Flashback: Saturday night, August 23, 2008. I am sitting on a bus, parked alongside about 10-15 others, in a dusty lot on the Kuwait International Airport. We have been allowed to get out and stretch our legs a bit if we’d like. Though I initially resist this, I eventually succumb, realizing that I will not have many “open air” opportunities for the next 24 hours. It is almost 10 PM, so the searing heat of this desert country is not an issue.

Outside of the bus, there are the typical fixtures of the middle-east-deployed soldier’s life: porta-potties and tubs full of lukewarm water bottles. I avail myself of both, and wander around just a bit. I note that we are only a couple hundred yards away from the air traffic control tower. Eventually we are shooed back into the bus, which sits there for another 45 minutes before a Sergeant Major boards our bus and asks us to “listen up.” Nearly all “listen-up” moments are bad news; it is just a matter of the degree of badness. This one isn’t too bad: we are delayed due to malfunction of a fuel truck. Should be leaving shortly.

15 minutes later, the bus is moving, and we drive only a minute or two, then stop and are unloaded again. Our bus is the last to get on the plane, so I expect the worst: a middle seat on the immense MD-11 plane. As I walk up the stairwell and onto the plane, I am pleasantly surprised: though I am among the last souls to board, there are entire rows which are still empty. Sweet! A bit of elbow room can greatly improve the enjoyability of a flight, especially a 19-hour ride like this one.

I scoot into a side row, with three seats, taking the aisle and strategically placing my bag on the middle seat, a not-so-subtle message to those people behind me. In reality, though, I knew that my erstwhile traveling companion, Dr. Daphne Sims, has yet to board, and I want her to have that window seat if she so desires. A few minutes later, she boards and immediately grabs the window seat in my aisle, and all is well. I have a good spot on the plane, an empty seat next to me, and a good friend to help pass the time.

And thus it went for the rest of my trip home. As bad as Kuwait was—with the terrible customs procedure, the scorching heat, the tents-on-slabs, and the waiting waiting waiting—the rest of my trip seemed to make up for it. We traveled via World Airlines, who took great care of us: good meals about every four hours, attentive stewards, and lots of pillows, blankets, etc.

First stop was in Leipzig, Germany, around 3 AM. We were allowed off the plane, but did not go far; just into the same area I had visited on the way over here, with some phones, a few little shops full of gummy bears, and a wi-fi service called “mycloud” which I could not, for the life of me, get my computer to recognize. Too bad, as I wanted to upload my latest blog entry, and find out who Barack picked as his running mate. Oh well.

After an hour, we were back on the plane. The next leg would be 10 hours, and I hoped to get some sleep, but despite trying all my best tricks and then taking an Ambien, I had little success—just a few nod-offs here and there. When we landed in New Jersey, it was about 7 AM (remember, we gained 7 hours on the trip, going from Baghdad time to EST), and as I walked out of the plan onto McGuire AFB, the air smelled sweet, clean, and wet. The surroundings were green and lovely, and the cracks in the asphalt had luddles of water in and around them, rather than dirt. I was back in the USA, and it felt good to be here.

The terminal at McGuire had lovely internet access, which enabled me to update all of my podcasts and upload my latest blog entry. Then, we were whisked back onto an even-less-filled plane, for the two-hour flight to Benning.

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When we finally pulled into Georgia, it was around 11:15 AM. No one lingered on that plane for long; the second they let us get off, we all scooted out with our bags, pillows, opened packages of gummy bears, dangling M9 pistols, and all of the other paraphernalia, and hit that tarmac as fast as we could. I had planned to kiss the ground, but when the moment came, I had too much stuff in my hands and did not want to spare the 30 seconds to do so. I walked into the big, beautiful terminal at Benning, and past the band playing a jaunty march, across the floor, thinking that Lorri might be there. After a moment, I decided that they must not have allowed family into the terminal, as I had seen no reunions, but just then I had a tap on my shoulder, and there she was. Short, dark hair, a black dress, looking as beautiful as the day we were married. We hugged for a good, long while, without many words, and then the band stopped playing. We were all asked to stand for the national anthem, and then a chaplain gave a nice opening prayer. There were a couple of brief, stirring speeches of thanks from the company commander and others, and then our fate was turned over to the CRC cadre, who explained a bit of what would happen from that point on.

The next few hours might have been more painful were we not all on a bit of a “back in the USA” high. They briefed us, and then we set about turning in all of our stuff: the Beretta M9, chemical protective gear, the “sleep system” (a.k.a. sleeping bag), body armor, and other “recoverable” items. I was sad that they took my polar fleece, and my camelbak, but I got to keep the extra camelbak that had fallen to me in Iraq. Daphne Sims went through this line with me, and we helped each other out, as we handed the stuff in. At the end, Lorri picked up both of us, gave us a ride to the CRC site, where I was able to sign out right away, and be done with Ft. Benning. Goodbye to CPT Sims, and Lorri and I were off to the hotel.

As I travelled on the long road out of the CRC compound, I was struck by how surreal it all seemed: how at varying moments it seemed like I had been gone for an eternity, and at other times it seemed like I had just been here with my bawling kids seeing me off. Having Lorri’s companionship again was so sweet and satisfying—she truly is my best friend, the one who laughs at all of my jokes, loves me even when I am stinky from a very very long foot-bus-and-plane trip, and cuts me slack when I am tired and irritable. I was not at 826 Sparkleberry Road quite yet (we’d make that drive tomorrow), but I was most definitely Home.

Note from Erik: I have just touched down on US soil, on Fort Dix, NJ. The air smells sweet, cool, wet, and green. God bless America. More to follow. The entry below was typed last night, and upped now at my first brush with net access.

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SNAPSHOT: I am now sitting in a very nice Mercedes Benz bus, in the middle of a convoy of about six of them, somewhere on a highway in Kuwait. We are headed, as we have been told, to a dirt lot someplace, where we will be allowed to get off of the bus, “smoke ‘em if you’ve got ‘em,” pee, and then back on for a few minutes before we get on the plane which will take us home by way of Leipzig, New Jersey, and finally, around 22 hours from this moment, Fort Benning, GA, which is where I get off. I am listening to Rogue Wave on the ipod, occasionally glancing, just for the thrill of it, at the counter on my laptop which reads “Erik Goes Home: TODAY!” We are all stinky from the day’s activities (read on), but there is an undeniable giddiness in the air, as we all know that, no matter how much the Department of Defense tortures us along the way, at the end of this long, strange day, we will be back in the good old US of A. Zimmy said it best:

Sailing around the world in a rusty gondola
Oh how good
To be back in the land
Of Coca-Cola

So here’s how the day has gone:

Up at 0445, got the packs all ready and out the door so that I could catch a ride to the customs area on one of the “gators” (small gasoline-powered golf carts with pickup-truck-like beds on them, for carrying bags around). Our bags were to be at customs by 0600, formation at 0700. After the bags were dropped off, I headed to the DFAC, where I ate a big breakfast, as I did not know when my next meal would be. This turned out to be a good move.

Formation at 0700, in which we were informed a bit about our journey, and were asked to produce our “L.O.R.” (letter of release, the document which states I am allowed to go home). Small snag there, because as of last night, my LoR had yet to show up. This is a document which is supposed to be in the soldier’s hands when he first heads to Kuwait, but mine had not been completed by the people at Brigade up in Balad by Wednesday night. On both Thursday and Friday, I was promised that I would have all of my paperwork by 1500 hours, to be sent electronically to my liaison officer, but each night I stopped by SSG Aleman’s desk and got the bad news. By Saturday, this had ceased to be an inconvenience and became a serious matter, as I could not get on the plane without those papers.

At the Saturday morning formation, I was excused to try and rustle up the paperwork, and SSG Aleman got paged out of her breakfast to check her e-mail, and:

Fortunately, the packet of goods was right there waiting for her.

Unfortunately, the text on many of the documents was so faint as to be entirely illegible.

Fortunately, the subject of those release papers (me) was a geeky type who though he could electronically “photoshop” the documents to render them somewhat legible.

Unfortunately, I was able to improve them a bit, but not a lot. Most of the lines remained illegible despite my best efforts.

Fortunately, I all that really needed to be visible on the documents was a stamp and a signature at the bottom, and fortunately my efforts did, indeed make that portion visible.

Unfortunately (I will stop this game soon, I promise), my orders printed out so faintly that the “printout” of them looked suspiciously like a piece of virgin white Hammermill paper.

Fortunately, I had brought approximately 7000 copies of my orders with me in the event of just such an emergency.

Bottom line: after some tinkering and a fair bit of angst, I emerged from the liaison tent with all of the papers I needed to get on the plane. However, I feel the need to point out how this little episode epitomizes all that is wrong with the Army. I have served the 62nd Medical Brigade faithfully for six months, and all it would have taken to help me avoid this little unwished-for escapade on the very day I am to leave theater, was for someone—anyone—at brigade to have completed my paperwork, scanned and e-mailed a legible copy to me 3 days earlier. A completely unnecessary waste to not only my time, but that of the liaison officer, her staff, and the people who were supposed to be briefing me about my flight at the time that I was taking care of all of this stuff. This kind of hassle sends a message to the departing soldier that he/she is not valued by the brigade, and that our welfare is not of any import to them. Frustrating, and unacceptable.

By 0800 I was forwarded to the briefing tent, and then the real fun began: customs. I had been warned about this, even promised that it would be a tortuous experience, but it is not hyperbole when I state that the next few hours were to be the least pleasant of my entire deployment.

Before I get into the customs process, let me remind my alert readers that all 200-or-so of us in that formation were, at the end of the day, going to board a plane for a 19-hour ride, at the end of which we would be hugging loved ones. There was a great desire to avoid getting too sweaty prior to the ride, as this would 1) make the plane ride less comfortable, and 2), possibly result in our loved ones recoiling after smelling the sweaty person who had just 36 hours previously been in a formation 7000 miles away.

After briefing, we were led, in groups, to the customs tent. Image a line about ten blocks long of people carrying three-to-five bags each, waiting to be thoroughly inspected. The line moved slowly, but this was actually a blessing, as all of us had our hand full sliding our bags along in the Kuwaiti dust, leaving a thousand little trails behind them. I stood in line with CPT Daphne Sims, a pediatrician whom I knew from Al Asad, and the extra set of hands proved invaluable to each of us as we worked together to get each others’ bags through the line, and eventually into the customs tent. Unfortunately, said tent was not adequately air-conditioned (and by “adequately,” I mean “at all”). There were a number of huge government fans situated around the room, but they were not getting it done by a long shot. Inside the room were about forty tables, with an inspector lined up behind each one. I could not quite see what the process was, and didn’t really have time to look as I was too busy getting sliding my bags around in the line. Eventually, it was my turn.

I lifted my bags up to the stand, where a kind-looking man explained the process to me: for each of my five bags, i was to take every single thing out, put it on the table in front of him, and he would rummage through each article. I would then put the bag and all of its contents into a big plastic bin, set that to the side, and then we would start the process again with the next bag.

This process took about 10 minutes per bag, which doesn’t sound too bad when you read it, but it means that I was standing on the other side of a table, undoing my careful packing, and watching this guy rummage through my skivvies, inspecting every last ipod plug, tube of steroid cream, DVD, bag of Atomic Fireballs, etc in my bags, and then dump the stuff unceremoniously into a plastic bin, where it would all need to be repacked. All in a warehouse-sized tent with temps upwards of 90-degrees.

When the inspector finally got through my stuff (no flagged items), I took my five huge bins o’ Erik’s crap to the tables in the middle of the room for repacking. 1 hour, ten minutes, and about two gallons of sweat later, I had repacked all of my stuff, strategically swapping out the drenched t-short on my body with a clean one from one of my duffles.

Finally, out of the goshforsaken customs tent, and into a “lock-down” area, from whence we were not allowed to leave. I made it into my lockdown tent by about 1100 and a few moment later, we were informed that we would remain there until 1800. Why would we spend seven hours in a tent waiting to be transported to the airport? As opposed to just starting the process seven hours later than we did? Or having the flight—which was only for us, and no one else—leave seven hours earlier? These are questions which you and I are not allowed to ask. Mine is not to question why; mine is just to sit in a tent eating the provided granola bars and Gatorade drinks and talking with other similarly confused people. Gotta love the military.

At 1800, as promised, we boarded the Benz-buses. I seriously lucked-out in that I ended up on the last bus, which had some empty seats. This meant that I do not have to keep my monstrously-oversized carry-on bag in my lap, but am able to sit it to my side, which has enabled me to write this lengthy tome.

As I write this, we are sitting in a dusty lot, somewhere not too far from the airport, and are told that we can use the porta-potties, smoke, get some water, and/or hang out in the bus for the next hour, after which we will be boarding our plane.

Then, the journey begins.

Well, kids, I am refreshed and feeling great as I write these words, after an improbably excellent night’s sleep. I mentioned in a long-ago blog entry that the billeting at Kuwait is generally less than ideal: we are all shoved, willy-nilly, into cavernous GP-medium tents which are lined up in great rows along “Tent City” on the main portion of the base. These tents have quite literally nothing in them except some barebones bunkbeds with plastic mattresses and a string of fluorescent lights. The lights have two settings: “torture” (requires the use of shades and SPF 2000 sunscreen to avoid growing melanomas right on the spot), and “off.” Because of this, we mostly leave them off, and use flashlights to get around and find our stuff. But last night around 1 AM, about six servicemembers came into our tent, having been assigned there for the night. So the lights had to go on, which woke the rest of us up, all the way.

Fortunately, I had gone to bed early—around 8 PM—as I was still exhausted and recovering from the previous sleepless night. So by midnight, I already had four hours sleep under my belt. I got up and went to the bathroom, came back in, listened to music and played a silly little ipod game for a while as a lot of shuffling noises went on all around me, soldiers getting their stuff in order and getting themselves into bed.

When I have to bunk out in these sort-of public situations, I have a simple method of creating a bit of personal space and increasing my privacy: I build a fort, just like when I was a kid. I got my most opaque blanket (the shiny Army blankie issued to me at CRC) and let it hang from the top bunk (holding it down with duffle bags) down and around the sides of the lower bed, leaving a small opening at the foot end. This effectively blocked out the Army Torture Lamps a bit, and helped me feel like I was not sleeping in a fishbowl. (Not as much, anyway.)

To my surprise, the lights went out again around 2 PM as my tentmates apparently got themseves all tucked in, and remained off until 7:15. I slep that whole time, so overall got more than nine hours’ rack time. Not too shabby for such crummy sleeping conditions. So I am refreshed today, have already had breakfast, and am currently at the MWR (Morale, Welfare, and Recreation) tent sitting on a sticky couch, with some nice A/C cranking and the US volleyball team fighting it out with Russia. Life is good, and getting better.

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Backing up a bit: by Sunday night, it had been established that the company would try to get me a flight out of Al Asad on Wednesday. By Monday, it appeared that no Wednesday flight was available, but my faithful compadres finagled me a spot on a very crowded C-130 which was to depart Thursday morning at 0130, with a “show time” (meaning that I had to check in at the airport) of 2200 hours. We are not allowed to discuss or even allude to flights out of theater, so I could not broadcast that info on the blog. Nor could I discuss my last few days’ activities, as most of the notable events were “goodbye” experiences, which would telegraph my impending departure. But I can discuss them now.

On Saturday, we had a barbecue, and the medics presented me with a silk-screen print of an Al Asad scene, adorned with the signatures of each of them and numerous hilarous comments, most of them referring in some way to my shiny head. Sunday was my last day at church, and more goodbyes, and I got a blessing for a safe flight out of Al Asad (worked!). I have not yet been released from my calling as first assistant to the group leader; that will likely take place next week.

Monday was divided between clinic and running around doing errands: mailing a package, getting some cash for the trip from Army Finance, picking up a few last-minute gifts for the faithful at home, and so on. On Monday night, our Company Commander, CPT Melissa Thomas, arrived from headquarters, stating that she had a presentation she wanted to give on Tuesday.

Tuesday consisted of more clinic and more errands, and in the afternoon after clinic, CPT Thomas got everyone together, called attention to orders, and asked me to come up to the fron of the room. She awarded me the Army Commendation Medal (ARCOM) for my service as the Al Asad Troop Medical Clinic Medical Officer-In-Charge. I was honored to be so recognized, with the fourth ARCOM of my Army career. Afterwards, I was asked to say a few words, but I said more than a few, as I singled out, separately, every soldier in our company, and offered a “gift” to them (usually something silly and particularly related to that soldier—our clinic’s “pretty boy” SGT Evans, for instance, received an Army-issue handheld mirror). At the end, the tone of my remarks changed as I offer my heartfelt thanks for the many sacrificed, noticed and unnoticed, which these fine soldiers had made for me over the course of my deployment. I presented to each of them a personal letter, noting their accomplishments during the past six months, and thanking them for their service to me, their fellow servicemen, and their country. I wrote down my e-mail address for all of them, and encouraged them to let me know if they are in the Fort Gordon area.

I will likely say more on this subject later, but it is hard for me to imagine serving with a more dedicated, professional, and generally excellent groups of soldiers than those in the Troop Medical Clinic on Al Asad. I had an experience at the Combat Surgical Hospital on Sunday afternoon which I may recount at a later date, but suffice it to say that it reminded me that the truly high quality of care offered by my medics is not, in fact, universal in deployed medical facilities. I was very lucky to have been assigned to serve with these fine soldiers.

Wednesday AM I did not go in to clinic—I had planned to, as my absence makes things difficult for the other provider, CPT Hall, but events necessitated that I finish all of my packing. Also, I wanted to drive around the post just a bit, and get some last-minute pictures for the inevitable slide shows that will take plavce when I get home. I worked Wednesday afternoon, and then after clinic, my good friend CPT Baker and I took a bike ride around the big loop. Usually we run that loop fairly quickly, but this this time we rode nice and easy, as I took it all in. Back in the cans by 7 PM, and I did all of the last-minute stuff, got some chow, and !LT Coleman, CPT Baker and I headed out to the flight line.

The flight itself was quite uneventful. It was packed to the gills, but I was the most comfortable person on the plane, as I had been tipped off by one of the Al Asad higher-ups about a recent change in security procedures (decreased now, with the lack of any recent attacks on US planes). I can’t tell you the specifics for OPSEC reasons, but suffice it to say that I had a bit more room on the plane than anyone else. The flight went through Al Taqqadum (”T.Q.”) and touched down in Kuwait around 4 AM. On to a Benz-bus, and in a few moments we were swiping our ID cards, to mark the end of our hazardous duty pay.

Never have I been so happy and willing to have my salary reduced.

Ladies and gentlemen:

I am writing to you from the “C-Zee” CyberZone internet cafe at Camp Ali Al Salem in Kuwait. I got out of Iraq last night, taking a jam-packed C-130 flight from Al Asad, through Al Taqqadum, and on to Kuwait, arriving at 4 this morning. Got into a lovely GP-medium tent around 5-ish and after a shower and a bit of breakfast, I sacked out for a few hours.

There is much more to this story, including an explanation for my radio silence over the past few days, and a description of my last poignant moments with the medics of the 581st Area Support Medical Company. I’ll try to catch you up on that later today, but wanted to let everyone know that (as Lorri mentioned), I am safe and sound, and finally out of the combat zone. As I write, it is 1:46 PM Kuwait time, and 124 degrees outside—much warmer than Al Asad ever seemed to be. My flight out of Kuwait International Airport is scheduled to leave Saturday night.

Thanks for your thoughts and prayers over the past few days; other than the red-eye aspect of last might’s journey, it went very, very smoothly, and I am grateful for that. More to follow, after a bit of shuteye.

Ladies and gents, a quick update for you.

Many of you know that I will be heading home in the not-too-distant future. Due to operational security reasons, I cannot give exact dates and times here—in fact, I myself have not been given them as yet, though I know what the approximate plan is. This imposed radio silence makes it difficult for me to describe much of my recent activities to you, as they have mostly been related to preparations for the upcoming trips. Once I am in a safe location, I will be able to reveal more details on this weblog, including some info about the events of the last few days.

What I can tell you: I will soon be leaving Al Asad and traveling to Camp Ali Al Saleem in Kuwait. I will remain in Kuwait until the next available “freedom flight” which will take me to Europe and eventually home. The doctor who is replacing me has already arrived in Kuwait, and will be in Al Asad sometime soon.

So: sit tight, relax, and the next time you hear from me, I will likely be safely in another location, one step closer to home.

To all those who are praying (and more) for my safety: I thank you sincerely. More to follow soon…

Deployed personnel in Iraq are not allowed, under any circumstances, to wear contact lenses. This regulation, officially put forth in Army DA PAM 40-506, is widely disseminated during CRC and other pre-deployment screenings, and is advertised on AFN and the walls of clinics and other buildings throughout the combat zone. But it remains widely ignored, in most cases because the alternative—wearing eyeglasses—is simply unacceptable, even unthinkable, to many soldiers. (If you’ve seen the Army-issue “BCGs,” a.k.a. “birth control glasses,” you will better understand this mentality.)

However, this particular rule is a pretty important one. The very fine silt-like dust in Iraq, along with the inability to keep hands clean for insertion and removal—all of this makes contact lens wear dangerous, and every Army optometrist and ophthalmologist has horror stories about eye infections, corneal ulcers, and subsequent permanent loss of vision in soldiers who have worn contacts in the field.

With that preface, I relate to you the following incident, which took place in our optometry clinic on Thursday:

A soldier, let’s call him “Private Eyegoo,” walks into clinic with his Non-Commissioned Officer in tow. Chief complaint: “It feels like there is something in my right eye, and there is yellow stuff on my eyelids in the morning.” On further questioning, the patient also complained of swollen lids, and itchiness of the right eye.

Our optometrist, sensing something very familiar about this particular complaint, asked the soldier if he had worn contact lenses at any time while being deployed. The soldier stated resolutely that he had not EVER worn contact lenses in Iraq, and went on to elaborate in detail how his NCO had seen him attempting to insert lenses in Kuwait and informed him that this was not allowed, so he had put them away, and never touched them again. “I haven’t worn any contacts for months.”

(It is right about at this point in my little narrative that the alert blog reader will begin to suspect that perhaps Private Eyegoo is not telling the whole truth. What makes this one more interesting is that “not-so-honest” is about to meet up with “not-so-smart”—a combination which is nearly 100% lethal to a military career.)

A few moments later, as the patient was examined, our fine optometrist noted an ocular surface infection in the right eye. But he also noticed something else: at that very moment, Private EG had contact lenses in both eyes. Being the nice guy that he is, our doctor gave the soldier another chance to right himself: “Let me remind you that you are speaking with an officer. Please tell me about your contact lens use over the past month.”

“I have not worn any contact lenses over the past month, sir.”

The Optometry Clinic Non-Commissioned Officer, along with the patient’s accompanying NCO, were then asked to report to the exam lane, where the patient was again asked if he had been wearing contact lenses. He again denied it. Our optometrist then calmly explained to the errant soldier that contacts were in his eyes right now. The patient stated that this was impossible, that the lenses were in his contact lens case.

At this point, our optometrist, who is apparently a much more patient man than I, removed the contact lenses in front of the two NCOs, and had both of them verify the presence of the lenses. At this point the soldier’s NCO looked ready to strangle him. The patient indicated that “I don’t know how they got in there.” He was put on antibiotics and asked to return to the clinic the next day, with his company commander present. He was then escorted from the clinic by his NCO, who looked about ready to strangle him.

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My optometrist and I have debated a bit amongst ourselves as to the motives of PVT Eyegoo. So far, we have two operative theories:

1. Private EG truly did not know the contacts were in his eyes. Perhaps he put them in a long time ago, and simply forgot about them. This would explain his willingness to be seen by an optometrist, where any reasonable person would know that the contacts would be instantly discovered.
2. Private EG is not a reasonable person, and thought that the presence of contact lenses would somehow go un-noticed by our optometrist as he examined him under the slit lamp. It may seem incredible to you, but having lived here for six months, I have seen how blatant misinformation is often quickly believed all-too-willing servicemembers. I can easily imagine that a buddy of PVT EG told him how “no one can prove that you have contacts in, not even an eye doctor.”

Either way, I don’t really want this guy walking around Al Asad carrying a weapon, and I am happy to report that he has been relieved of his M-16.