2025 – 02 – 26 – Callsign: Fan Tower
I’ve been out to the field three times now with this new unit, and every time, heaters have been a problem. It gets damn cold in the night when we’re on fireguard, sitting around the radio. Even here in the desert for our National Training Center rotation, these nights dip down into the 30s – a stark contrast to the pleasant ~60 degree daytime weather where the sun kindly kisses the skin covering our frigid bones.
So imagine my surprise when we not only bring a single heater for our entire staff, but on probably our third night here, it breaks. Just shuts right off, I guess. Which meant we were supposed to head into “the box”, our eight-day training excursion into the yonder of this base as large as Rhode Island, with no heater at all. What madness!
I simply couldn’t fathom it, so I switched on my rusty mechanical mindset and the gears began to turn. I am an engineer, after all, and the only one in Battalion staff. Apparently, somebody knocked it over, which meant it either something came unplugged, or a fuse snapped, or something much worse. I would have no shot in fixing something worse, I could probably bypass the fuse at the cost of it being a safety hazard, or hopefully, something obvious just became unplugged and I could unfuck it relatively easily. So, I opted to take it with us out to the field to tinker with it when I found the time.
Twice before I got my hands on it did somebody try to throw it away. The second time, I literally caught it with a Soldier on the way to the trash. But I remembered how cold I was during the previous night without it, and how much the troupe of Soldiers I had been hanging out with oh-so-deeply lamented the cold, so I though, why not, I’ll take that bitch apart and give repairing it a stab. I used to repair airsoft gun gearboxes after all, so it can’t be much different, right?
As I awkwardly disassembled it with a screwdriver off a coworker’s leatherman, I couldn’t help but think about how useless I’ve felt during my time here. Surrounded by Captains with Army knowledge that mine pales in comparison to, I’ve struggled to find my place here on the battlefield. Hell, I still don’t fully know what I’m supposed to do here, minus being a spare staff officer to man the radio and do various other bitchwork tasks. Everybody knows I’m leaving the Army soon, so I should have stayed back at Fort Riley. A couple of other small fuckups along the way in front of my Battalion Commander have had me feeling rather down lately. You don’t know what you don’t know, but it’s hard to help when you don’t understand what’s going on. LTC P and CSM P both told me to do my best to help everyone out here, and I’ve approached this with as solid of a mindset as I can, but still have felt like a fish out of water.
I'll admit I prayed as I took that blasted heater apart. I asked God for a favour, requesting that I could get it up and running to prove my worth. The first attempt went poorly – I pried it off its baseplate, which wasn’t necessary to get into the core of the heater. It wouldn’t go back in place, giving it a permanent lean like the tower of Piza.
But with my engineer background just like LTC P and CSM P empowering me, I gave it another crack. Tearing it all down, by the grace of God, I found something unplugged – the best-case scenario. I snapped it back into place and rushed my patient to the generator, split wide open with its sandy guts exposed to the world.
My coworkers gathered around as I plugged it in. SSG P, one of the guys most vocal on how cold he was the night prior, said he’d put me up for an award if I got it running. So with the eagerness of anticipation weighing on my shoulders, I pressed that fateful power button on the top.
“BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!”
I’ll never forget SSG P's face of raw exhilaration. “OHHHHHH!” he went, giving me the most victorious of high-fives. The electric invigoration surged through the surrounding group as we relished the ecstasy of that moment, realising we got some way to heat ourselves during these nippy desert nights.
I went back to my sleeping area to reassemble it fully, overcome with a sense of gratitude. I know in my heart this is going to be a good year. Chinese calendar be damned, I decided it'd be the year of the tiger, and I fux heavy with tigers.
Since then, I had to run a message to an adjacent unit when enemy trucks were inbound. It’s a funny story, actually – turns out the part of that unit is a part of our village, but I ran a good 400-500m through the desert sun in my nighttime coldweather kit (rifle and armour included) to another part of their unit because, hell, we’re about to be attacked! Our guys have to know as soon as possible! The crew got a kick out of that. I considered it my 1917 moment, after that bomb-ass WWI movie.
Anywho, I guess they called up to that unit to let them know I was coming with my new callsign – Fan Tower. Or, maybe it was Mr. Heater, or something else related to my tinkering with heater. I’ll confirm that one later. But still, it meant a lot to me. If nothing else, if I fuck up everything else from here on, at least I’d still be the guy that fixed the heater.
Today a senior Captain in charge of our logistics gave me the credit when my fellow LT offered a spare heater for us. I told him later on it meant a lot to me, too.
Year of the tiger, baby. And of course, your boy does some damage with the heater.
Comments
Post a Comment