

I don’t know what it was about going to a few more schools and getting put into positions that pay roughly twice as much as the people that do the actual work that made the officers I found myself consuming liter beers with feel the need to sleep on warehouses or fall between the subway and the platform. I don’t know what it is about flying helicopters or pushing papers from one end of a desk to the other that made them get lost between the bathroom and a table at the largest tent at the fest or almost get kidnapped by fake Polizei.

What I do know is that at least it was fabulously entertaining and no one is really the worse for it. They were, for all of their interesting behavior, better than the enlisted infantry troops on the train heading back that wanted to pick a fight with everyone and everything to include each other. A personal peeve of mine is when certain Soldiers seem to think that they are better than anyone else because of their job, particularly when those Soldiers haven’t even seen combat yet. There is no need to think that a finance Soldier is any less than anyone else, for instance, and in fact I tend to be much nicer to the people that control my paycheck or my paperwork or my supplies or the condition of my vehicles, because it is very hard to function without them. Infantry Soldiers are notorious for the obnoxious behavior of calling other Soldiers names like “POG” (pronounced like “powg,” long “o”), a term for “Person Other than Grunt” and meant to be deragatory to non-infantry personnel. I never saw a problem not being infantry; in my days of dismounted patrols, checkpoint operations, raids, and cordon searches, I have respect for but no desire to be in a field such as that. The Soldiers on the train, traveling in packs as they tend to do at that age and mental capacity, only reinforced my feeling that I would do poorly in a unit like that as my head might explode trying to examine the logic of their behaviors. They might make an excellent case study in GroupThink and pack dynamics, but nothing I want to get mixed up in.

And at fests, particularly one such as Oktoberfest, the Germans are not without their peculiarities as well. They insist on bringing small children into the beer tents, never mind the raucous mood of the general crowd. They don funny hats and shoot dirty looks at the Italians that venture up from warmer climates for the festivities. They wander around in togas and traditional German dress despite the cold weather and misty rain. They sing along to drinking songs the oompah band plays, and insist that you get on the table with them or risk having beer spilled all over your plate of half chicken and cabbage salad.

So overall, Oktoberfest was a Time. Good times sometime, not-as-good times during other times, but overall worth the experience at least once. I heard from my friend that he eventually made his way back here last night after missing the last train out, one of the group may have broken his foot, and the others slept their way through their post-deployment reintegration briefs at the back of the theater this morning, so at least all is well and good here.

Now I really should go and wash my jacket from the beer spills.

Today, I was confused.

This afternoon, as I gave instructions to a Soldier on a briefing I need him to give, he wrote down little notes about what needed to go into the briefing and nodded a lot. Then, when I paused, he interrupted with the statement, “Sergeant? You know I am an extreme introvert, right?”

Now, the job we do deals with people. Human interaction is part of the description. The word “Human” is somewhere in his job title, as a matter of fact, and was so when he enlisted.

After telling him I didn’t really care and he had better get over it before the briefing, I finished telling him what he needed to do and left for a meeting. On my way to the meeting, I pondered exactly what would make someone who dislikes talking to people look at the job description and say, “Sure! That sounds like something I would like!” It is not as though the description reads, “Sit alone in an office, surf the web, and eat free cookies,” or something of the like. It in fact mentions direct human interaction. But he apparently still thought it would be a lovely idea, the recruiter must have as well, and now he sits in my office worried about a five minute briefing where someone has already told him what he needs to say. He has effectively become My Problem.

I promptly gave myself a swift kick for reenlisting.

My First Sergeant always categorizes incidents like this, where I have to seclude myself in a room and allow my brain to bleed a little more into the tumor that claims squatter’s rights in my skull, as “Leadership Challenges.”

With this one, I think I am about all challenged out.

I am beginning to think that brain tumor aside, I went crazy long ago and have been in fact having full conversations with brick walls instead of people on numerous occassions.

Issue number one: my combat action badge submittal was returned again. Despite the fact that several doctors have now established a connection to an explosion in Iraq affecting the general condition of whatever marbles were rolling around in my dome, there are simply those who prefer to believe what someone tells them instead of the paperwork in front of them, such as statements, manifests, and other proof. The nice thing is that the Veteran’s Administration might actually look at the paperwork one day, long after I am out of uniform. They will also be paying the tab on the brain problems that were exacerbated by the incident, so I suppose it is only fair to give them the honor of bestowing anything else that goes along with it.

Issue 2: I think someone, perhaps my First Sergeant, perhaps Xenu, perhaps whatever karma-punishing element there might be in the universe, has it in for me. For some reason, I just have trouble finding good help these days. Our unit has recently fallen into a little bit of a staffing problem as the Big Army figures out how to right itself from a little mess it made when it combined some jobs, got rid of a few others, and brought in civilians to make up for missing Soldier positions. The qualifications I hold have thus become a bit of a hot commodity in this little bubble in the market, but I appear to be federally controlled and not getting any pay raises for the things I get to deal with and the swapping around I get to do. I was just told yesterday that some of the things I have been chasing and in fact reenlisted for, such as deployments and courses, are now a liability because I can’t go away for too long without a backfill that the Army has yet to provide. While this should not affect my return at the end of the month to complete the course I was so rudely ripped from earlier in the summer, it does make the next two and a half years a little daunting. For the past two years I have been trying to weasel my way around staying in my current position, but the karma-gods have combined themselves with the brick walls until now it might be too late. I had better go to this course at the end of the month; it might be my last escape for awhile.

Issue 3: My Soldiers seem to have put their common sense into a lovely, carved, wooden chest, locked it, and then buried it somewhere, and now have apparently lost the treasure map. This isn’t that much of a surprise, actually, as I already knew this about them, but conversations in the past week have sometimes gone past trying to talk to the brick wall and resulted in my beating my head against it instead. I am starting to wonder if this isn’t part of some dastardly plan on the part of my command to get a few giggles at my expense as I try to figure out not only why, but how my Soldiers come up with some of the things that come out of their mouths and the things they do.

Luckily, I go in the middle of next month for the doctors to determine the status of my headaches. With a little luck, these experts will assess my situation and can perscribe me something helpful to deal with the still-present pain.

Like a nap.

Back to Germany, to formally return to work at 0600 tomorrow after roughly four and a half months in the United States. My apartment smells like rotting mayonnaise and I think my landlord shut off my heat and then went on vacation. It is about 30 degrees cooler out here, and the spiders have developed clever traps in their rebellion against my stalled weekly cleanings.

I called the company to let them know I was back and stupidly called during lunch. If there is one thing the military takes seriously, it is lunch. 1130 to 1300 there is no chance of finding a human being near a phone, and if someone finds himself near a communication device of sorts, they steadfastly ignore it. We learn that at Basic, I think. I called anyway, and my commander answered, which implies that he is in fact a machine. Since he has taken up marathon running recently, I already knew he wasn’t quite human, so I was only moderately surprised when he answered. I told him I was back and he seemed most pleased, which I found to be a strange reaction, and then he told me that most of the senior non-commissioned officers were at an exercise and would be back Monday. He then mentioned that I should probably head up to see everyone Monday so they can figure out what they are doing with me. Naturally, he gave me no hints. I think they enjoy making me squirm.

Meanwhile, the doctors forgot to make my follow-up appointments, one of my Soldiers is about to be homeless because his barracks are condemned and housing gave away his new room while he was at a course, and I think my warrant officer has discovered a rather frightening combination of alcohol and arrows in some fashion, all among other things.

If I said it was good to be back, I would have to seriously consider my mental state. And work doesn’t even start until tomorrow.

It is too late for some of us, but not all…

A friend contacted me recently, commenting that he is considering joining the Army. He wasn’t really sure what he wanted to do, but is leaning more and more towards the infantry.

I am not one to stop someone from joining the Army. I will tell it like it is, naturally, and point out that it isn’t all AK-47s and roses, but that I think it is a very beneficial experience for some people. I think that everyone, regardless of who (whom? I was never good at that), should have some sort of public service in their life in their formative late-teens to early-twenties. Be it military service, Peace Corps, Teach For America, USAID, Habitat for Humanity, or even a Save the Sea Lions campaign or local YMCA service. I strongly believe most Americans live out their lives in sheltered bubbles and that we would all be better off if everyone realized that they actually are not the only living things on the planet and that the world isn’t around just to please you and you alone. Serve someone else a little bit and then sit back and get an underpaid cabana boy to shave your bunions, because you will appreciate it more.

Digression aside, I still felt the need to ask my friend if he had recently lost his mind. Being in my age group, he is at or around 30 years old by now. I have a husband with one fully operational body part, largely because he joined the infantry at age 25. I maintain that he did it because he had something to prove, with his two brothers being Marines. Had they not done that, he might have done something a little less hard on the body and a little more developmental of the talents he already had. Joining the Army was not the silly thing; it was a 25 year old with back problems from construction trying to keep up with 18 year olds running around in soggy North Carolina woods while training for long days in 140 degree sand pits and 10 degree dirt heaps.

His response? He wants to serve his country, feels that infantry gives the most pride, it “feels right.”

Sure, and it’s going to feel just cozy in your knees, back, hips, and shoulders while you are realizing that you have very coherent memories from the day some of the Soldiers that outrank you were born. I am still entertained by my Soldier in his late 30’s who did his first Army stint when I was conquering long division, but who I now get to take out the trash when it needs it. And naturally, his knees are bad. He was smart enough this time around to stay away from going back into the infantry, and to serve his country instead by following my orders.

In the end, of course I support that my friend should join the Army. He feels it is best for him, he feels it would benefit him and his life, and I agree that it most likely would. But a 30 year old joining the infantry? Someone who has talents and brains and patriotism going into something that aside from security jobs has little future outside the military? That benefits no one. We need the infantry, in all shapes, sizes, ranks, and brains, and I need someone to kick down that door for me if someone I want is inside. They do a job I can’t, and I recognized that long ago. But it isn’t for everyone, and may not be the best way to benefit the Army, you, or the country. If you have talent, by all means use it in the Army. Build bridges, do finance, collect intelligence, analyze data, whatever. But remember that the Army isn’t forever, and that by 35 you should be setting a path, and that your body will have to accomodate and that an 18 year old body can do a lot more than even a 25 year old body. People forget that, particuarly as they get older but don’t want to admit it, and it’s scary to watch. I have had Soldiers that were a bad fit for my job, particularly in the more infantry-like parts of my job and also in the career aspects, and they were a nightmare and every day I wished for someone in admin or pharmacy or anywhere else in the Army to swoop in and offer them on-the-job training for anything outside of my proximity. It never happened, and instead the Soldier suffered and so did the Army.

I understand the overwhelming need for some people to go infantry. I married one. People feel that that is the “real” Army, that they do the “real” work and see the “real” deal. People forget that it is other people telling them where to go to find the bad guys, and where they can expect to find bombs along the way. People forget that you can serve your country by shooting bad guys but you can also serve it by finding the bad guys in the first place, or guarding those bad guys once they are caught, or serving eggs in the morning to the people doing the finance for the admin guys keeping the truck driver’s paperwork straight. I serve mine wandering through fields and poo-canals hoping to catch a glimpse of the jerk that woke me up with mortars the night before, right alongside the infantry guys who provide me with a secure escort to find that jerk relatively unimpeded. I also serve my country training other Soldiers how to avoid walking directly through a poo-canal by double-checking the map before a 2am departure. I have not had to fire my weapon in combat, despite having been fired upon, but I have locked up my share of threats and have not had one Soldier walk through poo to get to a village since I had the fortune. So I have done my part, and it is a part to which I have continued to commit for a few more years. I use my brain, whatever remains of it, to help the Army, myself, and my country, because quite frankly I am just no good at kicking down doors and would just get in the way.

I hope my friend makes the best choice for himself, because that is really the only way to make the best choice for the Army. Despite all of its faults, I have a perverse loyalty to the organization and a desire for it to change for the better, and as such hate to see potential wasted. Some of us made mistakes in our time, either by career move or just missing the turn while on patrol. Hopefully others can learn from those and save themselves from the same.

Having been on leave about three weeks now, I have adjusted well without the military butting its head in periodically to remind me that it is there.

Well, not often anyway. Several things have nevertheless come to light as I try to relax and get my brain back in working order before I go back to Germany to get dumb again with Soldiers that toss things or themselves out windows and occasional questions about if Hugo Chavez is Russian. I can’t make things like that up, by the way, and can only report what happens in my sad, sad life.

Anyway, despite my best efforts to regain some sanity, yesterday I encountered a puzzle. Because I have been gone awhile and there was a significant debate on who would pay the bill, it turned out that for awhile in fact no one paid that bill. At least, not appropriately. My unit picked up the tab and helped me gain access to the system so I could file for partial payments, which they then paid at times designated I assume by the phase of the moon, whether Mars was in Aquarius, and who won the Rutgers football game last weekend.

Yesterday I got a nasty-gram from the government credit card company. It had been rerouted several times, having been dated approximately five to six weeks prior to my date of receipt. I decided, since I am in the process of purchasing a home, that it would be prudent to give them a call.

Despite my unit having given them several thousand dollars recently, it became apparent that the bank was just as absurd as the automated system cutting those checks. The bank, without practical information to the contrary and clearly without any form of common sense, happily applied the money to current dues owed and not to what they deemed my “overdue” account, which is probably monies owed from back in May when this whole shebang started. Apparently because it took the military a bit to start paying because I couldn’t access the system, I was delinquent on some money and instead of the logical (I think, anyway) process of paying off the oldest things first, the money was attributed to newer charges such as the Great Walter Reed Caper of 2008. So while those are being paid, I still am having my card shut off and getting nasty pieces of paper tracking me around the world because the money isn’t being routed right and my crystal ball, being in the shop, didn’t tell me that was the case for me to fix it prior.

The answer? Pay it myself, since I don’t have access to the system while on leave, and hope to get paid someday later. My answer to that? Well, it’s not terribly polite.

So it appears that even though I sit watching HGTV sipping an iced tea and all looks well, there are still ways for the stars (namely the Great Bank Constellation and the Army Nebula) to align in ways that confuse. There is simply no escape from the absurdities. Strangely, that is comforting, as I grow more and more unsure that I would know what to do with myself should life become suddenly “practical.”

Moving right along, I have made good my escape from Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Quite frankly, it was not the happiest place on the planet. By and large, the general population of patients seemed to be grouped into amputees, the very elderly, and the crazy. I have all of my limbs and do not consider myself in the elderly category, leaving only one thing for me to become should I remain much longer. I opted instead to convince them to let me go.

It took some doing, as do most things in the Army. They had to straighten out my orders, which was only complicated because apparently everyone was just waiting around for me to fix them myself on the new automated payment system. That would have been fine if 1) someone had mentioned that was what needed to be done and 2) if I had any access to the system aside from begging people off their computers. In the end, I found someone willing to let me onto the system and fix what needed to be fixed, and a week later it had wended its way through the system for the 108 digital signatures it needed for processing. Then it was a not-so-simple matter of switching my flight to something in the same time zone as my intended location, packing up my strewn belongings, and convincing the doctor that it really was time for me to go instead of running a few more tests to make sure my brain was still tucked away inside my skull somewhere.

So now I am on leave, my unit having the sense to recognize that flying back to Germany for what amounted to two working days and a four-day weekend was not really practical, back in the comfort of New Jersey. Yes, some people do find New Jersey comforting. Once you leave the area immediately surrounding the airport, it actually is a lovely state. We designed it that way to keep undesireables out, so once they land at the airport they think there is nothing to see and will just keep moving along while we can live in general peace.

Meanwhile, I wait for word on what the Army has in store. Deployments, classes, Soldiers, medical appointments, all are options on the table. There is a bit of a conflict as to what I want to do as opposed to what I really should do, so I left the general decision-making up to those in higher echelons somewhere in Eastern Germany while I mill about and watch Animal Cops on Animal Planet and enjoy pizza that can only be found better in Italy.

I know that soon enough the Big Green Machine will call me back with some description of where I need to be, when, and in what uniform. Until then, I have every intention of taking advantage of having nowhere to be, at no particular time, and with my uniforms tucked safely away in the bottom of my suitcase.

Two years, eight months, and counting.

I am starting to wonder about myself. Some would say that is long overdue, but that is not currently the point. I will deal with those individuals later.

Each time I go to a doctor, they ask me to describe, honestly and in detail, how I am feeling. I tell them. Then they usually look at some things, check some pieces of paper, and make their determinations.

In recent months, each determination has been nearly the complete opposite of the symptoms I describe to them when they ask how I am feeling. If I tell them I feel fine, they tell me that is strange, because there are a million things wrong. If I tell them something hurts on the right, they tell me it should hurt on the left. It goes on. Each doctor can find a list of things that are not quite right, but none that can explain the symptoms and none of the symptoms can be directly related back to anything.

Today, for instance, I went to the ear, nose, and throat doctor. He is just as much fun as he sounds. A very nice guy for someone who takes thin pieces of metal and shoves them up your nose much deeper than any child could ever lodge a raisin. So he asks how it’s going. I tell him I don’t breathe so good on the left side of my nose, but the right is doing just lovely. Up go multiple pieces of metal, jabbing my tear ducts and possibly muddling up my brain a little, though I can’t be sure. He checks the right. He checks the left. He grunts and asks which side I can’t breathe from. I mumble back at him since by now my throat is numb. He grunts again, shoves a vacuum into my head, and giggles a little. I think some people become doctors for the specific reason that they can legally torture others.

When he removes the metal from my face he comments that I should have had problems on the right. I disagreed, and even breathed for him so he could note that the problem is in fact on the left. Up goes the metal, but he still insists I should have more problems on the right, although he admits that I am not breathing so well on the left and seem to breathe fine on the right. But then he shrugs, removes the metal, hands me a tissue, and tells me to have a lovely day. Apparently not concerned that the evidence does not support the overall conclusions, nor really interested in figuring out a suitable excuse.

So I continue, for about another week, to wade through this medical conundrum that has become me from the neck up. Whispers of another medical board, referrals to other doctors halfway around the world, and an awful lot of shrugging has accompanied the past two weeks, and I figure it can only get better from here. But it has caused me to question myself, to make sure that I do in fact know my left from my right, at least well enough to figure out which side hurts and which side does not. Having done so, I then wonder if perhaps the doctors are unsure of their left and right, or if maybe someone in the lab is playing pranks again because they know how much I love to have blood drawn repeatedly.

Next Wednesday I should be able to escape this hall of torture and find my way to the greener pastures of leave and then, perhaps, Germany for at least a little while. I haven’t seen my Soldiers in a bit and I understand one is on crutches, one got promoted, and the third is probably still pouring coffee out the window with no one around to make him strong for it. Crazy or not, I really should get back and make sure all is in order before whatever other adventures the Army can throw my way.

An interesting observation today:

There are multiple secret floors in the hospital.

No one really seems to take the stairs in the hospital, and usually with good reason. If you are in a hospital, in all probability you are in some sort of circumstance where it is probably just healthier for you to take an elevator. That and the stairs are not terribly well marked, usually tucked around a corner, and it tends to be fairly hazardous to just go randomly opening doors in a hospital looking for stairs.

I, on the other hand, get headaches from elevators now, so I usually try to find the stairs and plod my way up or down instead to get at least a little bit of the exercise the doctors have forbidden.

Taking the stairs, one would think, would be quite straight-forward, if not as much as just wandering into a moving box and pressing a button corresponding to the desired floor number. Alas, nothing in the Army is ever as easy as suspected. Here they have even come up with having half-floors.

Half-floors?

Half-floors. When traveling, say as I did today, from floor 2 to floor 3, you must first come to the landing for floor 2 1/2.

These floors are not indicated on the elevator. While observed on previous trips up and down the elusive stairwells, today I paused at the landing to determine what could possibly be going on, and why the building doesn’t just have 12 floors instead of 7 with half floors. My math is correct, by the way, as I have yet to find floor 1 1/2. The vacuum didn’t remove that piece.

Back on track, I noted that while the regular floors have little windows in the fire doors looking usually directly to the wall about three feet in front of the door because no stairwell in the building opens to a main hallway, these half floors did not have even a peephole. Further, located next to the door I observed little black scanner boxes, presumably for a specific identification and access card in order to open the door onto the floor. I have never seen someone go into or come out of these doors, not surprising as I rarely see anyone else in the stairwell in general, but the little red light atop the scanner glared ominously enough at me that I did not attempt to scan my own identification card to sate my curiosity.

And it is probably better that I didn’t, anyway, as really what need has a hospital for hidden levels? What goes on upon these levels? Are they full-sized levels, or half the height? Who works here, and do they have windows? Why does the exterior of the building not seem quite that tall?

I probably should let it go. Nothing good has ever come out of me asking too many questions of the Army, and seldom do such questions lead to answers anyway. And I suspect that these may be things I don’t really want to know.

Diabetes Insipidus. If spelled properly, that is what I can toss into an Internet search engine to determine what it is the Army has given me this time.

While mucking about inside my dome trying to chase down an intergalactic battlelord, it appears that the doctors may have jiggled something that didn’t appreciate being jiggled and now my brain, and possibly whatever remains of Xenu up in my skull, is taking revenge. Diabetes Insipidus, from my understanding, is called the “salty” diabetes instead of the “sweet” diabetes and means that my body isn’t holding onto or processing water that I take in, leaving my blood and all those other important fluids to be extra salty. What is good for a plate of fries is apparently not as good for me, as it just makes me thirsty and perpetually looking for the closest bathroom.

However, it is not the kind of diabetes that makes it a tragic sin for me to eat cookies or ice cream, so at least in that I am still able to maintain some semblance of sanity.

Can it be treated? They can try, with a spray that is the same stuff that didn’t work very well when I was in the hospital.

Will it ever go away? They have no idea.

Is this what is causing the headaches and nausea? Headaches, probably not but possibly. Nausea, a definite maybe.

So my life in the fine care of Army medicine continues unfettered by pesky things such as “answers.” Meanwhile my unit continues to try and figure out how to get me back to Germany without a layover 2000 miles in the wrong direction and I spend my days trying to avoid the particular ward full of doctors that have threatened to stamp me “non-deployable.” Despite my new tendency towards acute dehydration, I still find that the Army is much easier sitting in the warm sand trying to discern if that was Akmed or Akhmed that put the bomb in the ground, and knowing that no matter if the group wandering in the distance is sheep or goat, either way it can make a tasty dinner.

Hold the salt, please.

I feel like an old, neglected, Jewish grandmother. Sitting here in the dark, no one to talk to, and no one even closed the window so now we are cooling off the whole outside and I might catch my death over here because I haven’t got a sweater on.

The torch of responsibility continues to get passed. I am back now for more fun and excitement in the general vicinity of Walter Reed, so I opted to stop in and pose the question to the lovely folks over at the Medical insurance section how it is I am supposed to get paid back for all of this fine, upstanding Army care I have been receiving since sometime in the middle of June.

Their answer? Who knows.

I was sent here at the demand of some doctors in Landstuhl, two of which I never actually met. They ordered the doctors in Arizona, where I was happily minding my own business, to strap me onto a plane and ship me over to Washington D.C. The folks in Arizona cut me a set of orders. Those orders, when prudently examined, were to fly to Washington, have someone shove a tube in my brain and suck out whatever doesn’t belong, and then to apparently get back on a plane and head back to Arizona immediately following. No allowances made for outpatient care or, coincidentally, the fact that I actually live in the opposite direction of Arizona and have no real reason to return there for some months yet.

But fly out here I did, and vacuum my cranium they did, and I thought all was well and good, having been told in Arizona that all would be taken care of and not to worry about it. So I, foolishly, did not worry about it. Until, that is, this morning.

Arizona does not pay for outpatient care. Walter Reed does not either. The unit, it turns out, is supposed to pay for outpatient care. My unit is across quite a large pond and thought that these fine medical people would take care of it all, since it wasn’t exactly their choice to send me here in the first place and it was all doctor meddling that got me into this. Well, actually it was the meddling of a large explosive in Iraq a few years ago that really made a mess of things, but goodness knows the Iraqi government isn’t going to pay for my hotel in Washington.

Meanwhile, the insurance people are thinking I have to fly back to Arizona in order to fly back to Germany. I pointed out that I really have nothing to do in Arizona until at least the middle of October, so it would really help me out to not have a layover there. Were it three weeks later, I could just go kill some time at a school in Arizona before finishing up the class I was already in the middle of, but those three weeks would really put a damper on things. The answer I got was “But your orders state you have to go back there. We have to send you back. We don’t particularly care that there is no reason for you to go there and it is a waste of government money and your time. Have fun, see you later.” I’m now laid up in my hotel room that no one wants to pay for with a massive headache from trying to figure out the logic behind this one. I’m fighting a losing battle.

It’s appears just that no one particularly feels like paying much attention to me over here, only long enough to argue a little about finances while still trying to shuffle me off to someone else to take care of the problem.

So now the game begins as everyone goes back and forth trying to determine who is going to pay me back for the five or six weeks unaccounted for, spent largely with needles in the arms and people shoving cameras up my nose to see if my brain is still somewhere up there.

If it is, I do hope it has the sense to leave before this gets much more complicated. As long as it shuts off the lights on the way out.

At last check, the only fully functional body part between my esteemed husband and myself was a right arm. That means that, in five years of military service, both of us have managed to keep that arm out of trouble.

That’s it.

My right ankle and both feet. His left ankle. His knees and hips. My tailbone. His spine. My left shoulder. His left arm. My head. His head. The results come back Monday for his neck. We can’t wait.

Join the Army. Explore new places and occupy them. Meet exciting foreign people and shoot at them (and get shot at by them). Learn things about yourself, like the tensile strength of the human bone.

He is starting to make his transition to prepare to re-enter the civilian world after more than five years, sparking a hint of jealousy from his ever-supportive-but-still-a-little-cranky wife. His post-deployment medical assessment was a learning experience for the doctors and for him, and I have to remind him that when his doctor says that he shouldn’t even be walking too far pending further evaluation he should probably talk to his command about jumping out of a plane at low altitudes in the coming weeks. But what do I know… He points out that I’m the one who had headaches, memory problems, and strange vision issues after a little impact shoved some foreign matter in my brain around an artery and it took two and a half years for someone to shove a vacuum up my nose to clean out some of the scrambled mess.

People ask if we intend to make the military a career. Lucky for them it takes us too long to get up and get moving these days to make chasing after people who ask that a very effective threat.