On Saturday, I spent an entire day in a tent with a black Master Sergent named Jon. At our first conversational lull, Jon belted out this chunk of wisdom:
MSgt Jon: You know, black people are smarter than white people when it comes to animals.
Me: How’s that?
MSgt Jon: Animals are not your friend, [...]
If that isn’t frightening, I don’t know what is: officers are getting promoted too quickly, and PTSD is rampant.
The first time I deployed in support of OIF, Americans were still fairly novel creatures to the regular “Joe Iraqi” townsfolk, as were our beardless faces, our cargo pants, and–most intriguing–our sunglasses.
On one of the two trips I took “outside the wire” while there (both unauthorized), I saw firsthand the perception they had about our [...]
This is the dry erase board on which I encouraged the 39 members of my flight last year to write some things for which they could be thankful, even while stuck spending a holiday in Iraq. See? Things weren’t so bad.
And here’s the Beastie Boys telling us to be grateful:
I’ve never been one to [...]
11.11on veterans day
I was sitting here wondering which story to tell tonight when a flashing light on my blackberry signaled a message from my friend Jon, the managing editor at an Atlanta newspaper, wishing me a happy Veterans Day. I met Jon five years ago at a luncheon; he heard me refer to my recent deployment to [...]
