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DEL.ICIO.USLove and war: ‘Will you wait for me?’
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
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| Elissa Eubanks / AJC |
| Nicole Lopez, who works at a Kennesaw restaurant, talks almost daily with her boyfriend, Spc. John Giunta, who is stationed in Iraq. |
Sitting across from him at the restaurant, she’d sensed he was gathering courage to ask a question.
He’d gotten past the preamble, and what a preamble it was: I’m going to Iraq. Then, stumbling some, he dove in:
Will you wait for me?
The average American soldier in Iraq is between 20 and 24 years old.
Spc. John Giunta is 21.
His girlfriend, Nicole Lopez, is 19.
At 19, you wait — especially if you believe he’s the one.
Giunta, of Company H, 121st Infantry, asked Lopez to wait about a year ago. Now, describing that night at the restaurant, Lopez’s hands move as she remembered his did. The timbre of her voice matches the memory of how his trembled. Her brown eyes sparkle, a perpetual blush colors her smooth round face. She shows off her trendy Guess purse, where she has stitched one of his National Guard nameplates, perfectly centered on the leather: “Giunta.”
The sight of it makes her grin.
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| Elissa Eubanks / AJC |
| Lopez has stitched one of Giunta’s National Guard nameplates on her purse. |
She first met Giunta at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. Their paths, quite literally, crossed as she was catching a flight to visit family in New Orleans and he was going to visit family in Boston. She was 18, petite and pretty; he was 19 and handsome. For 30 minutes they gazed at each other and talked in the concourse. Before his plane took off, Lopez got a text message from him telling her she was the most gorgeous girl he’d ever seen. They called each other every day. When they returned to Atlanta, they went out on their first date.
Then about three months into their relationship, he asked her to wait. A year might go by quicker than they imagined. His National Guard deployment ceremony was on her 19th birthday.
It’s obvious to Lopez that they’ll be together forever. So it kind of grates when people ask why she’s waiting for a guy at war. And her friends do ask.
They want to know why she won’t go party with them after classes or work. Or why she doesn’t just find someone who is here, who is less likely to be in harm’s way. Lopez says their families think they are just too young.
“Look, they are sending 18-year-olds over there and he’s 21, so he’s a man,” Lopez begins. “He went to war and now he’s risking his life. So I think he can date. And yeah, people say, ‘you could have any guy.’ Well, I don’t want any guy. He is just wonderful and he’s so nice to me and if you heard us on the phone you’d think we’d been together years. We know so much about each other already, and we know where we’re going and if we can make it through this year then we’re gonna be stronger than any couple we know.”
She says he calls her almost every day, and they talk for as long as they can. Her mother has said that as long as her daughter goes to college she’ll foot some of Lopez’s expenses. But this deployment has run Lopez’s cellphone bill up to $800 a month. Her job at a Kennesaw restaurant just pays her other bills.
But she has to take his calls whenever they come. They are her “sanity calls,” and she figures they are his, too. He vents if he needs to, or shares a laugh. If he’s scared, he doesn’t usually tell her, but she can hear it in his voice. It makes her worry. Like when he came back to Atlanta for his two-week break the day after Christmas. He wasn’t too talkative. In the car with her, he flinched if he saw something in the street. The roads in Iraq are studded with makeshift bombs.
She tried to make things as normal as possible for him. That meant taking a grand total of 467 pictures of the two of them together.
She is hopeful he’ll be home for good by the end of summer. But circumstances change swiftly. There aren’t any safe spots in Iraq, and Tal Afar seemed like one of the less risky. Giunta is stationed there. Last week his base rumbled from the impact of a nearby suicide bomb. Once she learned about it, Lopez held her breath and her cellphone. When Giunta did call, she heard that thing in his voice again.
After a while Lopez stopped pressing him with pleas of “what’s wrong?” He wouldn’t say. So she shifted to future tense, talking of what will be.
They will both go to North Georgia College & State University in Dahlonega. Lopez is moving their things up there and getting an apartment they can share.
She already has bought a strappy red dress to wear to the Paratroopers’ Ball next January.
All they have to do is make it through the next few months.
Permalink | Comments (2) | Categories: Reports from the Homefront
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By Proud Army Wife
April 16, 2007 1:26 PM | Link to this
Miss Lopez it takes a special type of woman to love a military man and from this article you definately have that quality. You and your soldier are in my prayers.
By Jenny
April 17, 2007 12:26 AM | Link to this
Don’t let anyone tell you it isn’t worth waiting for a soldier. During Operation Desert Storm I was asked the same question. He was 22 and I was 19. My soldier and I have been married 14 1/2 years, have two wonderful kids, and a great life together. It isn’t always easy, but is always worth it. I look forward to meeting you at the Paratroopers’ Ball. God bless you both!