I woke up to the shake of my bunk being kicked. This was typically reserved for a mission coming down and being summoned to the TOC. As my feet touched the plywood floor, the Iridium phone hit my lap.
"You're gonna be a dad today."
Satch smiled, turned around, and the divider curtain fell--leaving me alone to take in the gravity of the situation:
She's supposed to be born in three weeks.
I won't be home for another two weeks.
Does this mean I'm going to miss the birth of our first child?
Shit. I'm never going to hear the end of this one.
Over the next 18 hours, I burnt up tax payer dollars with an Iridium satellite phone, hooked to a 5590 battery, on the hood of a gun truck. Fellow Rangers would swing by to see how it was going. Occasionally, the phone would be drowned out by a jet in final approach to Bagram. And then it happened. Halfway around the world, I heard her sweet cry.
Today is a day of sadness and loss for many including myself. But had it not happened, she wouldn't be in my life.
She's supposed to be born in three weeks.
I won't be home for another two weeks.
Does this mean I'm going to miss the birth of our first child?
Shit. I'm never going to hear the end of this one.
Over the next 18 hours, I burnt up tax payer dollars with an Iridium satellite phone, hooked to a 5590 battery, on the hood of a gun truck. Fellow Rangers would swing by to see how it was going. Occasionally, the phone would be drowned out by a jet in final approach to Bagram. And then it happened. Halfway around the world, I heard her sweet cry.
Today is a day of sadness and loss for many including myself. But had it not happened, she wouldn't be in my life.
Does anybody else feel conflicted about how September 11th took and gave? Would you know your fellow warriors as well? Would you have met that woman? Would you have saved all those people? Would have grown this much as a person?
A dilemma.
Comments
My wife was a flight attendant that day and had just landed at home (DFW), when it happened .I will never forget listening to it happen on the radio.
I understand the dilemma; for me it was something that was born within myself. I was in middle school when those planes hit; old enough to realize the impact it would have on our country and the world, but unprepared for the impact it would have on me. It shook me to my core, and amidst the rumbling in my spirit, a part of me was awoken. It was a need to do everything in my power to make sure nothing like that ever happened again; a need to make the world better and less full of hate. This need was etched into my foundation and I feel it in my bones. It cannot be quelled.
I am grateful for this side of me that makes me very much the woman I am today; that may not have been realized without the tragedy that unfolded on September 11.