The Winds of Change
There is a cold rain falling in Baghdad tonight. The weather is getting warmer again, after several weeks of cold temperatures...but tonight's rain is cold. I enjoyed it as I walked from my trailer to the Palace. I smiled as I saw all the people trying to hurry up to get out of it, who had themselves bundled up to stay warm.
I work the night shift...midnight to noon now...and it lends itself to a strange lifestyle. I sleep when most people are awake...and I start getting ready for work the day before my shift actually starts...(Strange, I know...but technically midnight is the next day.) Well...because of this strange pattern of life, I have become very aware of noises...sounds...and other things throughout the day that I never really paid much attention to before.
For example, I know what a mop sounds like when it is being swept back and forth across a four foot wide hall way just outside my door. Normally I wouldn't even pay attention to something like that, but lately...that has been the loudest mop in the world...everyday...at 1:35 in the afternoon...just as I start to doze off.
I hear birds sing in a way that I never thought possible. Now I can tell the difference between a pigeon cooing and scuttling around on the sidewalk outside my trailer, and a crow as it lands on my roof. I hear doors slam three trailers down, and dumpsters being emptied near the Palace.
I also now have the ability to tell the difference between a Blackhawk Helicopter and an Apache as they fly over my trailer. The "Little Bird" helo makes a distinctly different noise than the Chinook...but they all wake me up. I know how to distinguish between our guys practicing their marksmanship at the range, and a firefight between insurgents and Iraqi Police. I can tell you if that explosion was an 88 millimeter mortar round, or a Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Device. I can know in my heart and soul if the thudding that just shook my trailer was a controlled detonation of something that we found...or if it was another mortar that hit nearby.
I also noticed something today...that I have only heard a couple of times since I have been out here. The wind. The wind was out in full force today...Whipping around all sorts of debris and smacking it against my trailer. The sound of it whistling through the rows of trailers and shaking the tarps covering the sandbag walls echoed throughout the Embassy complex today.
It seems that when the wind blows through Baghdad, things start to happen. The last time there was a wind like this, the weather started to become colder. The mood of the whole place seemed to change.
I can feel it again...and have for some time now. Things are changing in Iraq. In my job...a slow boring day is a good thing. It means that more soldiers were able to call or write home that night and say, "I'm fine...I made it another day."
I have been extremely busy for the last few days.
What it is...I can't exactly say. Not because of security or anything like that...but because it isn't one single thing...more a series of events, or a set of circumstances that just seem a bit off.
Most people who follow the news and politics and stuff, will know that statements have been made from both sides of this thing. (You know...this whole war thing...) It seems that patience is wearing thin on both sides...and we are all testing to see how far the other will let us go. Unspoken tensions and frustrations seem to be changing the way people are thinking over here.
We now have the Prime Minister criticizing the policy over here. I think it's bad enough that our own policy makers are bickering over what to do with this situation and how to handle it...let alone that whatever it is we are doing seems to be so bad, or wrong, or whatever, that the people we are trying to help are pretty muh saying "Don't bother." (Or so it would seem half the time...trust me...come work where I work and you will learn to loathe the mainstream media as much as I do.)
So, as I walked to work, I noted the changes. The change is weather...it is really starting to warm up and get very nice out here again. The change in mood...it seems that everyone knows something is going on...but no one is saying anything about it. The chages in attitudes from the top down...just watch the news.
I can't imagine that a city with as much history as Baghdad, and as much potential as this place has can be happy about what is going on within its own streets. It felt to me, as I walked in that cold rain, that the city itself was sad. The winds...a sigh of frustration and despair...and Baghdad was crying.
Something is going to happen. I don't know if it is political, or something in the media...or just and overall shift in the attitudes of everyone involved.
Something is different.
I don't know what will happen...or how big it is going to be...but I do know that all day, as I tried to sleep...I tossed and turned, as outside my trailer and all throughout the streets of Baghdad blew the Winds of Change.
SFC NEWMAN
OUT
I work the night shift...midnight to noon now...and it lends itself to a strange lifestyle. I sleep when most people are awake...and I start getting ready for work the day before my shift actually starts...(Strange, I know...but technically midnight is the next day.) Well...because of this strange pattern of life, I have become very aware of noises...sounds...and other things throughout the day that I never really paid much attention to before.
For example, I know what a mop sounds like when it is being swept back and forth across a four foot wide hall way just outside my door. Normally I wouldn't even pay attention to something like that, but lately...that has been the loudest mop in the world...everyday...at 1:35 in the afternoon...just as I start to doze off.
I hear birds sing in a way that I never thought possible. Now I can tell the difference between a pigeon cooing and scuttling around on the sidewalk outside my trailer, and a crow as it lands on my roof. I hear doors slam three trailers down, and dumpsters being emptied near the Palace.
I also now have the ability to tell the difference between a Blackhawk Helicopter and an Apache as they fly over my trailer. The "Little Bird" helo makes a distinctly different noise than the Chinook...but they all wake me up. I know how to distinguish between our guys practicing their marksmanship at the range, and a firefight between insurgents and Iraqi Police. I can tell you if that explosion was an 88 millimeter mortar round, or a Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Device. I can know in my heart and soul if the thudding that just shook my trailer was a controlled detonation of something that we found...or if it was another mortar that hit nearby.
I also noticed something today...that I have only heard a couple of times since I have been out here. The wind. The wind was out in full force today...Whipping around all sorts of debris and smacking it against my trailer. The sound of it whistling through the rows of trailers and shaking the tarps covering the sandbag walls echoed throughout the Embassy complex today.
It seems that when the wind blows through Baghdad, things start to happen. The last time there was a wind like this, the weather started to become colder. The mood of the whole place seemed to change.
I can feel it again...and have for some time now. Things are changing in Iraq. In my job...a slow boring day is a good thing. It means that more soldiers were able to call or write home that night and say, "I'm fine...I made it another day."
I have been extremely busy for the last few days.
What it is...I can't exactly say. Not because of security or anything like that...but because it isn't one single thing...more a series of events, or a set of circumstances that just seem a bit off.
Most people who follow the news and politics and stuff, will know that statements have been made from both sides of this thing. (You know...this whole war thing...) It seems that patience is wearing thin on both sides...and we are all testing to see how far the other will let us go. Unspoken tensions and frustrations seem to be changing the way people are thinking over here.
We now have the Prime Minister criticizing the policy over here. I think it's bad enough that our own policy makers are bickering over what to do with this situation and how to handle it...let alone that whatever it is we are doing seems to be so bad, or wrong, or whatever, that the people we are trying to help are pretty muh saying "Don't bother." (Or so it would seem half the time...trust me...come work where I work and you will learn to loathe the mainstream media as much as I do.)
So, as I walked to work, I noted the changes. The change is weather...it is really starting to warm up and get very nice out here again. The change in mood...it seems that everyone knows something is going on...but no one is saying anything about it. The chages in attitudes from the top down...just watch the news.
I can't imagine that a city with as much history as Baghdad, and as much potential as this place has can be happy about what is going on within its own streets. It felt to me, as I walked in that cold rain, that the city itself was sad. The winds...a sigh of frustration and despair...and Baghdad was crying.
Something is going to happen. I don't know if it is political, or something in the media...or just and overall shift in the attitudes of everyone involved.
Something is different.
I don't know what will happen...or how big it is going to be...but I do know that all day, as I tried to sleep...I tossed and turned, as outside my trailer and all throughout the streets of Baghdad blew the Winds of Change.
SFC NEWMAN
OUT
posted by Unknown at 5:10 PM
1 Comments:
Darlin, you have a big future as a writer after you finish keeping us safe.
Take care. My prayers to your wife and children.
Thanks again.
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