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DEL.ICIO.USGeorgia GIs full of jitters about homecoming
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Baghdad, Iraq — After he rolled into the darkness of Camp Liberty from his last Baghdad patrol, Sgt. 1st Class Patrick Eaton, silhouetted in red and yellow lights, gave the soldiers in his platoon one last pep talk.
“Remember, boys,” he said. “Nobody owes us anything. That’s the deal. When we get back, we fit right back in.”
Eaton, 40, a full-time Georgia National Guard soldier from Athens, wanted his Gainesville-based troops to know that theirs had been selfless service for America.
They would soon return home and unceremoniously slip back into their lives as husbands and fathers, teachers and firefighters, truck drivers and law enforcement officers.
Silence fell over the soldiers after they celebrated the end of the last mission. The reality and uncertainty of the days ahead was setting in.
“I’m nervous,” said Spc. David Smith, 23, a scrap yard worker who is returning to a troubled marriage and a 19-month-old son who will not recognize Daddy’s blond hair, blue eyes or freckles.
“Are we anxious?” asked Spc. Mike Brown, 35, a heavy equipment operator from Griffin. “I think everybody is. I think we are all pretty shot out.”
These soldiers from Charlie Company of the 121st Infantry Regiment’s 1st Battalion are expected to reach Georgia late tonight, when their plane lands at Hunter Army Air Field near Savannah.
Charlie Company is one of the first of the Georgia-based 48th Brigade Combat Team’s units to return home. Brig. Gen. Stewart Rodeheaver, the 48th commander, has said most of the brigade’s 4,400 soldiers will leave Iraq by mid-May.
Unlike active duty soldiers, National Guard troops resume the lives they left behind. After being gone for 18 months for training and overseas deployment, many of Georgia’s citizen soldiers said they will look for new jobs. Some will start college. Some plan to wed. Some will get a chance to bond with children born during the deployment and they saw for only a few hours. Still others will deal with the death of parents and other family members. Or go home to face marital or financial troubles.
Freed from combat missions, the soldiers spent their last few days at Camp Liberty’s Pad 14 leaning on one another.
In the afternoons, they sunned themselves outside the rows of two-man trailers; in the evenings they downed nonalcoholic brews and smoked Marlboros. Sooner or later, the jokes about Spc. Scott Odell’s sunburned belly or Sgt. Guy Serapion’s thick mop of just-barely-regulation-cut hair stopped for moments of reflection.
“Hey, at least you have a job to go back to.”
“I got pictures of the new house we bought. Do you want to see?”
“I don’t know what I’m going to do with my life, man.”
“I can’t wait for drill weekend to see you guys again. I’m kind of sad to be leaving this place.”
There was talk, too, of their year in Iraq.
They recalled the big things — roadside bombs, children playing on the trash heaps of Abu Ghraib and a Bradley Fighting Vehicle rollover last June that almost killed an entire crew.
How would anyone at home understand?
How should they answer the questions?
“No I did not kill anyone in Iraq. Yes, my vehicle ran over a bomb. Yes, it was 150 degrees inside the Bradley last summer,” Eaton joked about putting together a “Frequently Asked Questions” list.
For 11 months, Charlie Company soldiers patrolled the dangerous roads of western Baghdad and eastern Abu Ghraib.
They were weary from long hours in cramped Bradleys, tired of squinting into thermal optical equipment at night, the fumes from the armored vehicle’s exhaust burning their nostrils and eyes.
Staff Sgt. Brian Cagle, 35, made light of the matter.
“I’m really going to miss that exhaust,” joked Cagle, who works at Riverside Military Academy in Gainesville. “I’m gonna go into my garage once in a while and reminisce.”
In their last days in Baghdad, the men of Company C counted their blessings — they had lost no one. Maybe it was testament to their exceptional soldiering. Maybe someone was looking out for them. Or it could have been just plain luck.
Yet they knew they would not return home unscathed from the war. They all had a lot of time for introspection.
“I know I’m going back a changed man,” Brown said. “You do a lot of thinking over here.”
A son out of reach
From Day One, the deployment had been difficult for Smith, but not because he crawled into a driver’s seat of a Bradley every other day to face the insurgency.
He went home from training in February 2005 to marry the mother of his son, Landyn, who had been born the previous October. But by the time he arrived in Iraq, Smith knew his marriage was on the rocks.
“They train you to put it all out of your head when you go out on a mission, but you can’t,” he said.
On the streets of Abu Ghraib, Smith could hardly stand to see an Iraqi man holding a boy’s hand. He wanted desperately to be a part of his little boy’s life.
“How could I not think about it?” he said.
Sometimes, his marital problems consumed him to the point where he would seek the advice of his platoon sergeant through the Bradley’s radio headset.
“You learn to lean on the guys a lot,” Smith said. “We fought together. We bled together. For a young guy like me, I can’t ever replace them.
“I love what I do here but I’ve missed out on the first year and half of my son’s life,” he continued. “My wife and I — we were as happy as we could be. At least I thought we were,” he said. “Nobody wants to go back to a broken home when you’ve done your duty for 18 months.”
Smith talked often with his battle buddy Spc. Mitchell Winne, 30, a finance manager from Locust Grove. Winne, too, argued with his wife. He worried that his children Trinity, 5, and Tristen, 6, would not accept him as their father anymore.
“Do I even have the right to make any decisions for them again? Winne said. “Do I have the right to order them to clean their rooms? I haven’t done it in so long.”
“What we do in Iraq is easy,” Winne added. “This is the only place where you can do what you have to do and feel no remorse for it. I have no idea what I’m going to do when I get home.”
When he was in Georgia on a two-week leave last September, Winne mowed his lawn and smoked three packs of cigarettes a day. By the third day, he tried to get on a plane to return to Baghdad.
Winne was sent back to Georgia in late March to deal with his family problems.
“I’m leaving one war for another,” he said. “Except I don’t know how to fight this one.”
Close relationships
In the last week of patrols, 1st Lt. Will Phillips touched the photocopied picture of his 9-month-old twin sons and then placed his fingers to his lips. The photo hung on a bulletin board above the armor rack in the Charlie Company headquarters.
Married for three years, Phillips has been away from his wife, Tanya, for more than half that time. His sons, Chance and Stone, were born last May while he was away.
When he returns to the United States, Phillips will leave his full-time position with the Georgia Guard and relocate to Little Rock.
Last week, Phillips saw e-mailed photos of the new house that his wife has purchased. He seeks comfort in the fact that she is also a soldier — she serves in the 39th Infantry Brigade of the Arkansas Guard.
“I have two sons I don’t know. I’m worried about going home. I am counting on my wife. She’s my kindred spirit,” he said.
He is counting as well on motorcycling and parachuting to “get his rush,” the adrenaline high that he won’t get anymore from the riding around in an imposing Bradley, turret spinning and the wind slapping his face.
But Phillips is keenly aware that he will no longer have what he counted on daily on this deployment — the friendship of the other officers in the company.
At Liberty, the Charlie Company officers dined together and spent evenings at their makeshift “smoking club,” a circle of plastic outdoor chairs and a few fine cigars. The men gathered each night to talk about everything from combat to the latest video games.
After you spend every day with someone for 18 months, Phillips said, it’s hard to let go. No one else could possibly understand what they had gone through. Phillips knew the separation would be painful.
“We were able to validate our own villains with each other,” he said. “The only reason I didn’t have to see a counselor when I rolled over in my Bradley was because I have these guys.”
At the officers’ favorite dining hall down by the lake, where they gather nightly under an outdoor gazebo, the talk began centering on Georgia as it got close to going home.
One night, Phillips, a resident of Roswell, struggled to remember the exits off Ga. 400.
“Hey, what road is Exit 7?”
“Isn’t that Mansell Road?” replied 1st Lt. Billy Chau, Charlie Company’s executive officer and full-time Guard soldier from McDonough.
“Nah. Nah. I think it’s Haynes Bridge. That’s pretty bad when I can’t remember a road I used to drive all the time.” Phillips said.
“I think we’ve been away too long,” Chau said.
Had it been that long since they were home last?
And what did gas cost these days? They were looking forward to leaving behind Humvees to get into their Dodge Rams again. To open the windows and feel a balmy Georgia breeze.
“You know, I can’t even imagine paying for food again, let alone gas,” Chau said.
The soldiers think about even the smallest changes. Like a gas station that was constructed around the corner from their home. Or the smoking ban implemented in restaurants.
Charlie Company soldiers realize that while they fought a war on the streets of Iraq, the world moved on.
Now it is time to play catch-up.
“You all have been through hell, and nobody’s going to repay you for that,” Eaton told his platoon. “Be proud you guys are infantrymen. This company did excellent work.
“But now, I’m telling you to go home and do great things,” he added. “To borrow a phrase from my father, ‘This is the beginning of the rest of your lives.’ “
Comments
Commenting is now closed for this entry.
By Momma Kat Orr
April 18, 2006 10:54 PM | Link to this
Hey guys — you are in our prayers. We have stood by you as you fought on our behalf - we will stand by you as you re-adjust to civilization. We are dang proud of y’all - truly we are.
No matter what the days and weeks and months and years bring you — we are here for you.
Momma Kat Loganville, GA [Yikes!]
By Welcome Back Warriors
April 19, 2006 02:48 AM | Link to this
I hope each of you will have a safe trip home and when you get here I hope you can work through any and all problems caused by this seperation. God bless you and guide you. I pray that your adjustments will be quick and easy.
Thank you for your service. You are brave and beloved warriors.
Welcome Home!!!!!!!
By Colleen
April 19, 2006 03:03 PM | Link to this
In addition to being our hero’s you are and have been our salvation, so never forget that and know that you are the biggest part of everyones continuance and survival!
What you have had to endure for us and our safety is nothing short of a miracle and in doing so should and can NEVER be diminished!!!! Just remember everytime you look up in the sky you are all the light that shines from it and nothing can ever touch that. Everyone of you is my son/daughter/sister/brother…Please know we are here to help you rise above the mess and to never forget what is truly important…Sending you all trememdous Love, strength, peace of mind/heart and infinite joy!!!!
Very Sincerely and With Love,
Colleen (Nick’s mom)
By SGT Kimberly Schatz
April 19, 2006 03:38 PM | Link to this
Hey, 1LT Phillips! You better come by HRO for a visit before you take off for Arkansas! We haven’t gotten a chance to see those baby pics! I wish I could be there today when you step off that plane… You guys ROCK!!