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The stories below were written in
honor of men, women, and children I was honored to serve in Iraq, both military and civilian. These stories may be emotional
for many readers so I ask that you only read one at a time, and that, if needed, you find someone to talk to about your
reactions to the stories. These stories may be copied with prior written permission from the author. *****
An Angel Yesterday he was laughing, joking
with his buddies. They were telling colorful jokes, smoking, watching the sun rise, shaving, and talking
about girls back at home. It was a day like the day before, hot and dangerous. But he
was immortal, untouchable, seasoned in combat. Another day outside the wire, chasing an unseen enemy that
follows no rules.
Today a helicopter lands at our small hospital where we all wait in silence.
Four young men, just like him, walk in step in this very solemn observance. The ramp is down on
the helicopter and the four men reverently enter and so very carefully pick up the litter. As they lovingly
place the litter on the rickshaw, they tighten down the bolts to secure the litter. There can be no chance
that the litter could slip. Now they again walk in step, so formal, to a place just outside the prop wash.
There, they unfold a flag. Moments before I watched two of the men lovingly unfold and refold the
flag. It needed to be perfect. Now as they unfold it again they place it over a body
bag. A simple black body bag.
We all stand at attention and salute. As they pass I am overwhelmed with
feelings of care and love. All but essential medical care has stopped here because every Hospital Corpsman,
every nurse, every doctor and every administrator stands here to honor this Angel passing by. The bag is
so small, so still, carrying the fractured remains of an Angel. I had the thought that the bag seemed small
because he had already become an Angel and moved on. He had no more need for an earthly body.
The four young men take the Angel on the litter to a sacred room in the hospital. Only the Marines
and two doctors enter the room. The Angel and his effects are prepared for the next part of the journey.
After the Angel passed by, we all quietly go back inside. We ask about the sacred room. What
goes on in there? It used to be that people would ask if they could go in the sacred room and observe the
proceedings. But the men escorting the Angel were angered at what they thought was disrespect.
So none of us ask. But we all wonder. This is not morbid curiosity.
We all know this is a sacred room and sacred proceedings. We want to honor the Angel and bear witness
to the importance of his life and death. I hope that one day I will be allowed to stand quietly in the
sacred room. I am crying even as I write this, so I know I would likely cry then. But
doesn’t he deserve this?
No, it is not disrespectful at all. We have all come to this place in
the middle of a combat zone, to serve these young men and women. To lovingly care for fractured bodies
and fractured souls. Many will not become Angels this day.
But today a Marine will stand guard at the sacred room,
until the sacred men come to take the Angel away. The body will join the spirit for a moment in the sky.
We call this day River City, because a river of tears will fall for this Angel.
With my greatest respect
Two Children This morning two fathers saw their children off to school.
Two sons, part of a new generation free of the oppression of the past. Free to learn in a new school in
a new time. Two fathers taking a chance that their sons would be educated in a new way with new opportunities
they never had. So filled with hope. It
is amazing, this thing, hope. It carries us through unbearable difficulties and makes them bearable.
It fuels us to go where we previously feared. Hope is a wonderful thing. This afternoon, two helicopters land, carrying two small fractured bodies. The
playground transformed grotesquely into a killing ground. School clothes shredded by debris flying violently
through the air. School clothes now soaked in blood and covered with dirt. Who does these things? In whose name do they slaughter children. For what purpose
do they terrorize these little boys? I don’t think there are even any answers they could give.
I don’t think they even know why. It is as if some evil disease has infected them, stealing
all humanness from them. For surely no human would do this. This afternoon, two helicopters land, delivering two boys and two fathers. As we take the fathers
to another room, teams of doctors, nurses, and corpsmen surround two little boys. These men and women work
with God’s hands. Each touch divinely guided in the attempt to save lives. But one child ran to retrieve the ball. A playful game exploding with a deafening
sound and a torrent of blood. One child was too close, as the men had planned it. Now, two helicopters sit on our landing pad. One carries a little boy, carefully
wrapped up with a thermal blanket and life saving medical equipment. One father, so thankful, flying with
his son to a bigger hospital where they will continue to perform miracles for the son and the father. The other helicopter waits as the father, torn with grief, walks behind the litter covered with an
Iraqi flag, and carried gently by four men. One father, who will sit beside a small lifeless figure in
a small body bag. This scene is too disturbing to even imagine. And yet here it is.
The heart, carefully massaged by skillful hands, moments before torn apart by evil hands. Two helicopters. One carrying life and one carrying death. The
sadness is overwhelming. At times it feels like the excruciating pain will never end, as two helicopters
return to the sky with two children.
With my deep respect and profound sorrow
The
Sacred Men Life ebbs and flows through the river
bed known as the wadi…season to season…year after year. But there is always another season.
There will always be more rain, the reeds will always grow, and the oasis will always be. Scriptures
describe the passage of ancient holy men who traveled this land. Lush date palms and beautiful grass make
visitors stop and wonder, and sometimes pray.
A different group of sacred men are here now, season to season, year after year. But for their charges,
the last season has arrived. These men have a sacred duty that few others could meet. Every
call signals another loss, another fateful knock at a door, and another mother’s tears. The images
they face remain unseen by the world, to protect others from pain. But they see…they look…and
in moments unnoticed, stand silently and honor the dead.
The phone rings, bringing death, and an ambulance departs.
One time they drive to a hospital and the next to a place that surely resembles hell. Their mission
is to find what remains of an angel. Combat photographers have already gone and the moment is preserved.
The task is now to recover what remains of a woman’s beloved son. Blood spilled on dirty floors
and bombed out buildings. The destruction is unbelievable, impossible, but yet here it is.
Another explosion, more fires, more screams, and much later, an eerie calm. The sacred men are called
and the solemn process begins. They gather up the earthly remains of a young man. A young man who might
have joked with them yesterday at a meal. A young man with plans and dreams. In his
possessions they find an engagement ring and a photograph of a young woman.
How long have we been doing this, tearing
apart life and then trying to pick up the pieces? The sacred men are more than honorable, but each trip
becomes more immoral than the last. When will it end?
When this group of sacred men goes home,
some will return to college and others to regular jobs. And what will they say when someone asks, “What
did you do during the war?” Can they really answer that question without others pulling away?
But reading this, please reach out to them rather than pull away. These are the men who last held
what remained of a mother’s son. These are the men who so very carefully prepared an angel for a
final journey home. To these men, the earth here is hallowed ground. For
no matter how careful they are, there will always be something left behind. The sand here is painted with
pieces of their hearts and the blood of their friends. And each evening as the sacred men take down the
flag, the Arabian night cries unseen tears. With loving
gratitude
Arabian Nights Tonight I look at the expanse of deep purple and orange sky over a ridge in the distance. The intense
beauty of the night is in stark contrast to the barren desert of the earth, but even more in contrast to the silhouettes of
armored military vehicles. Walking past this strange looking collection of trucks, I pause and wonder which
ones will return from the next journey. Several hours ago young men sat on the hoods of these vehicles
and on the tops of the cabs. It is a peculiar scene, but one I see here every day. In
a different time some of these young men would be sitting on a bull waiting for the gate to open and the clock to start.
Some would be cruising in convertibles looking for trouble or girls. And some would be on surf boards—muscled
and tan. But here they are all in matching dirty coveralls—coveralls that are fire retardant for
a reason. Back from another day on roads far more dangerous than any you could imagine back home. This scene is almost like a distorted
version of young men getting ready for a street race. You imagine them sitting with cocky smiles, each
thinking his car will win the race, his driving will be the most wild and daring. The only thing missing
is the crowd. But this is more like a scene from ‘Mad Max.’ Wild looking
vehicles, constantly modified to keep a step ahead of an enemy that has no regard for human life. This
scene is surreal. In
the morning the vehicles will be gone—out on a journey from which some may not return. And with each
lost truck, how many lost men? Earlier today a nurse described to me the scene in the emergency room. The amazing efforts to save
a charred body that was a handsome young man an hour before. A young man with a beautiful young wife and
a whole life ahead of him. A young man soon to be a father. He promised to be careful,
and he was very careful as he worked this morning. With hands more skilled than those of a surgeon he disabled
two devices. But then there was a third. And in an instant the strong young man was
transformed. The scene is so disturbing that it clearly cannot be real. So people rush
to him, apply tourniquets, wisk him away on a helicopter and work intently, knowing that he will live. He
has to live. This cannot happen again. He is rushed into the emergency room
and a team of men and women work as only they know how to do. This evening, with a heavy heart, I wondered about a young man who would have been in this chow hall
yesterday. Which table would he have been sitting at and what would he have been eating. Would
he have been eating alone, or laughing with friends. Would he have sat facing a TV or preferred to ignore
the daily body counts and bombings on the news. This was a young man who performed delicate surgery on
evil devices, and saved more lives every day than teams of medical personnel might save in a year. He and
his friends are a special breed who step into the underworld every day, with a million prayers following them. Today all of the strange vehicles returned
and all of the drivers returned. But also today, a bright young woman received a knock at her door and
the world came crushing down around her. Today her world was swept away in a river of tears and tonight
she will look at the sky and plead with God, “Make this be just a dream and let me wake up tomorrow as I did today.” And on this side of the world tonight,
I look at these intense colors and see no beauty in the Arabian night. With
intense gratitude to the men of Explosive Ordnance Disposal And tears for a young wife .
Who Will Listen?
My heart is heavy from carrying this story. It is a story of
sad events in a sad place. A story about violence where there is no happy ending. Where
every day life is transformed viciously into death and someone picks up the pieces. Pieces of a young life.
A man I had known before…another place and another time. And
I remember the smile. As I looked around, bullets rang out from dark places
and invisible people. The search had to stop and we were ordered to leave. But leaving
felt like abandoning my own blood. Like leaving my own child in the path of evil. When
we returned later, vehicles had traveled there, erasing the trail. Vehicles tainted with the blood of my
friend. I searched until the others finally pulled me away. They said there was nothing
more; we had done all we could. A piece of my body was also left there as I cried. Tears and blood, spilled on grains of sand and
lost forever. Later, washing down the vehicle, I wanted to capture the red water and put the pieces back
in place. One story was worse than
the rest. This one was real. Real to me. This story was different
because I knew this man. We fought together once…stood side by side in harms way…laughed
and cried together. He ran out into the bullets that toppled me and pulled me to safety. I
owed this man my life and loved him as my brother. A year passed with time at home and simple everyday things. I chose a different
duty, one equally as honorable. And the time came to return again to this place where life blows away like
the powdery dirt. I remember jumping down once and laughing at the puffy cloud of dirt that rose up, and
for a moment I felt like a child playfully jumping in a puddle. But now the dirt seems like a huge deafening
dust storm laying in wait…waiting for a moment when it will rise up again and take another life.
Now, in this place, I thought I would be able to share some of my burden.
This one story. I wanted to tell you about the sadness and to feel that you cared. But
you didn’t hear me and the story was lost. Buried deeper in my soul. I know how
to smile and be strong, but this was a moment when I reached out. This was my story and the story was me.
So who will listen? Someone said, “Tell your stories.”
But tell them to whom? Who will listen and not turn away. Who will help me carry
this burden? Who will share this sorrow? Who will see this pain?
I carry this story alone again now. A story that will never be heard
and pain that will never be seen. I can only write and hope that the pen will hear me cry and feel my pain.
And I wonder…who will listen…who will write about me? .
I will, CDR
Beverly Ann Dexter
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