Second Deployment letter
Mar. 1st, 2003 05:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pecuniumWaiting. A constant of the military lifestyle. As waiting goes this is not so bad. Ft. Bragg may be the usual run of on base living (the diversions are not as varied as I am used to, and there are not the fleshpots of Monterey, nor even the long BART ride into SF from Camp Parks, but it could be worse) but it is far better than waiting in some tent someplace.
For the fourth time, in as many weeks, we've been re-organized. Now my First Sergeant and CO (sort of) are regular army guys from the 519th MI Bn. It has been that way since Thursday, but my actual CO gave all of us who had been in the computer class a pass. Which actually had a downside. I took advantage of it to visit my father. He drove east, I west, and we met in Charlotte. So I missed the announcement that the 519th was giving us all a three-day pass. It only mattered because by the time I found out it was too late for Maia and I to consider her coming out to see me. There were about a dozen wives and sweethearts who made the trek.
Finally, for the first time in a month, I've seen the sun. It makes a great improvement on the look of the area. There is no soil here. Packed sand covered with cypress and bracken. Where the trees have been cleared grass struggles to maintain a thin foothold on the sand.
If it rains (and it has been raining) the low spots fill. Since the land is very flat large puddles form. The sidewalks have lap-marks like the shore at low tide, where the dead bits of grass have drifted to the edge of the overflow. We are not allowed to walk on the grass, but the rule is not obeyed much by the active duty troops here, and the grass suffers for being trod on. To cross a patch of it after a rain is to feel it being stripped out of the ground as one's feet pass.
Later in the morning.
Waiting again. I am waiting more than most because of all the troops on the roster, I am the only one who seems to have fallen through the cracks. Everyone thinks I am in the Operations Sections, which is probably the best place to use the skills I've got. In some ways that is a disappointment, because it may mean I get no booth time, and so will still have lingering doubts about whether all the time I've spent teaching the doctrine translates into any real skill at the task. On the other hand I look at the kids who just came back from Afghanistan and think I must be able to manage it if they could come right out of the current school (which those of us who teach think to be a tad defective in the way it teaches) and do it.
The assimilation with the 519th is going well. This is not the first time they've had Reserve Component (RC) troops backfilling them. With the present trend of keeping about half the MI Human Inteligence (HumInt) assets in the RC it won't be the last either. It helps that most Guardsmen, more so than in the Army Reserve, have a fair chunk of time in the Regular Army, and that we are older than the average troopie, it makes us seem more credible. Give it a week and it will seem as though we were always part of this unit.
Such are the ways of armies.
Change of plans, or perhaps their culmination. I just got word that we are leaving, make sure the bags are packed and we are ready to go at 0230 in the morning.
Which is but a pair of hours away. I think I am packed, I'l find out when I get there. The members of the 519th are sucking wind, despite having been deployed four times in the past two years this is the first time they have had such short notice. In this we are ahead of the curve.
I have been given the interesting, if problematic assignment of OB NCO. This has nothing to do with babies. It is Order of Battle and means I will be responsible for keeping track of what the bad guys have, where it is, what it might be doing, and how capable it is of affecting our mission.
Interesting stuff (and it looks good on my resume) but it means I may not get much booth time (i.e. time actually interrogating). Given the question all of us are asking ourselves, "Can I really do the job?" this is a minor niggle.
But I will get some, and I have another yardstick, all the people I trained who are here. I will get to see how well they do the job. This is not a chance many teachers get. So for that (if nothing else) I can be thankful.
I will send word as soon as I am able,
For the fourth time, in as many weeks, we've been re-organized. Now my First Sergeant and CO (sort of) are regular army guys from the 519th MI Bn. It has been that way since Thursday, but my actual CO gave all of us who had been in the computer class a pass. Which actually had a downside. I took advantage of it to visit my father. He drove east, I west, and we met in Charlotte. So I missed the announcement that the 519th was giving us all a three-day pass. It only mattered because by the time I found out it was too late for Maia and I to consider her coming out to see me. There were about a dozen wives and sweethearts who made the trek.
Finally, for the first time in a month, I've seen the sun. It makes a great improvement on the look of the area. There is no soil here. Packed sand covered with cypress and bracken. Where the trees have been cleared grass struggles to maintain a thin foothold on the sand.
If it rains (and it has been raining) the low spots fill. Since the land is very flat large puddles form. The sidewalks have lap-marks like the shore at low tide, where the dead bits of grass have drifted to the edge of the overflow. We are not allowed to walk on the grass, but the rule is not obeyed much by the active duty troops here, and the grass suffers for being trod on. To cross a patch of it after a rain is to feel it being stripped out of the ground as one's feet pass.
Later in the morning.
Waiting again. I am waiting more than most because of all the troops on the roster, I am the only one who seems to have fallen through the cracks. Everyone thinks I am in the Operations Sections, which is probably the best place to use the skills I've got. In some ways that is a disappointment, because it may mean I get no booth time, and so will still have lingering doubts about whether all the time I've spent teaching the doctrine translates into any real skill at the task. On the other hand I look at the kids who just came back from Afghanistan and think I must be able to manage it if they could come right out of the current school (which those of us who teach think to be a tad defective in the way it teaches) and do it.
The assimilation with the 519th is going well. This is not the first time they've had Reserve Component (RC) troops backfilling them. With the present trend of keeping about half the MI Human Inteligence (HumInt) assets in the RC it won't be the last either. It helps that most Guardsmen, more so than in the Army Reserve, have a fair chunk of time in the Regular Army, and that we are older than the average troopie, it makes us seem more credible. Give it a week and it will seem as though we were always part of this unit.
Such are the ways of armies.
Change of plans, or perhaps their culmination. I just got word that we are leaving, make sure the bags are packed and we are ready to go at 0230 in the morning.
Which is but a pair of hours away. I think I am packed, I'l find out when I get there. The members of the 519th are sucking wind, despite having been deployed four times in the past two years this is the first time they have had such short notice. In this we are ahead of the curve.
I have been given the interesting, if problematic assignment of OB NCO. This has nothing to do with babies. It is Order of Battle and means I will be responsible for keeping track of what the bad guys have, where it is, what it might be doing, and how capable it is of affecting our mission.
Interesting stuff (and it looks good on my resume) but it means I may not get much booth time (i.e. time actually interrogating). Given the question all of us are asking ourselves, "Can I really do the job?" this is a minor niggle.
But I will get some, and I have another yardstick, all the people I trained who are here. I will get to see how well they do the job. This is not a chance many teachers get. So for that (if nothing else) I can be thankful.
I will send word as soon as I am able,
