Today is March 20, 2011. Eight years ago today Operation Iraqi Freedom started. I don't know how I feel about this. It doesn't seem possible that it's been eight years. My birthday is March 18. I turned 27 two days before OIF began. To be completely honest I didn't think I was going to turn 28. War in any form is a scary thing, there is nothing glitzy or glamorous about it. People die and get hurt. I knew all the Marines in MAG-39 who were killed. I saw the pictures on the news of guys I went to Parris Island with who were killed. I remember having chow with my friend Otis and sitting and talking to a guy Otis was friends with. The next day he was killed. Just one of the many to the folks back home who disagree with why we came to Iraq, but a real face to me. Life became very simple for us. Get up in the morning, check your boots for scorpions, go to the head and clean up, go to chow, go to MAG HQ work for 20 hours, go back to the tent, try not to fall asleep untying your boots, pass out... repeat. All the while you are doing two things: hoping you don't die and trying not to think about home. I know that I chose to join the Marine Corps. I didn't have to do this. We were trained to be hard as nails and that the most important thing was the mission. We were trained to improvise, adapt and overcome. We were trained to never give up and never surrender. I never broke a bone or got shot or hit by shrapnel from a IED. I wasn't deployed multiple times for over a year at a time. I do have scars. Sometimes it's very hard to keep my mind focused or my emotions in check. I can get overly sensitive or insanely angry for no reason. This happens to a lot of veterans. The saying goes that time heals all wounds. I've come to the conclusion that just isn't true. Some events are so earth shattering, so traumatic, so scary that you will never be able to let them go and you will never feel the same again. I have developed a bizarre coping mechanism, I focus my rage and aggression on the small and insignificant rather than real issues. You could say that I sweat the small stuff in order to deal with the big stuff.
I have been telling the story of The Misguided Children which began almost twelve years ago in a real time format, but today I wanted to pause and remember the 4,439 brave men and women who have died in Iraq and the over 300,000 who survived but have come home scarred in one way or another. All gave some, some gave all. Semper Fidelis.
When we came back from OIF 1 and got out of the Corps, I drove back to Illinois with a buddy. We stopped in Las Vegas for 2 days to party. The whole time I was there my right hand was across my chest near my left armpit, right where I kept my pistol while in Iraq. We were walking down the Strip and some jackass was throwing M-80 firecrackers out the window of his car. I saw him coming, I knew he was throwing firecrackers, yet when one went off near me I still ended up face down on the Strip with everyone looking at me like I was crazy. A few weeks later, back in Illinois, I was at a 4th of July BBQ when the fireworks started. I knew that it was fireworks, but I still had to go inside because of anxiety and an uncomfortable feeling. I couldn't enjoy the 4th of July for 3 years. What got me over it was a combination of time and talking. I sought out other Marines, talked to them about what happened over there, about buddies who didn't come home, about the fear and the anger of being under fire and the boredom of not being under fire. 8 years later I'm ok, I enjoy fireworks again, I don't tense up on the rifle range anymore, and my right hand hangs at my side like a normal person. Everyone had a different, very personal war, but finding guys who were there and talking it out deffinatly brought some peace back to my life. I still look back at those 6 weeks of war as the best time of my life, not because of some "combat glory" but because the Marines I served with were closer than brothers, and the tears of joy and relief from the Iraqi people who knew that life was going to be better without Saddam. They knew that the Marines had landed and the situation was well in hand. Semper Fi.
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