Thoughts after return from Christmas Exodus (Jan. 4, ‘08)

So here I am, back here in same place I was last year (one and a half week ago). People ask me repeatedly "did you have a good break?" Well I'm here to tell you that in this place a break, by definition, is good. Tougher saying goodbye this time with the uncertainties and extended journey ahead. I saw a LOT of old friends and it just doesn't get much better than that for me. Sadly, I missed quite a few as well. It felt like being able to re-enter a past life but for just one last moment. That life is gone for now. This is my new life- an american soldier at war. Time to put aside all the emotions, rewards, setbacks, and complexities of those times. these times are much simpler. There is only one path now, one decision, one team, one fight, and one mission. I'm taking my soldiers to war and I'm bringing them back to their families.

Many of them (fellow soldiers) got married over our week long break. One of my younger brothers had my new baby nephew, Achim, a few months ago. I've got many friends graduating from schools this semester. Some looking for new jobs and others moving to new countries. To each, in his/her respective situation, that is the most important thing in the world right now.

I often feel like I'm sitting in the bleachers of a big empty stadium and the world is on the field and I'm just watching it turn. It's a horrifying and beautiful thing to see from this perspective. From new parents devoting themselves to child rearing in one place to the little convenience store getting knocked off around the way. From broken hearts to the highest forms of elation. It is just one intense work of art. And though I know I'm etched into a micro sized speck of it, it can seem as though I am completely separated; isolated in a world of my own on an entirely different playing field.

I have but a couple weeks or so left in this fair country. Just a fleeting amount of time before the training portion is over and the execution, what all this training has been for, begins. Between now and then, I've got to make sure that I'm sure that I'm sure that me and my guys are the best prepared for whatever may come our way as humanly possible.