We started our block leave today. It's really starting to hit home that we're leaving fairly soon. Like in just a little over a month, crazy. Especially looking at our deployment orders and seeing the length of time as 485 days or 16 months, eeeekkk!!
Brandon came up to visit me this week and it's been great having him here. He's cooked more in my apartment in one week than I typically cook in a month or two. It was great coming home from work and having food almost ready. Pretty sweet, too bad he has to go to air assualt next week, I'd keep him around just for the cooking.
Friday, July 27, 2007
Monday, July 02, 2007
Visiting Arlington
I spent the 4 day weekend in Washington DC with the other two platoon leaders in my company. It was a bit of a long drive for a short weekend, but I'm glad I went, especially since it allowed me the opportunity to visit one of our classmates who is buried in Arlington.
Sadly, all of us knew someone who was buried in Arlington, but I suppose that more and more, that is not such an unusual occurrence for members of our generation serving in the military, everyone has lost a friend, classmate or someone else with a connection that hits home.
We watched the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and I think that all of us noted how glad we were for the advances in DNA identification that should prevent any of our service members from ever being unknown in the future. From there we wandered thru the peaceful paths thru the cemetary until we made our way over to section 60, which has the most recent burials, and is home to the majority of the OIF/OEF casualties. In this section, fresh cut flowers were prevalent, and there were quite a few people paying their regards. Thankfully there was not a funeral going on, I don't think I could have handled it.
I found the burial marker for my classmate, and stood there reflecting on the man who I did not know as well as some, but knew better than some of the other classmates we have lost in the war. We were in the same Buckner platoon, and it was mostly his antics and the easy leadership he demonstrated even at that early stage of his cadet career that I remembered. I stood there, sang the Alma Mater quietly under my breath, and saluting at "Well Done," hoped that we could all be worthy of his sacrifice, and the sacrifice of all those other men and women buried there.
Sadly, all of us knew someone who was buried in Arlington, but I suppose that more and more, that is not such an unusual occurrence for members of our generation serving in the military, everyone has lost a friend, classmate or someone else with a connection that hits home.
We watched the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and I think that all of us noted how glad we were for the advances in DNA identification that should prevent any of our service members from ever being unknown in the future. From there we wandered thru the peaceful paths thru the cemetary until we made our way over to section 60, which has the most recent burials, and is home to the majority of the OIF/OEF casualties. In this section, fresh cut flowers were prevalent, and there were quite a few people paying their regards. Thankfully there was not a funeral going on, I don't think I could have handled it.
I found the burial marker for my classmate, and stood there reflecting on the man who I did not know as well as some, but knew better than some of the other classmates we have lost in the war. We were in the same Buckner platoon, and it was mostly his antics and the easy leadership he demonstrated even at that early stage of his cadet career that I remembered. I stood there, sang the Alma Mater quietly under my breath, and saluting at "Well Done," hoped that we could all be worthy of his sacrifice, and the sacrifice of all those other men and women buried there.
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