26.JAN.2012; Foward Operating Base [Injun]

Posted by Jack on Feb 11, 2012 in The.Dispatches | 0 comments

[From Max]  I kicked rocks around the FOB for a few days.  I had no job.  No hard times to meet.  I was an Army of One.  I didn’t quite know what to do with myself.

I decided to do nothing.

I went to chow.  I went to the gym.  It was a makeshift little building stuffed with ropes and chains and left-over equipment.  I made due.  I fumbled with the weights, breathing heavily in the cold, thin air.

I got word that the Old Man was coming.  My boss’s boss.  Commander of the unit my company had been attached to.  I didn’t know for what.

The morning of his arrival I was told about the patch-in ceremony.  The CO told me to put my gear together – I was leaving with the convoy.

It was a busy morning.  My replacement had arrived.  We swapped weapons, and I watched as he inventoried all of the equipment I had worked so hard to sort and ship half a world away.

Just before lunch there was a full company formation.  I wasn’t included.  I stood off to the side, looking on as the colonel and the CO gave their remarks.

 Sacred brotherhood of warriors . . . etcetera.

The first sergeant patched in the guidon bearer.  One of my guys.  My best Joe.

The platoon sergeants and platoon leaders opened ranks and patched in their Joes.  I stood at attention, by myself.  The colonel spotted me and walked straight toward me.  He smiled as he approached, slapped me on the shoulder and shook my hand.

“How’re you doing, brother?”

“I’ve had better days, sir . . . ” I replied.

“You got one?”

“Roger, sir.”  I reached into my pocket.  The colonel patched me in.

“Find me later, we’ll talk.”

He gave me a warm, reassuring smile and slapped me on the shoulder again.  As soon as no one was looking, I adjusted my weapon and walked away.

Shortly afterward I convoyed with the colonel and his entourage over the mountain.  Snow began to fall as we drove.  The roads – if you can call them that – grew slick and going was slow.  I sat in the back of the truck, stifling the need to piss, listening to muted radio chatter in my headset.

It was snowing heavily by the time we rolled into the next base.  I found the liason NCO and moved my gear to an Alaska tent parked far off the beaten path, in a corner by the motor pool.

That night I went to meet with the colonel.  I bumped into a staffer I knew in the hallway as I was waiting.  He wasn’t surprised to see me.  His face twisted into a look of consolation.  He slapped me on the shoulder.

The colonel called me into his office.  He offered me a chair.  He was very congenial.  My first impressions of the man, back in the States, had been favorable.  He pointed to a folder sitting on his desk bearing my last name.

He told me he’d read through it, and that he thought it was bullshit.  Had it been his call, I’d have stayed right where I was.  I kept tight-lipped through the whole thing, refusing to point a finger at anyone regardless of how furious or dejected I felt.  Good cop routine or otherwise.

“Everyone is talking to me like they’re afraid I’m going to pop my cork,” I told him.

“It’s not like that . . . Look, this shit ain’t the end of the world.  Take a couple days, relax.  A couple months from now, you’ll get another platoon . . . “

The colonel and I chatted for a bit.  He extended his hospitality, as far as that went, and told me to come see him if I needed anything.

I lingered in the hallway to steal a cup of coffee.  It was weak swill, but I was exhausted and there was a blizzard pounding the door.  I was in no rush to go back outside.  I heard a voice I recognized through one of the office doors.  The staffer.  He was talking about me to someone.

The door opened and he walked right into me, almost spilling my coffee.  He looked startled, and was exceedingly apologetic.  I just shrugged.

“No worries, sir . . . “