*glub*
So just the other day,* a young woman in the locker room was making conversation and mentioned that her little brother had called to tell her he only had three more weeks of school, then he'd have summer vacation. He asked her what she was planning to do for summer vacation. As she told me this, she sighed wearily and rolled her eyes for effect.
* I forgot when this conversation took place. It could have been three days ago or a month ago. It's a blur.
I had to agree. Then I stopped to think about it, as I often do, and realized I didn't really agree with her. See, I go to night school. Throughout the semester, my time is absorbed with work, class, homework, research papers and projects. My weekends are often more wearying than actual work. I get a brief reprieve at the end of the semester, though. I get my vacation. If anything, the three weeks between semesters I get is more precious and meaningful to me than a full three months was when I was a kid.
I turned in my last paper of the semester last night (and the one for the other class, the night before). As you might imagine, last weekend was un-fun. But then, most of them are during the semester. So now...Wednesday evening, when I know I must rise at 5am to go to work tomorrow but I'm free from homework tonight for the first time in my short-term memory, I am drinking some wine.
That's right. Red, red wine. Mmmm. I haven't had an opportunity to feed my alcoholism since...the last time. :) Kidding. I'm trying honestly to remember when was the last time I had the time, energy or interest in having more than, say, a beer with my dinner, and I'm coming up blank.
That's some problem I have there. Perhaps I should take it to Life Skills.
Anyhow. I realized as I was driving home after a non-grueling day at work today that I have that summer's-here-what-should-I-do-first feeling. You know the one. We all got it when we were kids, particularly when it followed a particularly nasty week of papers and/or exams. You feel exhausted, but you're too excited about not having to do homework or worry about the outcome of anything in particular to sleep, and you want to catch up on your leisure reading...but reading isn't so fun when you've just force-read twelve books, then you think you should just watch a movie or two for fun, but don't really want to squander your evening with something so unproductive (or maybe that's just me), so you decide to...blog. Or maybe you end up going dress-shopping with your mother against your will, or helping your father change the oil in the Saab (a fun chore, considering the interesting angle they put that filter at), or mow the lawn, or help your little brother wash dishes. But nothing seems to be worthy of those initial hours of freedom.
So I made some calls I've been trying to find time for, checked my recent bulletin board entries to see if I need to douse some flames, and decided to greet my blogfriends. It seems worthy of the first precious hours of my freedom.
I wrote my paper on the experience of African American women in the Southern convict lease system, by the way (for those of you who were kind enough to make suggestions early on concerning the possible subject of my research paper). If you want to know anything about the convict lease system, I'm your huckleberry. That's just my game.
Meanwhile, my work ethic etc has again been complimented in that I am one of the top choices for Chief of Stan/Eval for the AFNOSC-NOD. And this time, I want the position.
Translation: Standardization and Evaluation for the Air Force Network Operations and Security Center--Network Operations Division. Still confused? OK. the AFNOSC is the top tier of the operational communications chain-of-command in the Air Force. The Network Operations Division is the arm that handles (surprise!) operations. We answer to the Command and Control Division at Barksdale. Stan/Eval creates and standardizes operational procedures, and evaluates members on their mission readiness. As such, I'd also be in charge of training new crew commanders for the NOD. So essentially, I'd be Training and Stan/Eval, All-Powerful, All-Seeing, All-Knowing Crew Commander of the Network Operations Division.
Um. Right.
I'm being courted for the position because (1) I'm an old hand at crew commander, (2) I don't suck. That's what Maj T said today (we just had a promotion, Dave; more majors to bridge the gulf between the Lt Cols and us unworthy minions). I said, "Well, thank you sincerely. All I ask of my leadership is that they occasionally reassure me I don't suck. I'm flattered. I...I...don't know what to say."
He said, "No thanks necessary. It's the truth."
Awwww.
So in other news, I was asked last week to sit on a board offering advice to those who are about to be deployed. This was part of a new Air Force program, "Wingman Call." Isn't that cute? It appeals to our flying brothers who always have a "wingman" who looks out for them. It was initiated a few months ago when The Powers That Be discovered that service members have been committing suicide in record numbers. (Really?! You don't say!)
Clearly, they hadn't read my blog, so I agreed to sit on the board. If nothing else, it offered practice speaking in front of (what turned out to be) a full auditorium of bored people, and attempting to make them un-bored. That was the challenge for me, anyhow.
There were five other board members. Only two of us were officers. Col Quin and me. For some reason, I monopolized the conversation.
See, it worked like this: the audience was supposed to ask questions about deployments. The problem with this plan is that no one wants to be an obvious deployment "virgin," so they don't ask questions they might otherwise ask, if they were to run into you privately. So there weren't many questions. We were left to offer disembodied advice as it occurred to us.
My advice: Tag your bags and be honest with your loved ones about what's going on around you.
This is a weird phenomenon I've noticed among deployed personnel. They don't tell their loved ones back home that they're being shot at or mortared. They pretend it's a trip to the beach. They don't want to "worry" the loved ones.
That's a noble goal, but when loved ones know you're going to a hot zone, they follow the news a little closer than normal, and the news they're getting here focuses on the dangers they face, occasionally in an unnecessarily dramatic way: "I'm here in Baghdad reporting live from the roof of the hotel adjacent to the palace complex, where American troops are quartered. OH MY GOD! THERE ARE INCOMING MORTARS!" (Reporter and cameraman drop to the ground, where the reporter finishes his report horizontally.) "I can't believe how close those rounds were!" Etc.
My advice is to tell people what's happening, but don't scream and rant. But be honest. There's another reason I state this: many people are distanced from their loved ones after returning from a combat zone because they have gone through something their loved ones cannot understand. Loved ones have no hope of understanding if you tell them everything is fine and nothing is happening when in fact there is something happening all the time.
So then Chief Barnes stood up and, in an obvious effort to steer the discussion back to "wingman" things, asked me how we helped people who were having a hard time coping. I had the mike at the time, so I said, "In my opinion, reaching out to others in such a situation is instinctual. There is no set procedure, but everyone looks out for everyone else. If someone is withdrawing or having problems focusing on his job, you pull him aside and talk about it--or you find someone he feels comfortable talking with." At this point, I realized that he was asking for a specific example, but I didn't have one. I said, "And as you can probably see, I'm speaking in generalities because I didn't ever help anyone."
The truth is, most people don't have nervous breakdowns in those conditions. Most people have a hard time adjusting and dealing, and show their problems in understated ways. But you all reach out to each other. And no...this isn't just some touchy-feely feel-good answer. It's the way it is. Service members abroad are a close-knit family faster and stronger than you could possibly imagine, unless you've been there.
Apparently, our panel was a big hit. Col Quin said to me when it was over, "I'm so proud you remembered to tell people about the bag tags. It took me two hours to find my bags at Al Udeid. Two hours!"
Make no mistakes. It's the little perks that make life worth living.
d
