On Duty

I was supposed to make a meeting. I was supposed to observe a student teacher discussing The Odyssey with her ninth grade honors English class. Tommi called on Skype from Iraq. I listened and typed while she talked. When the conversation was finished I didn't have the contitution to do more than watch my ants continue to tunnel. Here is that conversation:

(crying)
(crying)
We were lucky today
We were just lucky
A rocket landed close today
Really close
We all went down
(crying)
I was scared but then I saw how close it was
(silence)
(crying)

Almost … almost gone
(silence)
Nobody got hurt
(crying)

I’m just sorry
I don’t like talking to you about this stuff

M: Why?

I don’t want to scare you
I just got back
I’m glad you were there

We were a football field and a half away from where it hit
And I know that sounds like a long way
It’s not a bomb … it’s something dangerous
Nasty nasty shrapnel
Shreds metal … rips through stuff

Can’t tell you here
Anything I put into cyberspace gives an opportunity for exploitation
There were 5,000 people observed there
Many of them military
Then rockets hit the next two days in a row, hit right there again… where people where seen
All the stuff inside shreds
Shreds and tears through everything
They’re made to kill people
(crying)
It doesn’t make any sense
(crying)
I hurt so bad over that
It’s not my life I’m hurting over
It’s just like … I don’t …
I wanna go home in one piece
I wanna see my family again
And I want my soldiers to see their family’s again

And you wanna know the crazy part?
We knew it was coming
We closed the gate today
But I had to do my job
So I let most of my guys go after the half day
My Sgt and I stayed at the gate

The crazy part is that it didn’t explode and that’s the only reason nobody got hurt
Sometimes the detonation mechanism doesn’t fire
It missed some Iraqi soldiers by like forty yards
(crying)
They could’ve been aiming for the gate … I figured the margin of error … the gate was well inside range

M: So they missed?

Yeah, they missed
The good news is that they miss all the time
They’re horrible shots
But they still manage to hit something … people … equipment

(crying)
I love you
I miss you
I wanna come home
You would be proud of me
I stay strong in those moments

There was a woman at the gate with no body armor no protection … that woman from the non-profit, non-government ... she stood there watching the rocket fly over ... just stood there … the Sgt standing next to her … we gotta get you to a … it was about 75 yards … a run to our building … we had an extra flack jacket, so we gave it to her while she was there.

These attacks come in batches
They’ll hit you two or three at a time and then wait 20, 30 minutes and then hit you again
They usually dispatch the Apaches … fighter helicopters with guns on them … to go hunt

I hate this …
I don’t wanna be here

God did a very good thing for me when he put me in a place where I would be forced to see the nastiness
Even the men I came here with… sit in their air conditioned offices … they’re separated by distance and when Sgt and I went there to tell them we were safe … they’re like ok … thanks… oh, you were down there?
We’re desensitized to loud noises here because there are groups who actually control …
It would never hit them… I mean, where they’re located … it would never hit them … they would never be hit.
The First Sgt was there … I did learn that he went out of his way to make sure we were ok … you wanna know why? … cause when the rockets hit down at the gate last week … he was there … he knows … he knows how scary it is

Wanna hear a funny part about it?

M: Yeah… tell me the funny part.

(laughter)
There’s a sign, a big arching sign over the road right at the front gate … It’s suppose to say “Camp _____” but it doesn’t. It has the old name of the camp still there, and we all hate that sign but there’s no money to change it … well, the rocket hit close to that sign.
It missed by like 40 meters
We all thought "Damn" ... if it hit the sign we could fix it
The problem is there were people under that sign …

Tommi on Duty