2025 – 01 – 28 – Unforgiving Rain and Dangerous Birds
It rained two nights ago. In the desert, it poured from the sky. An absolutely miserable time for everyone, as they sheltered themselves underneath tarps and quasi-weatherproof sleeping bag covers in the sub-35 degree weather. Fortuna blessed me, though, as I had been working the night shift, meaning my sleep schedule was in the middle of the day when it was warmer. In the command post where all the communication equipment laid, I coddled around my precious space heater (see my previous journal for more on that). Well, until the people started trickling in.
Our Command Sergeant Major was the first to join me after all the Captains had finished their shifts and headed to bed. That is, if you count never quite leaving as joining. The poor Bermuda-born man situated himself in the middle of the room, somewhere between states of consciousness as he blasted my heater directly towards him throughout the entire night. The cold isn’t his thing. In fact, he’s asleep in this Humvee with me right now in another remarkable attempt to avoid the frigid desert night during winter. No worries, the command post had three additional heaters that arrived that same day to choose from. Except, one of them didn’t work. That’s fine, two heaters. Oh, the roaming guard would generally just come in my room and take another. They deserve it, one would certainly be enough for me. Rather, you might think so, until you hear the dreaded story of our Chaplain.
Now, Chap and I go way back. He was at my last unit, 1st Eng, and we’ve developed a great little friendship. He hails from Kenya, speaks seven different languages, has his first baby on the way, and is genuinely one of the most pure pillars of positivity I’ve ever met. A true asset to any team. So imagine my surprise when he lurks into the command post at about 2AM when everyone else is supposed to be asleep, armed with a thousand-yard stare. The desert rain blocked the light of God that had usually beamed down on him, but as a testimony to his resilience, he only made some quick comment like “cold, eh?” before plopping himself next to me with a wet squish. Apparently, he had fallen asleep in a truck that had a hole in one of its doors, drenching the entire right half of his body. Even the notebook in his pocket wasn't spared from the rain’s dastardly reckoning. Chap, who never asks anyone for anything (except sunflower seeds – which I have been excited to repay his friendship by belt-feeding him them out in the field since), didn’t even ask for my heater. But I’d surely go to hell if I didn’t give mine up for the Chaplain, right? So I shifted it towards his direction, and he said “thank you,” before leaning towards it staying quiet for the rest of the night. I suppose being kinda cold isn’t as bad as being definitively cold and also wet, anyways. Any remaining doubt of my decision subsided when he got up around four hours later and his seat was still wet.
Unrelated to the heater but still noteworthy of that night was when a Staff Sergeant popped his head in, donning his full kit, and mentioned that his bowels were in DEFCON 6 and that he had no choice but to make the 600-meter trek to the portapotties on the other side of our base. Again, in the rain. This Staff Sergeant had a reputation of being level-headed during any situation, so when he came back with the fear of God in his eyes and mentioned that he had stopped seven times along the way and almost shat where he stood, the gravity of his situation couldn’t be misunderstood. Apparently, something he ate gave his stomach the spins, which was alarming, because we all ate the same food. But he ultimately made it to the portapotty, although while reaching over the toilet, his gloves fell right in. Gone for good.
Regardless, I quite like working the nights. I get to avoid that pesky sun and the busiest time of the day where I’d be aimlessly waiting around, trying to help when I can, but ultimately not familiar with the systems of Division staff enough to be of too much use. In the night, it’s really just me and sometimes another Captain, so there’s a bit more leeway in what I do, considering there’s usually not much going on.
A con of that came today, when during my midday sleep, we took indirect fire, cutting my rest period short. I popped out of my sleeping bag in our sleeping area looking like a meercat poking through the entrance of its tunnel to catch my entire team prone around our command post. Our Battalion Commander, a special forces guy, snapped around and yelled, “put on your shit, we’re getting IDF!”
That whole situation panned out to be not as exciting as earlier today when my usual aimless waiting around the command post was interrupted by “red air” overhead, AKA bad guys flying a helicopter. I launched towards my rifle hanging on the wall, not even grabbing my helmet before catapulting out the back door, eager to go bird hunting. I missed the last time red air flew overhead because I had been asleep, and if nothing else, it was my goal to blast through all of my ammo here. My rifle jammed on every shot (I fucking hate the m4 carbine), but I got a good six or seven shots off towards the helicopter. Which, objectively, is pretty fucking sick. I shot a rifle at a helicopter! Blanks, with our laser tag equipment hooked up to it, but still. If nothing else, at least it made me feel good.
All of this happened with “Shout” by Tears for Fears stuck in my head, the one song I pulled up at the crack of dawn on my laptop when nobody else needed to use our WiFi for mission-essential tasks, so I could goof around it without anybody yelling at me. So yeah, my time here at the National Training Center goes on.
Anyways, apparently the 1ID Band (who is our security out here, LOL) just spotted a UAV overhead, so I’ve got to go try and get it shot down. Nobody will actually do anything about it, but in a real unit in a real situation, maybe it would have.
SOTD – just guess
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