Change Over
The last 3 days have been amazingly long and surprisingly fast. I’ve been spending every ounce of my energy trying to make sure the new communications crew is fully trained. I’ve been worrying endlessly at night trying to think of something I had forgotten to tell them during the day. With only 2 more days left to train, I’m hoping I can give them more than enough to transition into our shoes easily. So far they’re on top of their game.
I didn’t realize how much my job entailed until I had to cram a years worth of experience into one week. To be honest, I was amazed I even survived the first month of my deployment without knowing what I know now. I do remember that first month to be mentally painful, to say the least. Looking at my blog archive in the months of OCT/NOV, I see that I couldn’t even muster much of a journal entry either.
When I arrived here my trainer spent one day with me and then disappeared. He didn’t even bother to train the three other people in the communications squad. I can only imagine how lost they must have felt too.
This time around, we wanted to do it differently. I’m hoping that our efforts won’t go to waste.
The new folks seem to be amazingly warm and VERY eager to learn and get going. During my sections back brief to our respective commanders today, I felt like a proud mother hen. They really showed me how much they had retained during my 72 hour brain dump on them. It was at the moment when T explained the importance of *CCIR’s to his commander (something I didn’t really grasp well into the first month of MY deployment) that I knew I would sleep very well tonight. I couldn’t hide my shit ass grin.
I crashed soon after the elation that followed my pride in the new people and the pride in how much I had been working my ass off. I’m feeling so very drained at this moment. And I’m also feeling again what it was like to be new to Iraq. The feeling of not knowing what was around the corner…. Of not being able to anticipate and worrying that my reaction wouldn’t be the right one. I know what they’re feeling and I think that may be what’s keeping my brain going at night.
How can I explain what it feels like for a mortar to fall near to you?
How can I prepare them for the look in an Iraqi’s eyes when they visit a relative with half his head blown off?
Is there a way to word the feeling of absolute aloneness when surrounded by 100 other people?
What about the feeling of despair when you realize nothing will be the same when you return home?
My heart is also mixed with an unusual feeling of longing for this place. I’ve created a nice little bubble of existence and get pangs in my stomach at the thought of leaving it. Many of us are having trouble handing over our hard work. That sounds funny, doesn’t it? I’m surprised just as much as you are.
Two more days of shadowing left.
With the long journey ahead of me back to the states, I can’t say how many dispatches I’ll be able to crap out to my blog in the next two weeks. Soon I’ll be in Kuwait. Then the agonizingly long flight back to Wisconsin. Then the bus ride back to Chicago where my friends and family will be waiting with open arms. $10 says I’ll cry like a baby.
* Commanders Critical Information Reports (i.e. Just another crazy military acronym for us to remember that makes us sound like we know what we’re doing.)
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