A Soldier's Life

It's 0500 and into the first week in the 6 months you've been at Aziz Ullah that there has been the Ritz like luxury of a place to shower in camp. There are over 600 of you here on this forward operating base located dead center in the birthplace of the Taliban. You've been washing with water in your helmet, forget washing your clothes. It's about 25 degrees outside with a small breeze. And the showers are located in an unheated tent. There are ten of them, and a 40 gallon hot water heater with a slow recovery time. Your chances of hot water are nil....and even if you got lucky, you'd step out of the shower into the frigid air of the tent. But it's the only chance you'll get. You actually consider yourself lucky to even have this shower. Who knows what deal the First Sergeant had to make to get it here. You muse to yourself how great it would be if, after your shower, there was a commode somewhere to enjoy quiet ablution. You come to your senses knowing that the few porta potties on the base are the best you'll find, and if you don't get there fairly quickly, the toilet paper...currency in a war..will be long gone.

Another day, another dollar.

You didn't sleep much last night. There are nine other guys in your tent, and four of them snore at a volume that competes with the artillery that maintains a security blanket of daylight bright flares over the perimeter, because you're not alone here. And your neighbors want you dead or gone. When sleep comes, it's generally from exhaustion. But the conditions help maintain your edge. It's an edge you need, because in your real life, you just don't want to have to kill anyone...job or no job. You think you're a pretty good guy, and you act normal around the guys and the gals with whom you serve. But laying there at night, you wonder if your God will forgive you, knowing he will, but maybe praying that He will help you understand it all. Some of your buddies have been acting a bit detached lately, and you hope they're OK.

So you make formation, get your briefing on the days patrols or camp activities, do your PT and head to breakfast. You hear the Blackhawks approaching as you head to the tent on wheels, the mobile kitchen, that's been providing the entire camp's chow for months. You know the choppers will be bringing guys coming back from R & R. You know how they are going to act. And they'll be bring replacements for guys that have rotated out...FNGs..new guys. You have to keep your eyes on them and help them adjust the best you can. And maybe the choppers will bring mail. They almost never do, but maybe today. You really hope your girl has sent you a letter, or a picture, or something...anything. There's a tent called the MWR...Morale, Welfare, & Recreation..that has a couple of phones and a few computers for internet. You have to pay for phone use and the internet is unreliable and slower than dial up..,.almost not worth the trouble...and there are hundreds of you wanting that timed interlude with the world outside.



They keep telling you that the unit is getting a real DFAC..Dining Facility..with civilian cooks and servers, and heating, and air conditioning, and a 28 day menu. No more MREs and wheeled kitchens. But you've been hearing that for a couple of months. The reefers showed up to keep all the cold stuff in, but nothing else. It's something to hope for. Surely the generals haven't forgotten you.

On this day, you and your platoon have intel about a location outside the wire that houses a contingent of Taliban fighters and a huge cache of arms. You know that they won't give it up easily. You're confident of your team, your tactics, your technology, and your firepower....but the 101st has lost over 60 guys here in the past year and over 100 hurt. The bullets fly in both directions. You try not to think about anything but your job and covering your team's back. Nobody dies today, you tell yourself...not on our side. Let that other guy die for his country...oowah.
So you mount up, like most days, with a combat load that would bend a stout mule's back, and through the wire you go.

This is a story about many camps here. I lived this one for a couple of
days. Lord,,,protect these men..Specialist Tyler Hill of Mableton, GA for one..he convoyed me here. That's a job nobody wants. The IEDs on Highway One have cut a path through our troops...but there are only a couple of roads in this part of Afghanistan, and the Taliban know it.