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Chasing War
by
Jason Davis
Karbala, Iraq March/ April 2003 photo credit:
jason davis
The evening of March 7, 2003, the most difficult night of my life, I got up from the couch, turned off the t.v., and led my wife out the front door of our small three-bedroom home. We walked up the slightly sloped driveway, past the flower gardens and into the middle of two empty streets that intersected at the foot of the driveway. The distant streetlamps were blown out and the twinkling stars that shone through the streaking clouds provided the only light. The air was crisp and the night was quiet, like the stillness of an early morning pond. It seemed that life in our usually bustling neighborhood had stopped—for the week that led to this night, cars were not driven, children did not go outside to play, and wives neglected the gardens of their half-empty homes. We lived in an off-base neighborhood dominated by military families, and my unit’s delayed plane was the last to leave.
With my wife’s hand in mine, I pointed into the sky at a recognizable but unknowable grouping of stars. Robyn turned slowly and looked softly into my eyes. I told her I would look into the sky every night and that I would think of her. She cried and promised to do the same. After a few solemn and wordless moments with her hand in mine, I led her back down the slightly sloped driveway and into our small three-bedroom home. I finished my half-empty rum- and- C oke and went to bed.
Saturday, March 8, 2003 was not a morning like every other, but it felt the same. The sun had risen early and the sky was perfect and blue in a way that smoggy S outhern California would never know. I bloodied my youthful face with a dull razor and brushed my teeth with an old toothbrush. The air inside the bathroom was chilly and I stood beneath the shower to soak under the warmth of the falling water. I felt that everything would be fine if I could fall down the drain and escape to somewhere other than where I was; but on this morning, I would have to say goodbye. There is no such thing as goodbye when the deployment orders state “one-hundred and eighty days to not more than three-hundred and sixty-five.” Beneath the falling water, I thought of how naïvely and imprudently I acted the day I raised my right hand. I swore to defend the Constitution of the United States, and now I would have to do it in Iraq, for the defense and freedom of America at home. None of it made sense to me and I wondered how war could be defined and numbered in days. I thought of the valorous conflicts of generations past—Team America didn’t leave the game in the bottom of the fifth inning—they played that shit to extra innings if it meant victory! But this wasn’t a game I wanted to play.
My bags were packed into our only car—a hand-me-down Honda from the in-laws that had been towed from California to Kentucky by an even older motor home. Robyn drove us onto post through Gate Six and past the old, run-down housing preserved for Privates and soldiers new to the Army. Every door was shut; every window and curtain was closed. Deer wandered the deserted streets and picked at the grass in the front yards and doorsteps of empty homes whose wives and children had left for the company of family in other places. The radio was off and the road was smooth and quiet. An air of undisturbed absence glided over the fingertips of my outstretched hand through the passenger window. We drove past the 2nd and 3rd Brigade gyms and their empty parking lots. Even the parking lot for the Post Exchange, the Army’s version of Wal-Mart, was empty. Fort Campbell, home of the Army’s prestigious 101st Airborne, was deserted and the only remaining activity was the last of the 502nd Infantry Brigade readying to leave.
“DAVIS! Hurry the fuck up!”
Sergeant Colby was my Forward Observer (FO) and I was his Radio Telephone Operator (RTO). As artillery FO’s, we were as much an asset to the infantry platoon as a medic. I had only known Sergeant Colby for a month, but I liked him compared to the other sergeants. He was slow to anger and was sensible about Army bullshit. Sergeant Colby was short, but burly and thick like a tree trunk. He’d been in the Army for ten years but you could tell he’d seen better days. Soldiers like that just bide their time; having put in half a retirement, they were stuck, and had little leverage or say in their career paths. Department of the Army would send them to Drill Sergeant Academy, Recruiting School, or in Sergeant Colby’s case, to a deploying unit with an open position. That’s why he came from Korea: he was available, and I was a Private First Class (PFC) in a sergeant’s position for a unit heading to war.
Sergeant Colby and Staff Sergeant Behrends had walked toward my car near the back of the parking lot. SSG Behrends was my Squad Leader and the Bravo Company Fire Support Sergeant. He was a fellow Californian, and he smirked a thin but friendly yellow-toothed grin. He had a dip in his lip, a spray-painted desert-colored and insulated coffee mug in one hand, and a cigarette in the other. He rambled on about saying his goodbyes at home and that his wife would pick up his truck later. Sergeant Colby, too, had already said goodbye to his wife and little girls, and they were both rushing me to get my rucksack and duffel bags in line with the rest of the squad. I looked down at my dog. She was smiling, but I knew she would mope when I left. She usually positioned herself near the front door of our house, next to the couch, waiting for me to return. But I wasn’t going to return that year…
“Hurry the fuck up, Davis!” stammered Sergeant Colby.
I was going to spend the next year of my life with this guy, and the last thing I wanted was to piss him off. I hugged Robyn, kissed her, and grabbed my bags without a more proper goodbye. Halfway down the parking lot, I looked over my shoulder and saw the car start up. In typical Army “hurry up and wait” fashion, there was no real hurry. There was no formation, and no immediate timeline. There was only a preservation of order. Someone somewhere had dictated an 0800 arrival and three minutes early was twelve minutes late.
Fourteen hours later, Headquarters Company and Bravo Company 2/502 Infantry flew out of Campbell Army Airfield on a commercial 737 airliner. After a one-stop, seventeen-hour flight to Kuwait International Airport and a two-hour bus ride to Camp New York in the Kuwait desert, I found a few moments to look into the night sky. The stars twinkled but their glow was awkward, like a foreign gesture from someone speaking a different language. I thought of Robyn and wondered how she would get through the next year. I wondered whether she had looked into the sky the way I had at that moment. My head was clouded by the uncertainty and peril of war and of longing for home. Two days had passed and it would be another fifteen before we crossed the border into Iraq.
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