farwell to arms.

Yeah.
I am a bit nostalgic today.
I am a bit reflective as well.
Suprisingly, I recall all of the cool moments I have spent in the United States Army.
Funny thing is, some of these moments are also some of my worst.
I joined the Army for the strangest reason that many have ever heard. I was hungry, homeless, suicidal, and generally displaced. I yearned punishment as an escape from the seemingly endless punishment that life seemed to have been dealing me. I had been torturing myself with endless amounts of push ups and sit ups in an effort to displace my pain. In fact, I was doing push-ups when the Trade Center fell. How ironic. I needed punishment for existing; the United States Army was my shoe size. I tried them on.

Basic and advanced individual training were both truly punishing for me. The environments extremely challenged my mental and my physical existence. I lost myself in self inflicted pain. I discovered ecstasy in escape. I was free.

I trained in the middle of nowhere. I knew not one soul and was comfortable with that concept. I was an island unto self. I endured both the warmest and coldest environments that I had ever encountered during my lifepan. Little did Mother Nature know, the elements were at MY command; they affected me not. I had become immune to the torture of temperature and the stabs of eviromnental allergic triggers. Loneliness was my welcome companion. I gritted my teeth for sustinance. I had transformed Michaelngelo's David from a pile of dust. I was invincible and willing to dare the world to try me.
The world had its chance to test my fortitude.

I spent a great deal of my time in the Army being a single father to my daughter. The Army lifestyle, for a combat soldier, is not tailored to accomodating the typical lifestyle that is necessary to being a sucessful single parent. With the help of some extremely compassionate friends, mission accomplisment was achieved, but the battle was far from easily won. I learned alot about life from these moments.

I served in Iraq under Operation Iraqi Freedom 2. I completed over 350 combat missions as a medic with 1-34 Armor battalion. I served hand-in-hand with soldiers from th 82nd Airborne division, 1-16 Infantry battalion, 1st Marine expeditionary force. Along with these brave soldiers, I witnessed firsthand what it is like to walk the line between potential death and death actualized. One can tell a great deal about the human existance when life is the wager. I learned I am not a betting man.

I look forward to my new/ old life as a civilian. The transition from the miltary to the civilian sector is one that should evoke fears. I have forgotten what it is like to be scared of death; fear of life is also a distant memory. I merely exist in a constant flux of kill!!! and never!!!. Ambivilance is my watchword; numb is my expression. Perhaps I am not Michaelangelo's David afterall; perhaps I am Rodin's The Thinker instead. Only time will tell. Nothing is engraved in stone, is it?


The first picture above is of me while on ammunition detail during a training nine millimeter range, held outdoors, during freezing elements of a brutal winter. I smiled.

The second picture is of me from last night. My soldiers threw me a Army separation party. I was truly emotional as it seems, I mean alot to most of the soldiers that I have worked with. They had no problem expressing their willingness to die in battle with me. That type of bond does not come easy. I recognized. I smiled. Ohh yeah. They gave me the nicest award I have ever recieved and I have recieved quite a few. Death be not proud...