American Soldiers

A long time between posts....

2008-12-04T14:54:00.003-05:00

My blog really kind of dropped off the face of the earth after Seth and Eli returned from Iraq. The blog was my release...my therapy...my way to stay connected with the boys while they were in harm's way. When they returned my need to write and keep up with the news disappeared with the fear that I carried in my heart each and every day they were gone. It wasn't that I didn't have anything to say.....I just didn't have the NEED to say it!
Life has continued. Seth and Eli are happily embedded in their homes, Eli in North Carolina with Katy and Seth is living in Virginia with Brittany. Eli is working at a private school as a "jack of all trades" while Seth continues to try and finish his education at James Madison University. Josh is now living in Baltimore, Maryland working as a Guidance Counselor at an inner-city middle school. The family was rather obsessed over the last several months with the election of Barrack Obama. In June, Seth talked me into another blog, Left Leaning Right Minded, and you could check that out to see the level of his involvement with the campaign.
We celebrated Thanksgiving as a complete family and truly counted our blessings. Seth and Eli will end their committment with the National Guard in five months. We're counting the days. As soon as the Christmas season ends it's my intention to finally put this blog to bed for good. I plan to put the blog into book form for Seth and Eli to keep. My working title is: "Twins with Guns....our small part in the war on terror." I'll let you know how it goes.

A Picture's worth a thousand words....

2008-04-26T20:27:00.008-05:00

A parting shot and remembering history....

2008-04-26T07:11:00.002-05:00

I don't recall exactly how the saying goes, but it says that those who don't learn history are doomed to repeat history or repeat mistakes. Seth and Eli have been in the Guard for about five years. I say that we learned early on that nothing is definite in the Army until it is over and done...I say that....but I apparently don't believe it. I always get excited when they tell me something and I always believe what they say. They're getting their parting shot. Expecting the boys to arrive in Woodstock at 2:00 PM we left a few things undone until this morning. Plenty of time to get up and get a some stuff done. Seth called at 7:00 to report that they were already in Virginia and would be arriving at Woodstock around 11:30! I'd love to write a few more words, but I gotta go!!!!!!!!!!!

Returning to Woodstock

2008-04-25T06:26:00.004-05:00

Seth and Eli and the rest of Company B return to Woodstock, Virginia tomorrow. A place that saw many tears last spring will see them again....different tears, better tears. Here's a news release about their return:

Press Release 04/22/08: Charlottesville Troops Returning

Updated: April 24, 2008 10:56 AM

News release issued April 22:
Charlottesville, Leesburg and Woodstock area Va. Guard Soldiers return from Iraq

Soldiers from infantry companies headquartered in Charlottesville, Leesburg and Woodstock assigned to 3rd Battalion, 116th Infantry Brigade Combat Team returned to the United States April 20 and 21 after serving in Iraq and Kuwait since September 2007. The Soldiers flew into the demobilization station of Camp Shelby, Miss., and will conduct a number of different administrative activities to transition from active duty back into traditional National Guard status prior to returning back to Virginia. Approximately 150 Soldiers are assigned to each company.

The units will spend four or five days at Camp Shelby, but the exact arrival date for their return back to Virginia has not been determined at this time. The Virginia National Guard Public Affairs Office will issue a follow up advisory once the return date has been set.

All three infantry companies were assigned to convoy escort duty in Iraq and had numerous enemy engagements via improvised explosive devices, small arms fire and complex ambushes. A and B Companies operated in Al Anbar Province or Multinational Division West. A Company operated and in some of the most dangerous areas in Iraq to include Fallujah and Ramadi, and B Company operated in hot spots west of the Euphrates River and the far western portions of Iraq near the Syrian border.

C Company provided convoy escort in Multi-National Division North and operated in some of the more recent danger areas around Mosul and Kirkuk. Nine of the 10 Soldiers wounded in action from the battalion were from C Company. The battalion had no fatalities.

In addition to the three infantry companies, the Battalion is made up of approximately 100 Soldiers from the Winchester-based Headquarters Company, approximately 125 Soldiers from Fredericksburg-based D Company and approximately 125 Soldiers from Fredericksburg-based F Company, 429th Brigade Support Battalion. These three units will return to the USA in the coming weeks. Additional information about their return will be provided once the units have landed at their demobilization station.

Additional Background Information on 3rd Battalion, 116th Infantry

The 3rd Battalion, 116 Infantry, also referred to as Task Force Normandy, was alerted Feb. 3, 2007 for mobilization and overseas deployment in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. This alert came 19 months after the battalion returned from Afghanistan in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. The battalion entered active duty in late June 2007 for mobilization training prior to leaving the United States.

In the span of four months, the unit was able to staff and equip the battalion for the mission, calling upon Soldiers and equipment from 42 different units across the Commonwealth to form the largest battalion task force the Virginia National Guard has mobilized in support of the Global War on Terror. The battalion numbered nearly 800 Soldiers when the embarked upon their mission.

The battalion's deployment was also the first time a Virginia National Guard rifle battalion ever deployed from Virginia with the new organizational structure of the Army's new modular brigade system.

The battalion deployed with its Headquarters Company, three rifle companies, (A, B and C Companies), a special weapons company (D Company) and a forward support company (F Company).

While at the mobilization station, Camp Shelby, Miss., the battalion was unexpectedly forced to accelerate the deployment timeline for two of its six companies. Due to urgent needs in Iraq and in support of the troop surge, A Company and C Company were required to accelerate their training timeline in order to arrive in theater to begin combat operations.

Both A and C companies successfully completed six back-to-back collective training exercises with no rest in between.

"These exercises were physically and mentally intensive ranging from mounted combat patrols to urban warfare," said Lt. Col. John Epperly, commander of 3rd Battalion. "This is significant because the change from light infantry to mounted warfare represented a significantly new way of fighting for these Soldiers and one which they had never been trained in previously Fire teams and squads were re-organized into gun truck crews and trained in new tactics, techniques and procedures for mounted convoy escort. Under intense time pressure, both A and C companies validated for deployment and departed the United States on time under the new schedule."

Upon departure from mobilization station, Task Force Normandy deployed to both Iraq and Kuwait. The three rifle companies were assigned to convoy escort duty in Iraq. Each rifle company was assigned to a Combat Sustainment Support Battalion and provided convoy escort to an area of operations ranging from 750 to 1,000 square kilometers.

Headquarters Company, D Company and F Company were assigned to Security Force (SECFOR) missions in Kuwait. D Company provided protection to the strategically important deepwater port at Ash Shuaybah. F Company provided port security at Kuwait Naval Base and protection to ammunition sustainment operations and re-deploying coalition forces at Kuwait Naval Base. The Headquarters Company provided command and control to the battalion's port security missions as well as the Area Reaction Force for all of southern Kuwait, an area that covered over 6000 square kilometers of battlespace known as SECFOR South.

"During its time in Kuwait and Iraq, 3rd Battalion was integral to the success of several operations, events and activities," Epperly said. "The units stationed in Kuwait made significant gains and innovations in securing critical infrastructure vital to the war effort in all of southwest Asia."

For a period of over 8 months, Headquarters Company, D and F companies, in concert with Naval Coastal Warfare Squadrons 5 and 21, provided joint security to the two strategic deepwater ports in Kuwait. "These ports were absolutely critical to the entire coalition war effort in Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan since over 95% of all supplies coming into theater used these ports," Epperly said.

While securing these ports, the battalion searched over 100,000 vehicles and 300,000 people without disruption to the ports. The battalion's local combat patrols around the port facilities logged over 10,000 vehicle hours without a serious incident. The battalion also secured the loading and unloading of over 8,000 combat vehicles as several brigade combat teams flowed into and out of Iraq.

The Headquarters Company provided an Area Response Force for all of southern Kuwait. Soldiers provided personal security detachments for distinguished visitors and aerial quick reaction forces for both the President's and First Lady's visits. They worked in a joint security environment with Naval Coastal Warfare Squadrons 5 and 21 as well as the Air Force's 586th Expeditionary Warfare Group.

D Company provided fixed site security and a Quick Reaction Force for the Seaport of Debarkation at Ash Shuaybah, Kuwait. This is the theater logistics center of gravity because over 90% of supplies for the warfights in Iraq and Afghanistan flow through this port. Delta's mission had strategic implications. They also worked in a joint security environment with Naval Coastal Warfare Squadrons 5 and 21 as well as the Air Force's 586th Expeditionary Warfare Group.

F Company provided fixed site security and Quick Reaction Force for Kuwait Naval Base. Their mission secured the Naval Base where all ammunition enters the theater. Further, they secured the deployment and re-deployment of five Marine Expeditionary Groups. They also worked in a joint security environment with Naval Coastal Warfare Squadrons 5 and 21 as well as the Air Force's 586th Expeditionary Warfare Group. F Company worked closely with Navy Inshore Boat Units to provide seamless sea and land side security for the Naval Base.

Touchdown in Mississippi

2008-04-22T06:44:00.004-05:00

The boys landed in Mississippi last night shortly before midnight and arrived at Camp Shelby around 2:00 AM. With a 4:30 AM wake-up call there wasn't much time for sleep and after 72 hours on the move in the same clothes I'm sure showers came before sleep. During the next few days there will be medical exams, shots, financial paperwork, counseling and other good things to prepare them for returning home. The process of becoming a civilian again begins. Company B will be returning to Woodstock on Saturday. We'll have times later this week.
Last night, after getting the phone call that they had landed in Mississippi, Jan began to cry. It wasn't just tears of joy......there is a profound sense of sadness for all those families that continue to endure the sacrifice and for all those families who have suffered the loss of a loved one. Our joy is tempered by the knowledge that this war continues to rob our country of so much. While we celebrate the safe return of our children we mourn for damage done to our country and our military.

No news is good news?

2008-04-21T09:28:00.002-05:00

Have you ever sat on pins and needles....of course you have - everyone has had the experience of "expectation." Waiting with bated breathe....I didn't have a clue where that expression came from but it's something I've used growing up so I did a little research.
Shakespeare is the first writer known to use it, in The Merchant of Venice, in which Shylock says to Antonio: “Shall I bend low and, in a bondman’s key, / With bated breath and whisp’ring humbleness, / Say this ...”. Nearly three centuries later, Mark Twain employed it in Tom Sawyer: “Every eye fixed itself upon him; with parted lips and bated breath the audience hung upon his words, taking no note of time, rapt in the ghastly fascinations of the tale”.

The term means a heightened sense of expectation so intense that it becomes a tangible feeling....I never knew I was such a literate person to go around quoting Shakespeare and Mark Twain, but now you know how I feel! I'm waiting with bated breath and assuming that no news is good news. If the boys were hung up somewhere I'm assuming we would have heard.
Keep posted for breaking news! I hope soon!

Homeword bound?

2008-04-19T17:45:00.002-05:00

Details are few and OpSec requires that specifics are not available, but look to the sky! We have it on good authority that Seth, Eli and the rest of the 3-116th will be in Mississippi sooner than you know!

Cartoon from our paper

2008-04-19T06:07:00.002-05:00

2008-04-17T12:15:00.001-05:00

John McCain and the New GI Bill

2008-04-17T11:41:00.002-05:00

Having built his own career on his service and suffering in Vietnam, he surely must be aware that the new generation of vets receives nothing like the assistance made available to those who served with him in Viet Nam or in Korea or in World War II -- because the landmark bill (pushed by progressive liberals by the way) has not been updated for many years. The current level of benefits doesn't cover even half the cost of state college tuition for most soldiers. The original bill included full college tuition, books and spending money as well as no down payment, low interest house loans.

Sens. James Webb of Virginia and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska wrote the Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act, whose cost is estimated at less than $4 billion, or approximately one-tenth of 1 percent in the total expense of the current war. They have gathered 53 co-sponsors, including nine Republicans and three of the four other Vietnam veterans in the Senate, but they need 60 to defeat a likely filibuster by conservatives who've never served.
Incredibly, McCain has so far refused to add his name to the sponsors. His excuse is he has not had any time to read the bill during the past year or so. He has time to glorify his contributions as a member of the "Greatest Generation" but, he has no time for today's soldiers. He has no time to insure that they have the same benefits he had when he returned from Viet Nam. McCain called Obama an elitist for his comments last week about rural Americans and their gun and church. If anyone knows the meaning of elitist surely it's John McCain.

Barney Fife in Iraq.....

2008-04-17T07:39:00.002-05:00

I can't help it, but I keep picturing my boys as Barney Fife in Iraq. They continue their paid vacation in the big sandbox awaiting word on departure. All mission equipment has already been turned in including ammunition for their weapons. They still have their weapons, still have to have their weapons with them at all times - they just don't have any ammo. I have this picture of Barney fumbling in his pocket for his bullet and trying to get his gun loaded. I talked to Eli this morning. He said he tried to take some pictures of the inside of their tent this morning because it looks like it snowed during the night. They had another huge sand storm last night and continuing into today. The sand and dust finds it's way into the tents and coats everything. It may be a paid vacation, but it's at the Bate's Motel!

Email from Seth...Pics from Eli!

2008-04-15T09:59:00.003-05:00

Two pictures from Eli. The top picture is a sandstorm at Al Asad. Seth and Eli's tent is the second one on the left side of the picture. The second picture is out on the small arms firing range on base...Seth and Eli helped run the M-4/M-9 qualification range three days in a row and this was their crew. The following is an email from Seth:

Dear Family and Friends,

I hope this email finds you all doing well and having a great week. Things here are going well, we are just waiting for the word to fly. We recently celebrated over a month in tents. The tents were never comfortable, but at first they were welcome. They signified the beginning of the end, the last stage before leaving Iraq. However as the weeks have passed the tents have become more and more disliked. They are an oven during the day, and with over thirty smelly guys living together in close proximity, the heat is the least of our worries. Not only has the heat and stench drastically increased from a month ago, but we have been having problems with mice in our tents. One soldier went through his rucksack the other day to organize his clothes, and to his surprise he found a mouse in the bottom of his rucksack along with many signs that the mouse had been there for some time. We still find it hard to complain since we are so close to getting out of here, and we know that people have it much worse. But the tents are slowly starting to wear on us and our patience.

We don't spend our days sleeping in, because as soon as the sun starts to come up the canvas tent starts heating up. However we have found creative ways to fight boredom over here. Instead of spending half an hour at the chow hall we spend over an hour. We sit and talk, make sure to eat plenty of ice cream and enjoy each others company. We spend a lot of time in the air conditioned MWR rooms watching movies, reading books, playing ping pong, and just hanging out. As the sun goes down and the temperature starts to cool off everyone slowly migrates back to the tents. In the evening the tents are illuminated from the glow of numerous laptops. I shower every evening to rinse off the days dust and sweat, and then get into bed looking forward to another day, and another day off the final count. The only problem is, with the delays of soldiers getting out of country, no one is exactly sure what the count is. I sleep good with the knowledge that I am a day closer, whenever that day is ,

Take care and have a great rest of your week,

Lots of Love and Peace from the Middle East,
Seth

Hold the presses....John McCain detests War!

2008-04-14T08:16:00.004-05:00

During a campaign stop in Jacksonville, Florida, John McCain spent some time talking about war. He said, "I detest war. It might not be the worst thing to befall human beings, but it is wretched beyond all description. Only a fool or a fraud sentamentalizes the merciless reality of war." Good to know that McCain detests war, because at other times he sounds like he's very much in favor! Take his answer to a question about supporting Bush when he said we may have troops in Iraq for 50 years....."Make it a hundred...That would be fine with me." Or his now famous attempt at humor: "You know that old Beach Boys song, Bomb Iran? Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran." Or how about his statement when he appeared on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart: "I had something picked out for you, too - a little IED (improvised explosive device) to put on your desk." Who makes fun of IED's when our soldiers are being blown to pieces? So the question is: Is McCain a fool or a fraud?

The war touches Fairmont Drive

2008-04-13T10:42:00.002-05:00

Nineteen American Soldiers won't return home after last week's events in Iraq. While Bush and Bush wanna-be John McCain talk about the success of the surge and staying the course in Iraq, nineteen soldiers were killed last week. That week now becomes the deadliest of 2008 for our soldiers. Our across the street neighbor stopped by this morning to tell us that her nephew was killed last week in Iraq. Like Seth, he married last year before heading overseas. Another life lost, another family devastated, a young bride left to wonder about a future that will never be fulfilled.

A blog comment from LTC John Epperly

2008-04-13T10:29:00.004-05:00

The following is a comment that was left on a blog entry. I appreciate LTC Epperly's comments and send my appreciation to him for a job well done! I know how I've worried about my boys - he's had the duty of worrying about 810 boys. I'm sorry I won't get to shake his hand at the homecoming but I offer him my public, heartfelt thanks.

My name is LTC John Epperly and I am your sons' battalion commander. Several of my Soldiers have blogs that I read when I can to see how things are going for my Soldiers. It’s a great window in daily reality. As you put your blog to bed, please know that I have truly enjoyed reading it. You have given our Nation and Commonwealth two very fine young men. Thank You for your sacrifice in these past months. I know the worry you must have felt. I have two sons myself. I’ve worried over all 810 of my troops for many months and by God's providence we'll ALL be returning home soon. I'll miss you at their homecoming in Woodstock as I still must bring out the last of our companies a couple weeks later. But, I wanted to thank you for your support. May God Bless you and your family!

PS Don't look now, but there will be an airplane coming over the horizon soon...as promised.

John

April 12, 2008 2:45:00 PM EST

2008-04-13T07:07:00.002-05:00

Cue the music.................the theme music from Welcome Back Kotter....John Sebastian singing "Welcome Back:"

Welcome back, your dreams were your ticket out
Welcome back to that same old place that you laughed about
Well, the names have all changed since you hung around
But those dreams have remained and they've turned around

A swell of patriotic music - Perhaps "I'm Proud to be an American" or something equally capable of bringing tears to your eyes.

The music screeches.....remember old 45's and 33's when you didn't quite get the needle lifted cleanly..............and then

The Foundations singing:
Why do you build me up, Buttercup, baby
Just to let me down and mess me around
And then worst of all you never call, baby
When you say you will, but I love you still
I need you more than anyone darling
You know that I have from the start
So build me up, Buttercup, don't break my heart

Break our hearts they did! We learned early on during basic training that the Army likes to mess with you. We developed a saying: Nothing is definite until it's over! The Army strikes again. The countdown on my computer says "Bye, Bye Iraq!...Today is the Day!" I have to reset the counter because the Army says Today isn't the Day. Seth and Eli's departure has been delayed by a week. They had their change of command ceremony, the guys were pumped and ready to leave, and "hold on there - just a minute....not yet!
Why do you build me up buttercup baby
Just to let me down and mess me around!

Putting a blog to bed

2008-04-11T07:51:00.001-05:00

I started blogging in October 2004. My blog was titled "American Soldier" and it chronicled my son's experiences while serving in the War on Terror in Afghanistan. Seth and Eli joined the Virginia National Guard in the spring of 2003 - their senior year in high school. Their motivation? A surge of patriotism after 9/11, a firm conviction that giving back to their community was a good thing, a blief in the commercials that you can be a weekend warrior while helping your community, state and nation in times of need. The commercials show citizen/soldiers fighting forest fires, assisting during floods and huricanes. Cool stuff for an 18 year old boy. I still remember my wife telling the boys that, bottom line, you need to be prepared to fight a war. The recruiter countered that the Virginia National Guard hadn't been deployed outside the state of Virginia since World War II. The boys joined against the wishes of their mother, but I have to admit I was proud of their decision.
Long story, short....Seth and Eli enjoyed one semester of college before heading off for basic training - Seth in Infantry and Eli to be a combat medic. Seth returned from basic training in June of 2004 and by September was on his way to Fort Bragg to prepare for deployment to Afghanistan with the 3-116th Infantry of the National Guard. My blog was born - therapy for the soul. When Seth returned from Afghanistan I thought my blogging days were over, but in the spring of 2007 word came that both Seth and Eli would be deploying to Iraq...the blog was revived under the new name, "American Soldiers."
The boys have less than 48 left in Iraq. They will depart sometime this weekend, spend a couple of days in Kuwait then about a week in Mississippi before returning to Woodstock and home. I'll put my blog to bed....hopefully for good. But the question nagging me now is what to do with my blog? It represents a part of the Lovell family history. Can it stay on the internet forever? My oldest son, Joshua, printed out all the pages when Seth returned from Afghanistan and put them in a nice binder - a kind of keepsake for Seth. I tried my hand at self-publishing this past Christmas when I published some of my father-in-laws art into a hard-covered book using a web site called "Blurb." With little effort I turned out a beautiful 40 page book of his art called "A man, a pencil and a piece of paper." Blurb can automatically turn your blog into a book....the problem....my blog would need a 400 page book and would be prohibitively expensive. You can see my problem. As I continue to update my blog covering the return of the 3-116th to Woodstock I'll be thinking about how to put my blog to bed. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Email from Eli

2008-04-07T20:09:00.005-05:00

We've had some boring days and some busy days lately...today was one of the boring ones. Seth and I just found out that we could bring our personal laptops to the MWR computer room, so I thought I would make the trek and send you some pictures. Yesterday, Sunday, Seth and I went with a group from our Company to visit a part of the base that, according to myth, was a location mentioned in the bible. The place is called "Abraham's Oasis" and there is a plaque there that gives a history of the area and of Al Asad Air Base. The inscription on the plaque is written in both English and Arabic, and a section of it reads, "According to Arab legend, Abraham, the patriarch of the Hebrew Bible, the Qur'an, and other Islamic writings visited the Oasis at Al Asad on his journey from Ur to Haran (Gen 11:31; Stories of the prophets...) According to legend he stopped at the oasis, drank from its water, and bathed himself. He and his family camped here for a short time before moving on to Haran."
There is a lot more, but I was typing all that while reading it off of some pictures I took of the plaque, and that was getting tiring. It was a cool experience and fun to get some of the history of the base. The base was built in 1985 by Yugoslavian contractors. We also got to see some of the old base and the bobmed barracks and Iraqi fighter jets. I took pictures, but this e-mail can only fit two pics on it. We also hiked around the area of the Oasis, which is full of a variety of date trees, which resemble palm trees. The other thing we walked to was a mass grave, erected for civillians and military during the Iran/Iraq conflict. We spent about two hours on this tour and then went to the Gospel service on base...a service that is very stereotypical gospel, lots of yelling "can I get a witness?" and "can I get an amen?" and very upbeat music. Seth and I love it! We then enjoyed some pizza at pizza hut and spent the evening getting some things together for our platoon party on Tuesday, which we have the Chuville MWR rented for.

It won't be long now until we are home, and it is hard to believe. The end is in sight, and it seems close, but at the same time it still seems far away. Its been over a year now since this deployment became a big distraction to our lives, and we've been gone for close to 10 months now, so what little time we have left when considering all that seems like no time at all. Seth and I are both glad we had this experience and proud of the fact we served our country, but boy oh boy are we ready to get this behind us and be with our family! We always joke that we make good soldiers, but we make even better civillians. I hope you all are doing well and we will see you soon!
Love you all!
Eli

No News is Good News!

2008-04-06T07:50:00.002-05:00

Everything you read about blogging and maintaining your own web page tells you to update regularly.....after all, who wants to read the same thing over and over....beware! - you'll lose traffic if you don't continually post new content! As far as I'm concerned, no new content is a good thing. I honestly have nothing to post about other than the fact the the countdown on my computer is progressing in a good, efficient manner. Seth and Eli are spending their last days in Iraq and by next weekend will be on their way home. The question I've been asked by many is "Will they have to go back." My answer - "I don't know." I'll pray that they don't and I'll pray for an end to this war because I grieve every time a soldier leaves his family and heads off to war. I read the other day that we now have soldiers who have spent more time in a war zone than soldiers did during World War II. I also read in our local paper that for the first time since polling began to ask this question, over 80% of Americans think this country is headed in the wrong direction. Unfortunately, those responding were more concerned about high gas prices than the war. The war has begun to take a back seat to other, more pressing concerns. That thought makes me one of the 80% who think we're headed in the wrong direction.

Happy Days are almost here!

2008-03-30T18:09:00.003-05:00

On Saturday we learned that Seth was "off missions" meaning no more trips outside the wire. Today we learned that Eli has also been pulled "off missions." Eli had been scheduled for a trip on Monday, but he called Katy with the news today that he was done! Seth and Eli won't be leaving Al Asad Air Base until they board a plane bound for the U. S. of A! The only enemy they'll be fighting is boredom.....an enemy I'm comfortable with. When we got the news today about Eli, Jan and I were sitting in the den taking care of bills and school work. The relief was such a physical feeling that the tears flow easily and quickly. I can only imagine how it will feel to have them back on U.S. soil and then in our arms.

Draft beer, not people

2008-03-28T07:41:00.003-05:00

That quote, "Draft Beer, Not People," has been attributed to Bob Dylan. I guess he was an anti-war hippie. What does he know about war. Where are the words about war from the people who know war intimately?

What a cruel thing is war: to separate and destroy families and friends, and mar the purest joys and happiness God has granted us in this world; to fill our hearts with hatred instead of love for our neighbors, and to devastate the fair face of this beautiful world. ~Robert E. Lee, letter to his wife, 1864

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron. ~Dwight D. Eisenhower, speech, American Society of Newspaper Editors, 16 April 1953

If we let people see that kind of thing, there would never again be any war. ~Pentagon official explaining why the U.S. military censored graphic footage from the Gulf War

The basic problems facing the world today are not susceptible to a military solution. ~John F. Kennedy

Anyone who has ever looked into the glazed eyes of a soldier dying on the battlefield will think hard before starting a war. ~Otto Von Bismark

It still amazes me to hear people talk about "winning the war." Just this morning in our local paper a reader was commenting that the war had to be won or "They" will be on our doorsteps. He claims that someone smarter than you or I may have had information we're not privy to and that the war is justified. I guess he's talking about George and his band of war mongering friends. The war must be won! I don't think I'm alone in thinking that this war won't be won with military might. Every bullet we fire creates more terrorists.....winning this war in the conventional sense won't happen.......

Give me the money that has been spent in war and I will clothe every man, woman, and child in an attire of which kings and queens will be proud. I will build a schoolhouse in every valley over the whole earth. I will crown every hillside with a place of worship consecrated to peace. ~Charles Sumner

Education News

2008-03-27T16:21:00.010-05:00

We spoke with Seth and Eli this morning...two different phone calls. They are finally back at Al Asad after a two day delay returning due to sand storms. We've heard this story before, but this will probably be their last trip outside the wire (except for maybe a short day trip or two.)......This all falls under the category of "I'll believe it when I see it!" Whatever the plans, I know that they will soon be leaving Iraq and returning home.
I would like to believe that Seth's letter writing campaign had the desired affect with the National Guard's educational reimbursement policy. Whatever the reason, House Bill 524 passed this year's legislature. I don't begin to understand everything it says, but here it is.....I've highlighted some of the important parts:

Any person who (i) is a member of the National Guard of the Commonwealth of Virginia and has a minimum remaining obligation of two years, (ii) has satisfactorily completed required initial active duty service, (iii) is satisfactorily performing duty in accordance with regulations of the National Guard, and (iv) is enrolled in any state institution of higher education, any private, accredited and nonprofit institution of higher education in the Commonwealth whose primary purpose is to provide collegiate or graduate education and not to provide religious training or theological education, any course or program offered by any such institution or any public career and technical education school shall be eligible for a grant in the amount of the difference between the full cost of tuition and any other educational benefits for which he is eligible as a member of the National Guard. Application for a grant shall be made to the Department of Military Affairs. Grants shall be awarded from funds available for the purpose by such Department.

Notwithstanding the foregoing requirement that a member of the National Guard have a minimum of two years remaining on their service obligation, at the discretion of the Adjutant General, if a member is activated or deployed for federal military service or state active duty, an additional day may be added to the member’s eligibility for the grant for each day of active federal service or state active duty.

This last part is the important part......Now I don't know what it means that it says "at the discretion of the Adjutant General:, but at least we're seeing some movement toward something that is fair and honorable for those soldiers who have given of their time in this war. They should not be penalized for serving their country!

Anna Quindlen's commentary in NEWSWEEK Magazine

2008-03-25T19:40:00.000-05:00

Because It’s Right
It's hard to serve your country in Baghdad or Kabul. It shouldn't be hard to pay for college once you've come back home.
Anna Quindlen
NEWSWEEK
Updated: 12:43 PM ET Mar 22, 2008

James Webb, the Vietnam Vet and senator from Virginia who was once secretary of the Navy, likes to share the chart he prepared for five of his Senate colleagues. They are men who fought in World War II and afterward went to college and even law school on the American taxpayer, a free ride in exchange for their service. Webb's chart quantifies how much of their education costs would have been covered if they had served in Iraq orAfghanistan. Not even close.

In 1944 President Roosevelt signed the Servicemen's Readjustment Act, commonly known as the GI Bill. It was one of the most visionary and transformative pieces of legislation in American history, providing free education for returning veterans. Its champions believed it was the moral response to the sacrifice those service members had made, but it also solved an economic and social problem. An influx of millions of unemployed and untrained men into the labor force could have triggered another Great Depression. But with 5 million of those soldiers becoming students instead, the result was the ascendancy of the middle class and a period of enormous prosperity. Every dollar spent on the GI Bill was multiplied many times over in benefits to the postwar U.S. economy.

But government institutions are notoriously amnesiac. College costs have escalated, and benefits have shrunk. Service members are surprised to discover that the grateful nation that made it possible for Sen. John Warner to go to both college and law school and Sen. Frank Lautenberg to graduate from an Ivy League university won't even cover three years at a public institution, much less a private college. Members of the National Guard and Reserves, who have been a linchpin of the current conflicts, receive only a fraction of that help.

"Watch the commercials," says Paul Rieckhoff, founder and executive director of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. "It looks as though you're going to be able to go wherever you want. People ask all the time, 'Don't you all go to school for free?' "

The answer is no, but Senator Webb is the author of legislation that would help change that. His revamped GI Bill would cover the full cost of the most expensive public institution in any given state; World War II vets like Lautenberg and Warner are enthusiastic supporters, as are dozens of other senators. (Oddly enough, Webb has not been able to get John McCain, who received the ultimate taxpayer-funded education at the Naval Academy, to take a position on the bill.) The source of the opposition is shocking: the Department of Defense, whose leaders argue that offering enhanced educational opportunities to soldiers would hurt retention. Military brass apparently tremble at the notion that multiple deployments, starvation wages and inadequate medical care might not be enough to hold on to their people.

Of course, this is the military brass who have had to lower age and ability standards despite spending billions to try to entice young men and women to join up. It does not seem to have occurred to them that a better long-range plan would be to offer true educational incentives so that more focused and ambitious people would enlist. Webb says, "This will expand the recruiting base because you could approach smart people just finishing high school, who are worried about paying for college, and say, 'If you serve your country you'll get a first-class education'."

Because of the DoD opposition, Webb has had a hard time prying loose estimates of how much these expanded benefits will cost, but at this point he thinks the figure is about $2 billion. That's half what is spent annually on recruitment and the cost of only a couple of days' worth of war in Iraq. But, more important, Rieckhoff says it's one of those costs he suspects the American people would support happily. "If the president stood up tomorrow and said, 'I need $2 billion to send vets to college,' people would be doing bake sales and carwashes across America," he says. "They can find that kind of money in the seat cushions on Capitol Hill."

The original GI Bill set the standard for innovative and audacious legislation. It was right in both senses of that word: the sensible thing to do, and the moral thing as well. And it helped expunge the shameful treatment of World War I veterans, many of whom had found themselves unemployed and destitute. The Department of Defense says it's a different era now, with a war that drags on and a volunteer Army, than it was when the GI Bill was first signed. But it's the same era, too. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that unemployment among young veterans is three times the national average. Already some Iraq vets are homeless and have substance-abuse problems.

Offering these men and women a college education is the least we can do. It's not free; they've already paid, in Fallujah and Kabul. If Congress wants an economic-stimulus package, this is a great one. A Topeka, Kans., lawyer and national commander of the American Legion, Harry Colmery, was the architect of the original GI Bill. He asked a question that is as resonant today as it was then: "If we can spend 200 to 300 billion dollars to teach our men and women to kill, why quibble over a billion or so to help them to have the opportunity to earn economic independence and to enjoy the fruits of freedom?"

2008-03-25T10:31:00.002-05:00

Another Holiday without the boys....

2008-03-24T07:07:00.005-05:00

The girls are paying the price for Jan never having the opportunity to dress anything but boys! Matching outfits for Easter. Luckily they live in three different states. Today the counter on my computer says twenty days to go until Seth and Eli leave Iraq and we hopefully celebrated our last holiday without a complete family.

George's Alternate Universe

2008-03-24T06:55:00.003-05:00

This comes courtesy of my father-in-law and the Hightower Lowdown, a monthly newsletter edited by Jim Hightower. This picture hangs in the oval office and is a personal favorite of Georges. In his world, it epitomizes his courageous political views and he probably sees himself as the cowboy, charging up the hill leading his men to victory! According to Hightower, he has also described the horseman as a circuit riding minister rushing ahead to spread the word of Christianity. Visitors are left without a doubt that George sees himself in this picture.
He might be right! This painting originally appeared in the Saturday Evening Post as an illustration for a short story, "The Slipper Tongue" about a slick-tongued horse thief. This work doesn't show a courageous leader, or someone spreading the Gospel....it shows a horse thief running from justice. Yep, that's George!

A call to action.....

2008-03-19T08:54:00.002-05:00

Please scroll down to my previous post about a "Moral Obligation." Read the comments. I've recently started reading Sojourner Magazine....a Christian advocacy magaizine. I found the article that I reprinted in my post about our obligation to provide care and support for injured soldiers. The story told about Wendell McLeod, a soldier who suffered TBI. Wendell's wife, Annette, left a comment about their family. There are faces behind every story and I've just had the honor of seeing the faces behind this story.
My challenge to every person who reads this blog is to copy the Sojourners article and send it to your representative in Congress. Don't know who your representative is? Click here to be directed to a web page to find that information. Our soldiers deserve more than empty words....let's give our Congress a call to action. It won't take long and they deserve that little bit of time!

Another Anniversary

2008-03-19T08:23:00.003-05:00

Today marks the fifth anniversary of a war that has cost over 500 billion dollars so far and almost 4,000 American soldiers. This doesn't count the cost in injured soldiers and dead and injured Iraqi civilians.
Taxpayers in Virginia have paid $12.4 billion for the cost of the Iraq War through 2007. For the same amount of money, the following could have been provided:
3,459,079 People provided with full Health Care OR
10,196,455 Homes built with Renewable Electricity OR
263,819 new Police Officers OR
186,783 Music and Arts Teachers OR
1,537,441 full Scholarships for University Students OR
772 New Elementary Schools OR
6,226,450 Children provided with Health Care OR
1,722,920 Head Start Places for Children OR
179,848 Elementary School Teachers OR
195,233 Port Container Inspectors

It's easy to quanify some costs. But other costs can't be quanified. What about the emotional toll on children and families when their loved ones don't come home, or come home with traumatic injuries? What about the stress of multiple deployments?
What about the loss of our moral leadership in the world when we have a president who condones torture? What about the loss of our privacy as we give the NSA access to our emails, cell phone conversations and other areas of our lives? What about the cost of living in fear as we listen to the fear-mongering of our leaders? How do we quanify those costs and so many others? What about the stress that families live with? I could go on and on......
Has it been worth the cost? I honestly don't think so.......do you?

By the way...for my readers in other selected states:
Massachusetts has contributed 14.8 billion
Texas 42.7 billion
Pennsylvania 9.9 billion
California 66.2 billion
New Jersey 23.9 billion

If you're interested in learning more about our spending on the war and what we could have for the same amount, visit The National Priorities Project

A moral obligation....

2008-03-17T09:33:00.003-05:00

I spoke to Eli this morning. He was calling from Baghdad. He and Seth had just completed a little shopping at a local bazar and were now taking the opportunity to make a few phone calls. They don't know when they will depart Baghdad for the return to Al Asad. I asked Eli if they had a chance to see Dick Cheney or John McCain who are both in Baghdad....John expressly says this is not a campaign trip..just a fact finding trip. I think that's wonderful. Maybe he'll actually find some facts to convince him that Little George's war was wrong at the start and is still wrong! One thing for sure, he probably won't repeat his gaffe about Baghdad being a safe place for a stroll (unless you're surrounded by a hundred marines and have helocopters providing ground support!
Since there's not much news I thought I would reprint an article from Soujourners Magazine:
Leading an Army infantry platoon in Baghdad for a year, I was awed by the young men and women serving there. Their dedication to one another, and to their ideals of service, was extraordinary. But when I came home, I was struck by how disconnected many Americans seemed from what troops were encountering in the war zone and the issues they faced when they returned to the United States. I was infuriated to see veterans struggling every day to get the medical care they need, to overcome bureaucratic red tape, and to transition to civilian life.

Caring for millions of combat veterans and their families will be one of America’s greatest challenges in a generation, but throughout the history of this country, people of faith have responded to crisis with love, compassion, and determination. For a country starkly polarized by this war, the church is one place where we can come together and pledge to love those who fought in it.

One of the wounded is my friend Army Spc. Wendell McLeod. McLeod’s head and back were badly injured when he was serving near the Iraqi border in Kuwait in 2005. McLeod was a sharp, jovial man from South Carolina who took great pride in his strength and independence. As a result of his injuries, however, his memory and mood have changed dramatically—and so has his life. He can no longer perform even simple tasks, such as brushing his teeth, unaided. His incredibly compassionate and dedicated wife, Annette, has said, “Now I’m married to a man I no longer know.” McLeod’s horrific experience has extended far beyond his physical wounds. At Walter Reed Army Medical Center, his injury was misdiagnosed; it took a year and a congressional investigation to get him the help he needed.

IT TURNED OUT that McLeod had a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), often called the signature injury of the Iraq war. TBI has affected hundreds of thousands of troops and is what ABC News anchor Bob Woodruff suffered when he was hit by a roadside bomb while reporting in Iraq in January 2006. The malady is caused when roadside bombs or mortar explosions cause a person’s brain to hit the inside of the skull. This impact can lead to emotional problems, vision or hearing difficulties, memory loss, and—in the most severe cases—brain damage. TBI is invisible and often goes undiagnosed and untreated.

Many troops are also suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). They are exposed in this war to terrifying things that take a terrible toll. At least one-third of Iraq veterans will face PTSD or another mental health problem. If left untreated, the mental health effects of combat can lead to unemployment, drug abuse, domestic violence, homelessness, and even suicide.

Veterans’ families also suffer and, in many cases, are being torn apart. A high percentage of married U.S. troops in Iraq say their marriages are headed toward divorce; 2,200 U.S. children have lost a parent in Afghanistan or Iraq. New studies suggest that deployments have also led to a dramatic increase in the rates of child abuse in military families.

Americans can open their hearts, open their homes, and lend a hand. We can support this new generation of veterans by volunteering our time, donating money, or reaching out to a local military family in need. Offering to baby-sit for children in a family where a parent is deployed, or shoveling snow in a wounded veteran’s driveway, can make a big difference to a family under great strain.

Our country’s newest generation of veterans needs our help and compassion, and it is up to each of us to provide that. Democrat or Republican, young or old, it doesn’t matter whether you’re for or against the war. We all have a moral obligation to care for the troops who fought in it.

Email from Eli

2008-03-14T06:34:00.004-05:00

The desktop on my computer has a counter that says "Bye Bye Iraq." It has been counting down the days until April 13 and today it says 30 days! When we got out of bed this morning it was 1:00 PM in Iraq and I knew that Seth and Eli were spending their last day in their room, were probably busy packing and cleaning and getting ready to send some of their gear home. Tomorrow evening they'll be in transitional housing, living in a tent. Last September I worried about how we would survive this deployment. I worried about Katy and Brittany and thought how unfair it is to ask these young brides to deal with something of this magnitude. As the days grow shorter I don't find that I'm worrying any less. I think it's more like holding my breath...waiting and hoping that the next 30 days will pass and Seth and Eli and all the Virginia boys will be back home with their loved ones.

Here's an email from Eli that arrived this morning:
Dear Family and Friends,
I have meant several times to sit down and write another group e-mail, and since I will lose my Internet tomorrow as we move into tents, I thought now was an appropriate time to finally write. Today we will take two duffel bags and a foot locker down to our motor pool to be loaded up into a connex to be shipped home. We're sending off gear we don't need any longer and personal items. Next week we will have to drag all of our stuff back out of the connexes, empty everything on the ground so customs officials can make sure we aren't planning on taking home anything we're not supposed to, and then we will load everything back up. For the next four weeks we will live in a tent with 40 other guys and sleep on cots. We have to pack in a ruck sack and an assault pack (one big bag, one medium sized bag) and live out of just that for the remainder of our time. All this sounds like a giant sized pain in the butt, which it is, but it is also wonderful because it signifies the end is in sight.
Here soon Seth and I will be leaving on a convoy mission to Baghdad, and we've got flags we are going to fly from the ASVs (Seth's flag is the one he carried with him in Afghanistan). That has become the big thing over here, flying American flags while out on missions. Seth and I are also going to go to Saddam's palace while in Baghdad. Seth has not been yet and I have only walked around the outside. We're going to see if we can get inside the palace this time.The palace houses top US military personnel and officials, and you have to find a sponsor to take you inside the palace, so we'll be doing some sweet talking. The last time I was at the palace we walked around with some Australian soldiers and got some pictures taken with them.
One quick story from our last mission. We were out for 8 days and spent over 60 hours on the road...but it didn't need to be that long. We left TQ to drive the 10 hours to CKV, and after four hours on the road the HET crew we were transporting lost some major points in our book. On a security halt to take care of personal business and check loads the HET commander came to our commander, the convoy commander, and informed them that one of his soldiers left his weapon at TQ. That is a big deal over here! We waited on word from Battalion as to what they wanted us to do, and they told us to turn around to retrieve it. So we did. However, on our way back to TQ we ran into a sand storm and had to change our course and go to Ramadi. The storm did not let up and so we were forced to stay there in a tent with no heat that felt like a fridge. Some people actually chose to go sleep in their vehicles so they could at least turn the heat on.
The next morning Seth and I were woken up at 5am to take a four gun truck element from Ramadi to TQ to retrieve the soldier's weapon. We took just four of our gun trucks so we could move at top speed through the desert. We were able to go about 55-65 mph and made great time. We joked around that this was like a modern day Saving Private Ryan...taking a group of soldiers away from their assigned mission to go on a questionable mission because of one soldier. Not exactly the same situation, but you can see the similarities.
I hope you all are doing well and are ready for Spring to arrive. We bypassed that season over here and jumped right into Summer. We have already had days in the 90s! The picture I enclosed is just one I like a lot. It is of two of our gun trucks going through a town called Little Baghdadi on Al Asad road...which is right outside our base. The second vehicle is our third gun truck, which is where I ride. Seth and I will be out of touch until we get home, but might have the chance to go to an Internet lab and write a time or two. Take care and thanks for the continued letters and support.
Love,

From the Virginia National Guard Web Site

2008-03-12T12:16:00.002-05:00

Combat medics in Iraq ready when needed

By 2nd Lt. David E. Leiva
3rd Battalion 116th Infantry

AL ASAD AIR BASE, Iraq — The minute the roadside bomb exploded, Spc. Eli Lovell’s heart pounded.

Palms sweaty and the adrenaline rushing, the convoy commander ordered Lovell out of the vehicle to evaluate the possible casualties after they failed to respond to repeated radio calls asking for their status.

There was another danger: The possibility of a secondary Improvised Explosive Device placed for first-responders.

Sprinting in the pitch dark along Baghdad’s most treacherous strip, Lovell and the commander came across the vehicle that had been struck.

They each opened one of the vehicle’s doors and stared at the two Soldiers, sitting there motionless, not responding to any questions being asked.

“Are you okay?” Lovell recalled asking them.

“I thought they were temporarily deaf from the explosion,” he said.

They were fine, although their lives had been disrupted by an IED planted by insurgents who intended to harm the Soldiers, not their vehicle.

That night, there was only one bomb.

So goes the life of a combat medic, affectionately referred to as “Doc” because he is the closest thing to a medical doctor out in desolate areas. Issued a 9mm handgun that he is not really expected to use, the medic accompanies each convoy in hopes his skills won’t be needed either.

In Bravo Company 3rd Battalion 116th Infantry, tasked with providing convoy security throughout western Iraq, the medics have logged more hours and miles on the road than any other Soldier.

Even after a two-week leave in January, Spc. Scott Dalrymple of Blacksburg, Va., has the most missions under his belt in the company. In seven years as a National Guardsman, this is his first deployment.

While confident in his abilities, Dalrymple can’t help but be candid. He admits the stress of being the sole person responsible for trauma care can take a toll.

“My worst fear is that somebody dies, and I can’t do anything about it,” he said.

So far, he’s only had to hand out band aids and aspirin.

Sgt. Samuel Anthony, 24, is fine with that. Anthony is Bravo’s senior medic on his second deployment to Iraq. He is still haunted by his first trip, where he worked on a Soldier who was hit by shrapnel during a mortar attack while eating dinner.

Anthony was at the gym when it occurred, and Soldiers rushed in and asked if any medics were available. For 10 minutes, he tried everything, including a tracheomety, a hole cut into her throat to help her breathe. She died on the scene.

“I always wondered if I had gone to chow that night instead of working out what might have happened,” Anthony said. “What if I had been there?”

Along with handling the unit’s medical administrative duties, he ensures Soldiers and medics will have every supply necessary, even if it means ordering more than required.

With only four military-trained medics in the company, Capt. Jeff Sink, Bravo’s commanding officer, ordered each Soldier to receive 40 hours of Combat Life Savers training, the Army’s answer to the medic shortage. Infantry units typically have only one medic.

This preparation, most of which was done at the mobilization site at Camp Shelby, Miss., ranges from starting an IV and splinting a fracture to performing CPR and helping Soldiers breathe through a tube.

Army officials began pushing this type of training last year at the service’s five basic training posts with the hope of reaching 180,000 Soldiers annually. The premise is that the first hour is the most crucial, and some focused life-saving training can keep the number of fatalities down.

According to the Defense Department, as of mid-February, there had been nearly 30,000 Soldiers wounded in Iraq. More than half have returned to duty.

Still, it’s a sobering figure. But the numbers, in many cases, could easily be Soldiers killed had it not been for expedient medical training.

“The most critical 10 minutes in a Soldier’s care in combat is the first 10 minutes. We’ve focused on the skills that would give us the greatest opportunity to evacuate an individual to a higher degree of health care,” said Col. Kevin Shwedo in an interview with The Associated Press last year.

Shwedo served as director of operations, plans and training for the Army Accessions Command, which oversees training.

Taking a page from Plato’s “The Republic,” necessity has proven to be the mother of invention at Al Asad. Through an arrangement made by Sink with leaders of a battalion from the 82nd Airborne Division, Bravo Soldiers who could not complete the course in Mississippi have been sitting through three intensive days of CLS.

Terms like “thinking outside the box” and “use all of your resources” forced Bravo leaders to also look within its ranks for Soldiers with civilian medical skills. Spc. Michael Kidd of Danville, Va., was one of the finds.

Insightful enough to bring some personal medical equipment on the deployment, the husky 33-year-old still figured he would be lugging around his M4 rifle because the military trained him to be an infantryman.

Instead, he is using his civilian skills as a nationally-certified paramedic, three levels higher than his military counterparts. At home Kidd works in an emergency room, where he has treated burn victims and revived people who have had heart attacks by performing CPR.

“I take pride in that my squad leader trusts me,” said Kidd, whose affinity for science started in grade school.

He has completed prerequisites to become a physician’s assistant. When he returns home, he hopes to be accepted at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine in Richmond.

Cases like Kidd are unusual. But the bond between Soldier and medic mends into lifelong friendships.

Pfc. Stephen Conner, 22, works as a medic at Fort Pickett, Va., the state’s National Guard headquarters. Conner, of Staunton, Va., is enjoying many firsts, including his first deployment and the recent birth of his first child.

During convoy missions, he usually sits comfortably in the back of the combat vehicle listening through headphones to the chatter going on inside the vehicle and within the convoy.

All the while, waiting for that moment when he is thrust into his role.

So far, he’s among the top three busiest Soldiers, but he couldn’t describe what much of the road looks like.

Instead he is forced to rely on his “faith” in the drivers. They don’t mind reminding him he has the least amount of responsibility on the mission.

Conner, gregarious in nature and the subject of constant joshing, bites back.

“Infantry doesn’t really appreciate us,” he says with a chuckle, “until they need us.”

View from the Rat Vehicle

2008-03-11T10:39:00.002-05:00

During their recent mission, Eli spent some time riding in the rat vehicle. The rat vehicle travels ahead of the convoy scanning for IED's and moving vehicles out of the convoy's way. I'm not sure why the call it the "Rat Vehicle." The only thing that comes to mind is if they run into trouble they're trapped like rats in a sinking ship....far away from help!

A couple of pics from the last mission

2008-03-11T07:00:00.006-05:00

Morning email from Seth

2008-03-11T06:57:00.000-05:00

Eli and I are continuing the process of getting packed up and ready to go. Even though it is still about a month away, it is all everyone is talking about. Last night Eli and I did something that we haven't done since we first got here in September. We slept with the AC on. For the past five months we have been sleeping with the heat on, and freezing when we step outside at night. The long PT pants and PT jacket are gone, and the heater is no longer needed. While the Iraq heat is not fun, it is welcome since we know we won't be around the see the weather change again. I've decided that Iraq only has two seasons, Hot and Cold!

We had to be down at the motorpool this morning for formation. We didn't really get any new information, just all the same stuff we've been hearing. We're still scheduled to move out of tents this weekend, and send off a good bit of our equipment as well. We worked on cleaning the weapons today, and then doing some work on a truck that has been broken. We went to lunch around 1130, and are now just doing some more packing. I have a sign up on our front door advertising the TV that we are selling. I'll keep the updates coming, even though there really isn't much to report. With the end in sight there isn't a lot going on, so I've got plenty of time to be bored and write emails. I hope things back home are going well, have a great day and I'll talk to you all soon,

Back safe and sound

2008-03-09T18:07:00.002-05:00

The latest email from Iraq:

Dear Family and Friends,
I just returned from my longest trip outside the wire, and also my most stressful trip. We provided security for a transportation unit that was helping to move a company from a small forward operating base near the Syrian border, to a larger airbase in Al Taqaddum, which is close to Baghdad. During the eight days we spent over sixty hours in the vehicles, one of the days saw us in our ASVs for approximately fifteen hours. During the trip we saw a lot of the country, including a couple of trips through downtown Fallujah. I spent the majority of the trip driving, but also spent time as the gunner, and even spent a couple of trips as the truck commander. It was a tiresome trip that seemed to drag on, but it was a good experience. It was an opportunity to see some parts of the country that I haven’t seen, and spend one last extensive mission out with my squad. Our time here in Iraq is coming to a close, and the activity in our motor pool is evidence that the end is near. The unit replacing us already has soldiers on ground here, we are beginning to pack up our equipment, and by next weekend we will be moved out of our room and moved into tents. In the next week or two I will be completely pulled from running missions, and start the long process of waiting for the end. This next month will slowly crawl by, due to the fact that it is impossible not to concentrate on time. When we first arrived in Iraq the end seemed so distant, that it was nerve racking to even think about it. We just concentrated on each day, and each mission. However now that the time is so short, it is impossible not to dwell on the end. The next couple of weeks will slowly go by, and before I know it Iraq will turn into a distant memory. This is a memory that will stay with me the rest of my life, and one that I will never regret having.
While things are going quite well here in Iraq, this past week has reminded me of the distance that I have to suffer from my family. Two different events have affected the people that I love the most. As I’m sure many of you know a student from Wilson Memorial High School was tragically killed in a car accident. I did not know this student well, but the tragedy was still very upsetting. The loss of a life is never easy to swallow, but when it is someone who is young it is even harder. This event has greatly upset my Mom, and has added to the stress that she has been forced to endure throughout this year. I want so badly just to be able to give my Mom a hug, to give some relief to her sadness. It is hard not being able to get a hug from your Mom on a regular basis, it is even harder not being able to give her a hug when you know she needs one.
The bad news did not stop there. Upon my return I found out that Brittany’s grandmother (Todd’s mother) was in the hospital suffering from septic shock. Brittany was very upset by this news, and was having a hard time dealing with it without me home. This morning Brittany’s grandmother passed away. I had to talk to my wife on the phone, listen to her cry, and I had to do this with the knowledge that I was not there for her. I can’t even explain how badly I wanted to be there to give her a hug, to cry with her, to help her deal with this. Brittany was close with her grandmother, and this has not been easy on her. A deployment is tough for many reasons. Today the reason that is at the front of my mind is the fact that I am not around to give comfort to those who I love the most. In a little over a month I will be able to give my Mom and Brittany long overdue hugs.
I hope this email finds you all having a good weekend. Thank you all for the continued love and support, I will look forward to talking to you all soon, and before to long being able to see you all as well, take care,
Love and Peace from the Middle East,
Seth

2008-03-06T12:33:00.001-05:00

A student at Wilson Memorial High School died Tuesday night in a single car accident. She was in 11th grade and active in many things...softball, music, cheerleading. I had her as a middle school student and Seth and Eli graduated with her brother. Here's part of an email from Jan that she sent to Seth and Eli:

Today I spent an hour in the parking lot as students gathered around her parking spot, filling it with flowers and stuffed animals and pictures. Messages in chalk were written on the pavement. Her parents and brothers and grandparents were there. I talked with all the family members briefly. It was very sad and I’m tired before the day has even started.

The one bright spot is that Katy let us know today that she had heard from Eli so I know you guys are exhausted but okay and will hopefully be back at the base by Saturday or Sunday! On Wednesday morning as the faculty was hearing the news for the first time, many teachers said, “I need to hug my children. It hit me hard that I had no idea where two of my children were or if they even were safe so the news from Katy this morning was greatly appreciated.

I walked to the end of my hallway when I read Jan's email. I can see the WMHS parking lot from our school. As I looked at the space filled with flowers I cried for the family and for every family that has lost loved ones. During the time that I've been writing this blog I've been acutely aware of loss and grieving. It's time for Seth and Eli to come home.....if just for a hug.

Waiting patiently.......NOT!

2008-03-05T20:05:00.003-05:00

At this point the boys have been outside the wire for about six days. The anticipated length of their mission was never exactly nailed down, so we don't really know what we're waiting for. The only thing I think I know for sure is that they are 38 days away from leaving Iraq! It's getting harder to stay focused I think the weight drags you down a little more each day. Jan has said many times that she doesn't need the boys home as much as she just needs them on U. S. soil. I think their wives would want them home.
Seth was spending his time before this mission writing to different politicians about the problems with educational benefits for National Guard soldiers. Here's what he wrote to our local senator:

Senator Hanger,
My name is Seth Lovell, and I am a member of the Virginia Army National Guard. I am a member of B Co, 3/116th INF currently deployed to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. In 2004-2005 as a member of the same company I was deployed to Afghanistan in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. I have given up two years of my life to serve my country, and to represent my state. I have done so willingly and with great pride. The reason I am writing is to bring to your attention a great injustice that I believe is being done to our soldiers who have been deployed. Numerous soldiers like myself joined the Guard to help with the financial burden of attending college. The educational benefits that a National Guard Soldier is eligible for is the Montgomery GI Bill through the VA, Federal Tuition Assistance, and State Tuition Assistance. All three benefits help to greatly reduce the cost of college, and reward young men and women for their service to their country. I am writing because I believe there is a problem with Virginia’s current setup for State Tuition Assistance. I believe the program is flawed, as it does not take into account the frequent deployments that the National Guard has been dealing with recently. In the Code of Virginia 23-7.4:2 (b) it states that a soldier who is applying for state tuition assistance must have two years left on his contract in order to obtain funds from the state. This system is set up on the idea that Virginia National Guard soldiers are not being deployed, and have the first four years of their contract available to attend school. However in my first six years I have been deployed twice, and have missed five semesters of school due to this. Not only do I believe that there should be no requirement of two years left on one’s contract, but I believe that soldiers who are deployed should have that year forgiven, and allowed that time past their contract to obtain benefi ts. Because of my two deployments I am no longer eligible for state tuition assistance. There are many soldiers who are in a situation similar to my own. It is a shame that soldiers, who give so much, are given so little in their return. I appreciate the benefits that I receive from the government; however, I do not believe I should be penalized for my service. I believe I should have continued access to these benefits upon my return from two combat tours.

I am a strong believer in the power of politics. I have a lot of respect for you Senator Hanger, and you are the first person I have written. I would be honored if you would sponsor a bill to update Virginia’s benefit system for deployed soldiers. I would like to be involved in the process, and give any assistance that I can. I will be home from Iraq in April, and would love to speak further with you on this issue. I understand if you are not able to take this on at tlhis time, and I will seek assistance elsewhere. If you are interested in helping me with this cause please e-mail me back. Thank you very much for taking the time to read my e-mail and consider my problem, I look forward to hearing from you soon,

Sincerely,
SPC Seth Lovell

"Out of touch" can mean different things.....

2008-02-29T12:33:00.003-05:00

Seth and Eli will be out of touch for a little while. I haven't posted much to the blog recently because, quite frankly, there hasn't been much to say. It's been kind of a slow time in the sandbox, which is usually a good thing. Seth's been fighting boredom by becoming a political activist. I've written before about the problems with State Tuition assistance for Guard members. Seth's been contacting all kind of people about that issue and has received some promising replys. I'll try to post some of his letters and replys soon. The boys will be leaving Al Asad soon on an extended mission. While gone, they will be out of touch and we'll have to wait patiently for their return and word that they're okay. For Seth and Eli they will be "out of touch" for a while. George Bush seems to be permanently out of touch. Oil experts are forecasting $4 a gallon gas by this summer. When Little George was asked about this yesterday at a press conference his reply was shockingly ignorant: he hadn't heard about that! There's "out of touch" and there's "OUT OF TOUCH."

Al Daher and Seth

2008-02-22T16:07:00.003-05:00

Al Dahler writes an opinion column. His recent column is provided below as is a response Seth sent to Mr. Dahler.....Interesting reading:

McCain more like Bush daily
Al Dahler
From a progressive point of view, observing the culling of the Republican presidential primary herd has been quite entertaining.
Tom Tancredo and Duncan Hunter, the two anti-immigrant bashers, were non-starters. Fred Thompson, whose anticipatory candidacy was highly touted, went nowhere once he entered the race. Rudy Giuliani, whose utterances always converged on 9/11 and theReagan legacy, turned out to be an empty suit. Mitt Romney, the businessman, learned the bitter lesson that money does not buy love and affection from the voting public.
Three candidates are left. Ron Paul was never a contender. Tenacious Mike Huckabee continues to hope for a miracle. That leaves us with the self-declared choice of the Republican party — John McCain.
Rush Limbaugh and his cohorts are in a state of funk while President Bush has embraced McCain as the conservatives' conservative. Will the Bush endorsement prove to be visionary or vacuous? Only time will tell.
In his courtship to endear himself with the Republican party establishment, McCain is morphing into a Bush clone. He will nominate only "strict constructionist" Supreme Court justices, e.g., Roberts, Alito, Thomas and Scalia. The economically disastrous tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans will be made permanent. Health care will be left to the bureaucratic, multi-billion-dollar health insurance and pharmaceutical industries. Civil rights and civil liberties will continue to be shredded.
Hypocrisy best describes McCain's stand on health care. His and his family's health care is assured by four outstanding government-sponsored health care programs. As a military retiree, he and his family qualify for Tricare-for-Life. As a senator, he and his family are eligible for congressional health care. As a veteran, he is entitled to Veteran Administration services. And, his age makes him eligible for Medicare. While McCain and his family enjoy the largess of government-sponsored health care, he is willing to deny this privilege to ordinary Americans.
Victory in Iraq is emerging as the hallmark of the McCain campaign, yet he has never defined the substance of victory. Certainly, Secretary Gates' and General Petraeus' policies have been more successful than those of their predecessors. However, the Bush administration claimed progress in Afghanistan only to have the Taliban reemerge. Al Qaeda keeps growing stronger.
Irregular or guerrilla forces and non-government-sponsored insurgents or terrorists, when confronted with well-organized armed might, simply withdraw from the battlefield to preserve their strength and await more opportune times. Time is on their side. They have nowhere else to go, nothing else to do but wait for more favorable times to continue their struggles. Politically, there has been no cooperation or reconciliation among Iraq's factions. The age-old and well-honed hatreds persist and will continue to nullify and sabotage any peace initiatives.
Financially, the Iraq debacle defies any conception of victory. The American people have been, and continue to be, the losers. The war is costing approximately $343 million each day or two to three billion dollars each week. With an estimated expenditure of $150 billion per year, the cost is fast approaching a trillion dollars. This does not account for repairing and replacing unserviceable and destroyed equipment, or the care of the wounded and traumatized veterans, or the money wasted on homeland security to provide an illusion of safety from terrorism and mass killings. It may be well to remember that recent killing atrocities, e.g., Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois University, have been perpetrated by Americans and not Islamic terrorists.
The magnitude of this financial hemorrhage becomes staggering when considering the opportunity cost, i.e., the domestic program enhancement and initiatives that are being sacrificed, the enormous debt accumulation that will place our children and grandchildren in bondage to foreign lenders, and the lack of foreign assistance to developing nations to improve the quality of life in the global village.

Al Dahler is a retired Air Force officer and a former college prep school administrator and lay hospital chaplain

Seth's email to Mr. Dahler:
Mr. Dahler,
My name is Seth Lovell, and I am a SPC in the Virginia Army National Guard, and am currently deployed to Iraq. I read the Newsleader online daily, and always enjoy your articles. I especially enjoyed your article today concerning McCain and how his policies compare to Bush. I agree with your article, and the prospects of a McCain presidency worry me. Your point concerning the cost of the war for America is very important. The biggest issue I have though as a service member serving in Iraq is not the monetary cost, but the cost in personnel. Not only are we losing good soldiers through casualties, but also we are losing them through retention. I have been in the National Guard for four years, and this is my second deployment. I was deployed in 2004-2005 to Afghanistan with the same unit. We are working with an active duty company from the 101st, and are serving with guys who are now on their fourth tour of duty. It is America who is carrying this burden, but more specifically it is the military that is carrying the brunt of this. Military leaders claim that recruitment is up, but at what cost? We have raised the maximum age to enlist, and have continually lowered the standards. I worked in Staunton for a year as a cadre member in the regional Recruit Sustainment Program (RSP). Our job was to have enlistees who were waiting to go to basic training come to drill with us for their monthly training. We trained them in rank structure, drill and ceremony, general orders, and other basic information that would help their transition into basic training go smoother. We worked with close to one hundred kids each month. While doing this training I was able to get a first hand look at the type of recruits that were entering into the military. There were numerous kids who had very little chance at being successful in basic training, and even less of a chance at being an asset once they reached their unit. While it is disheartening to see the caliber of soldiers entering the military, it is even worse to see the soldiers that are leaving the military after just one enlistment. We are losing a number of very qualified guys, with a lot of experience. The main reason that many of these outstanding soldiers state, is the fact that they can’t keep putting their civilian lives on hold to go overseas. If we continue to maintain current troop levels in Iraq and Afghanistan as McCain claims is necessary, we will be doing a lot more than jeopardizing our nation’s economic interests. Our military can’t continue to sustain these frequent deployments. I believe that it is time to start thinking about what is in the best interest of our country, and in the best interest of its military. Thank you for taking the time to read my letter.

2008-02-21T10:01:00.004-05:00

Life is incredibly fragile. I read a quote once by Marcel Proust:
We say that the hour of death cannot be forecast, but when we say this we imagine that hour as placed in an obscure and distant future. It never occurs to us that it has any connection with the day already begun or that death could arrive this same afternoon, this afternoon which is so certain and which has every hour filled in advance.
Death has a way of sneaking up on you and the death of someone we know reminds us that we're still alive. It forces us to examine our own lives and question the purpose of our existence. Life is tragic, precisely becasue it always results in death. An untimely death tends to magnify those feelings. A friend and colleague of mine returned home yesterday to find her husband dead. He chose the hour of his death. Life was apparently burdensome and painful for him and he made the choice to persue release. Life is fragile.
I'm constantly reminded of the many blessings in my life and the love that surrounds Seth and Eli and my entire family. To my Friend and Colleague....May the lamp of love burn brightly during the time of your need.

The 3-116th Infantry Headquarters Company out of Staunton returns today from Baghdad. Welcome home! Soon we will be celebrating the ruturn of your fellow soldiers - our sons and commrades!

Red sky in morning....definitely a warning!

2008-02-19T15:11:00.002-05:00

This is NOT a bad picture......this is in the middle of a sand storm when everything turns red and it appears more like mars than any place on earth. Eli said that Seth's eyes hurt from the sand and when Eli took his shower he felt like he had been at the beach.....sand in places it shouldn't be!

Now that's a Church....sorry Seth and Eli

2008-02-19T08:37:00.002-05:00

A challenge Seth and Eli can't fulfill.....right now....
A Florida pastor has posed an unusual challenge to members of his church -- 30 days of sex for married couples and 30 days of abstaining for singles, local media reported Monday.
Head Pastor Paul Wirth of Relevant Church said Sunday the challenge is aimed at bringing couples closer together. He told his congregation that half of all marriages end in divorce.
"And that's no different for people who attend church," he said. "Sometimes life gets in the way. Our jobs get in the way."
The church has set up a blog, www.30daysexchallenge.com, for congregants to share their thoughts about the challenge.

A couple of corrections. I count on people to keep me straight on my blog. According to several people I've spoken to, the VaDF has existed for some time now. It goes through periods when it gets more attention and this appears to be one of those times. Another correction: Eli is scheduled for the mission that Seth talks about in the email below. I misunderstood and thought Eli was not scheduled for that particular mission. When they return from that trip, they will have about one week before they move into transitional housing on the base. They will vacate their housing to make way for the troops that are replacing them. The bad news: no internet or cable TV in their new quarters....the good news: they won't be in them long and they'll be headed home before we know it!

Boring is Good....an email from Seth

2008-02-19T08:32:00.000-05:00

Dear Family and Friends,
It has been awhile since I last wrote, and the truth of the matter is, there really is not much to report. As soon as I returned to Al Asad in January from my two weeks leave our squad was very busy. We made three different trips to the Syrian border, and a couple of other small trips all within a short time frame. However, after returning from a trip down south on February 13th, we have yet to be back out. We are not scheduled to go back out until some time after the 27th. Our next convoy is scheduled to be the longest I have been on, as well as the largest. We are supposed to be gone for approximately ten days, and our convoy could consist of up to one hundred vehicles. Of course with the mission still over a week away, I’m sure everything will change multiple times. I celebrated my 23rd birthday on the 11th. It was a very quiet birthday, just some pizza and a movie with Eli, but it was a memorable one as well. This was my second birthday spent in a combat zone, and hopefully it will be my last. The weather here has slowly been warming up, and before to long I’m sure we will be complaining about how hot it is. Right now it is very windy outside, and we are experiencing a very bad dust storm. Our unit is still on track to be home hopefully some time at the end of April, beginning of May. I try not to think about the time I have left, but it is hard not to. We are so close to the end, so close to being home in Virginia, that it is impossible not to stop thinking about it. Coming home to Virginia in two months will be such an incredible feeling.
Sorry I do not have more exciting news to report, but the truth is it has been pretty boring here ever since I returned from leave. As my parents always remind me, “Boring is a good thing!” I hope this e-mail finds you all doing well and having a great month. Spring is right around the corner, and with the warm weather, flowers, and all the other wonderful things that Spring brings us, it will also bring mine and Eli’s return to the states. Thank you all for your continued love and support, it has truly made this time away from home easier. Take care and I look forward to talking to you all soon,
Love and Peace from the MiddleEast,
Seth

The "New, Improved" National Guard

2008-02-15T07:32:00.005-05:00

I guess as a reaction to decreasing membership in the Guard....and the fact that they may not be here when you actually need them....Virginia is starting the Virginia Defense Force. The VaDF is an all-volunteer force allows people with prior service, and those with no service, to volunteer to serve their community in a quasi-military setting. The VaDF accepts men and women age 16 - 65 and volunteers learn military skills and serve in a military setting without the possibility of being deployed or serving in a war. Sound like National Guard Lite!

Obama wins big and we celebrate with a 2 hour delay!

2008-02-13T09:13:00.003-05:00

I did my civic duty yesterday by voting in the Virginia primary. Seth is a huge Obama fan and my vote was cast as much for Seth as it was for Obama. I have to admit, I'm not a big fan of politicians in general - Democrat or Republican. The way I figure it, anyone who wants to be president is precisely the kind of person we don't need. To have the ambition, drive and ego to want that job has to corrupt your soul in some way. I kind of think the job should be foisted on some poor unsuspecting person when they've stepped out of the room to relieve themselves after drinking to much coffee. "Oh good, you're back. By the way we elected you President while you were in the bathroom!" I do like the change that Obama represents so I will definitely keep supporting him. I can't bring myself to support McCain, especially after he appeared in that Baghdad market wearing his flak jacket, surrounded by 100 marines with helocopters flying overhead claiming how safe Baghdad was. Safe is when you walk down to the corner 7-11 without your marine escort! And, John....don't tell me the surge is working when the Iraqi government continues to drag their feet on the benchmarks we've deemed necessary for progress. As long as we have 170,000 troops in Iraq we can keep the lid on things...unfortunately we can't sustain that level of troops. The surge can be claimed successful when we draw down our troops and the level of violence doesn't raise. Oh, wait a minute....Robert Gates just said we're not going to draw down troops for the forseeable future....guess the surge isn't as successful as we thought, eh John?
And don't get me started on Hillary....not that I have anything personal against her, but I don't think 32 straight years of the Bush/Clinton monarchy would be a good thing (if Hillary wins and serves two terms, we would have 32 years of Bush/Clinton!)
Enough of that....we celebrated Obama's Virginia victory with a two hour delay for school. Actually the delay was caused by a little icy weather. The upside of that delay was we talked with Seth and Eli for about half an hour this morning. They had just returned to Al Asad from their mission and were in good spirits. The talk turned to how little time they had left and the fact that they are starting to pack some things to start shipping home. Jan had a momentary panic attack when she thought they would be shipping everything to our home, but that isn't the case. Seth will be back in for the next 7 to 10 days before heading out on a potential 15 day mission. Eli is not currently scheduled for that mission but is trying to get assigned so he can be with Seth during that time. Eli has nothing scheduled for the next couple days so they will both be enjoying some down time and doing some small details around the motor pool. Seth claims he'll be bored waiting for the next mission....personally, I like bored.

2008-02-11T16:21:00.000-05:00

Just what our politicians count on....

2008-02-11T14:32:00.000-05:00

The following is from the Rasmussen Reports, a national polling organization:
Given four choices as to the size of the federal budget presented by the President last week, 39% of American voters did not offer any answer, 36% guessed wrong, and just 24% knew the answer--$3.1 trillion dollars.
Nineteen percent (19%) said the budget presented totaled $301 trillion annually while 10% thought the proper answer was $301 billion. Seven percent (7%) thought it was only $3.1 billion.
Thirty-four percent (34%) of men knew the proper answer along with 15% of women. Voters under 30 and over 65 were less likely to know the proper answer than those between 30 and 64.

75% of those polled had no idea about the size of the budget....that's exactly what our politicians count on. We don't care about the size of the budget, the tax cuts for the wealthy, the program cuts for the poor and elderly....just send us our economic stimulus checks and we'll be happy! I think that if people really knew what our government was up to we may have another tea party.

Happy Birthday Seth and Eli!

2008-02-10T19:39:00.000-05:00

A birthday is just the first day of another 365-day journey around the sun. Enjoy the trip. ~Author Unknown

How many of us remember what we were doing on our 23rd birthday? Heck, if I were honest I'd have to admit I'm not really sure what I was doing on my 54th birthday even though it occurred forty-two days ago. I like to claim that I'm still playing with a full deck....I just shuffle a little slower these days.
Tomorrow Seth and Eli will celebrate their 23rd birthday and I'm pretty sure that they will always remember where they were and what they were doing. What they'll be doing is getting ready for another trip outside the wire. They'll be on the same mission this time, something that I don't think has happened since they both returned to Iraq from their leave. Tomorrow will be spent getting ready for the trip....getting equipment ready and having briefings. Their plan is to celebrate their birthday by getting pizza for dinner and watching a movie. This is Seth's second birthday celebration in a war zone. He turned 20 sitting in Afghanistan. While it can't possibly be much fun celebrating your birthday in Iraq this one will have to be better than his 20th because he and Eli are together. It must be nice growing up with someone like you - someone to lean on, someone to count on...someone to be with you.....even if you're 8,000 miles from home and loved ones!

As their time grows shorter, instead of being comforted, I think Jan and I are getting more anxious. Last Thursday Jan asked me through tears if I remembered what we were doing a year ago that night. Now I've already confessed that I can't remember what I was doing forty-two days ago, so what chance did I have at 365 days? A year ago last Thursday we were sitting with Seth, Brittany, Eli and Katy at an Eddie From Ohio concert at the Black Friar Theater in Staunton. Eddie From Ohio is an east coast group that Josh introduced us to and they've become a family favorite. We just want Seth and Eli to come home safe, sound and soon so we can get back to the business of building those family memories of good times being together. As their time in Iraq winds down I think the anxiety will build until we hear they're on their way home.

How can I think of retiring when Bush proposes a $3.1 Trillion budget?

2008-02-04T12:31:00.000-05:00

I'm 54 years old. I don't know how it happened, but somehow it creeped up on me. I have the medicines in my pillkeeper to prove that I'm getting old (or should that be I am old?) Just the fact that I have a pillkeeper to keep my medicines organized is embarassing. I'm at the point in my life that I would like to think about retirement. I admit I haven't been a fiscal conservative in my own life, so maybe it's too much to expect from our politicians. But, come on.....Bush's $3.1 Trillion budget is embarassing. I guess what our politicians count on is that the typical person on the street just doesn't care and can't begin to comprehend the magical slieght of hand that passes for the governments budget. Bush claims his plan will lead to a deficit of only 407 Billion in fiscal year 2009. Of course he's only budgeted 70 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan while admitting that the cost will be much higher (for those of you who are mathematically challenged, that means the deficit will be much higher.) I would have an easier time balancing my personal budget if I could just budget $100 for my mortgage payment while knowing that it's eight times that much! Bush also claims that we'll have a budget surplus by 2012 if we just follow his lead. I don't want to pooh-pooh his leadership, but following him hasn't exactly put us in a great position so far. This budget is nothing more than smoke and mirrors continuing Little Georges failed policies. While keeping his tax cuts for businesses and the wealthy, he's proposing cuts in just about every domestic program except defense. The cruelest cuts come in Medicare and Medicaid. Watching my parents struggle to pay medical bills makes this most offensive. What kind of society balances their budget on the backs of the elderly, poor and children. How can I think about retiring when George needs more money. It's my civic duty to stay employed, pay my taxes and stimulate the economy as much as one person can.

Palaces and Fishing

2008-02-03T09:13:00.001-05:00

We talked to Eli (and Seth in the background) this morning. Eli had just returned from a trip to Baghdad at 5:00 AM their time. While in Baghdad he and two other soldiers toured around the Green Zone and visited one of Saddam's palaces. They couldn't go in as it is now occupied by ambassadors and other officials, but they were able to walk around on the grounds. Apparently Saddam liked to fish and Eli said there were several man-made lakes on the grounds and since they just happened to have a few fishing poles in the humvee they fished a little at Saddam's fishin' hole. He didn't say if they actually caught anything but did talk about playing with an eel in the shallow end of the lake. It's currently 5:00 PM at Al Asad and the boys are getting ready to go to dinner. Seth will be leaving early tomorrow morning for a trip and Eli is unsure of his next mission, but it will be soon. Eli has been back for 10 days and has spent 5 of those days outside the wire. I've kind of lost track of when they're in and when they're out, but my impression is that the pace of their trips has picked up a little. When I mentioned this to Eli he concurred and noted that is good because it helps the time fly by faster. Seth and Eli love to see the calendar turn to a new month....it's a concrete reminder that time is flying by.

A Little Perspective

2008-01-30T08:44:00.000-05:00

Those of you who have read my blog for awhile know that I struggle with some anger issues...anger at George Bush, George Bush supporters, society in general....and the list goes on. I posted a George Bush joke last week that I removed after my wife took me to task stating she thought it was a little over the top for a blog read by family and friends. I tend to get wrapped up in my own little world that is powered by concern for the safety of my sons as they serve in Iraq. When this whole process started Jan and I talked about the dangers of living in this box and letting it dominate our lives. I know that's a danger and I've let it happen to me repeatedly. Every once in awhile, however, something happens that gives you a little perspective. For me it was two pieces of news. The first was about the husband of an Augusta County Teacher. This teacher has been Seth and Eli's coach, teacher and friend. Last week, her 34 year old husband was diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer. Their battle is beginning and I can not fathom the pain and fear they are facing. The second piece of news came when we learned that the daughter of a friend and former colleague of Jan's committed suicide. She had two children - a daughter and a son. About ten years ago the son committed suicide. Again, I can't begin to imagine the pain.
A little perspective is a good thing. My sons are healthy and doing something good. I watched a video the other day of a news show from Washington, DC that a reporter sent to me. It was the news report from Woodstock when the Guard was deployed to Iraq. Seth and I were interviewed. I spoke then about my pride in my sons, who have seen something larger....something bigger than themselves. They were learning about duty and obligation and sacrifice. Even though I would prefer to have Seth and Eli home, life is good. I am content thanks to a little perspective.
Eli traveled to Baghdad this week but is now back at Al Asad. He was a day late returning due to sand storms and Seth is apparently dealing with the same storms keeping him outside the wire a little longer than planned.

Back in the the saddle....

2008-01-26T12:34:00.001-05:00

An email from Eli:

Dear friends and family,

I returned to Al Asad this morning at 5:00am my time to a not so welcome homecoming....the door was locked and so I knocked, but that did not wake up my snoozing roommate, so I pounded on the door. After not seeing each other for two weeks Seth opened the door and said, "why'd you have to knock so loud, probably woke up the whole base," and with that he jumped back in bed and fell back asleep. I wrote a quick e-mail to my family and one to Katy (I could not talk to Katy as she was at work) and then I jumped in bed and attempted to sleep some despite my internal clock being all out of whack.
I woke up at 11:00am and went to lunch with Seth and some of the guys with the platoon. I was prepared to be given a hard time by everyone for getting an additional 10 days at home for leave, but instead everyone was genuinely concerned about how I was and if I was feeling better after having kidney stones. I am sure once everyone is satisfied that I am feeling better I will hear all about my long vacation. It was good to see everyone (2 guys had babies while I was gone) and it is good to get back in the swing of things. I will go back out in just a couple days for a three day mission.
Other then the goodbyes, the traveling and the adjustment to the change in time zones are the worst parts of leave. From the time I left my house in North Carolina to the time I stepped foot on Al Asad I spent over 60 hours traveling! Dad drove me to the Greensboro Airport (Katy is full throttle into her graduate program and could not miss school....she met her cadaver the day I left so dad kept giving her a hard time that she was losing a husband but gaining a cadaver) and from there I flew to Atlanta, then on to Germany, from Germany I flew to Kuwait City. Once we got to Kuwait City we rode a bus to a base in Ali Saleem where we stayed the night. We then got bussed to the air field and once we boarded the C-130 (a miserable aircraft to fly in) we were told instead of making the 2 hour flight to Al Asad we would be first flying to Qatar to drop off soldiers (10 soldiers from the Japanese Army) and pick up some soldiers, over 6 hours of flying on the dreaded bird! We were picking up soldiers from Qatar who had been given a pass there...Qatar is a small little peninsula country that borders Saudi Arabia to one side, and the rest is bordered by the Persian Gulf.
It was a lot of traveling (about 24 hours in all with the extended C-130 trip) and I am fighting jet lag but will be back at work tomorrow as I have to be at the motor pool for briefings. The end is in sight and I am staying focused on that. It was great to see all of you (everyone I got to see) and I look forward to seeing everyone in May when I get back! Take care!
Love,
Eli

Twins reunited!

2008-01-25T21:39:00.000-05:00

We had a brief email from Eli this evening that he had returned to Al Asad. It was 5:00 AM their time and he had just endured a 5 hour flight on a C130....not Eli's favorite mode of transportation.

Most of the way back....

2008-01-24T21:40:00.000-05:00

Spoke with Eli this evening. He's arrived in Kuwait and is hoping to fly into Iraq in the morning. When they leave Iraq, they fly out with full battle rattle and weapons. The equipment and weapons are turned in before leaving Kuwait. When they return from leave they are reissued their equipment and weapons in Kuwait before returning to Iraq. Eli has retrieved his equipment and weapons and is now ready just to get back and get this over with. Our motto has been, keep your head up and your eyes on the horizon.....seems the horizon is getting closer and closer!

Heading Back to Iraq.......for $82

2008-01-23T15:03:00.000-05:00

I delivered Eli to the Greensboro Airport this morning after a tearful goodbye with Katy. We left their house at 7:00 AM and arrived at the airport for check-in, breakfast at Dunkin' Doughnuts and time to just sit at the gate and chat for a while. Because Eli didn't use his original ticket out of Richmond on the 12th he was forced to pay $82 to get from Greensboro to Atlanta where the Army will take over his transportation. It's up in the air if he'll get reimbursed by the Army for this out of pocket expense and on the surface it seems terrible that he has to pay to return to Iraq. On the other hand, if someone had told him on the 12th that he could pay $82 for an additional ten days at home, I'm sure he would have thought that a bargain. It's all how you look at it! Before I got home to Virginia, Eli called from Atlanta with the news that he's booked for a flight out of the country this evening. He's hopeful that within 24 hours he'll be back in his room with his second favorite roommate.

Georges' Legacy....

2008-01-22T12:35:00.001-05:00

As Little Georges's term in office winds down, he is rightly concerned about his legacy. That's the reason for his sudden interest in assisting the peace talks between the Palestinians and the Isralis. Little George's legacy will include the damage he has done to our military. Repeated tours of duty have created a continuing strain on our military personnel and equipment that will take decades to correct. A couple of recent articles have caught my attention in this area. First, the number of high school graduates enlisting in the Army has fallen significantly. The Army's goal is 90 percent high school graduates, which it hasn't met since 2004. Each year since, the number of recruits with at least a high school diploma has steadily declined. National Priorities Project, a research group that analyzes federal data, found that only 71 percent of Army recruits graduated from high school in the 2007 budget year. Additionally, soldiers listed as high quality recruits, meaning a high school graduate and who scored in the top half of the Army's qualification test, has fallen from 61% in 2004 to 45% today. The Department of Defense is planning to increase the size of the military to help alleviate the strain of repeated deployments....the obvious question is where are these recruits going to come from and what what quality they will be.
A second article noted that the Virginia National Guard is having trouble filling Chaplain spots. They only have 8 of 19 spots filled and this is part of a national trend. Overall the National Guard has only 350 of 700 Chaplain spots filled.....Guess even ministers get tired of all the deployments.
And a final, sad situation: The New York Times found 121 cases in which veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan committed a killing in this country, or were charged with one, after their return from war. In many of those cases, combat trauma and the stress of deployment — along with alcohol abuse, family discord and other attendant problems — appear to have set the stage for a tragedy. Much is asked of our soldiers and little is given in return. We thank them for their duty, but provide little in the way of ongoing support. As Little George presides over an economy quickly heading into a depression he continues to support tax cuts for corporations and the rich while cutting budgets of institutions that could provide a safety net for our returning veterns.
Little George has a legacy.....it's just not the one he would like to have.

Medic for a day

2008-01-21T08:15:00.000-05:00

We had an early morning phone call from Seth. I don't know if it's related to Eli's absence or not, but on Seth's last mission he filled in as the medic. They are short on medics and since Seth is an EMT he was pressed into service. What Seth learned is that Eli has the easiest job in the world. Instead of driving, Seth sat in the jump seat in the back, napping, reading and generally enjoying the trip. I guess it's a great job unless you're called upon to do your job.
I was watching an episode of "Mash" last night and the story could have been about the war in Iraq. Hawkeye was incensed to find that doctors at home were taking advantage of the war to earn exorbitant fees. They were reading x-rays for the army and charging $5 per x-ray. Some of the doctors were earning as much as $2000 a month reading x-rays. Hawkeye was furious that some people were profiting from the war.....Imagine how he would feel about the Iraq war. Some things never change!

A Clean Bill of Health

2008-01-20T18:30:00.001-05:00

Jan and I visited Eli and Katy at their home in North Carolina this weekend. Eli visited the urologist on Friday and was given a clean bill of health. The kidney stone has passed. I wanted to take a picture of Eli holding a giant rock with a caption "This is how big it felt!" Alas, as with most of my creative ideas, I didn't follow through. We did learn that Eli is not alone in his battle against kidney stones...apparently this is a problem with soldiers in Iraq.
The following is from an article by James Parker that I found on the Internet:
It was stated that kidney stones are uncommon in the people under the age group of 30 however, the studies have proved that the soldiers in the Iraq most of them in their 20s have an increased risk of developing kidney stones due to their unique lifestyle. Since 1991, Linda Massey, professor of human nutrition at WSU Spokane, has studied the effects of variables such as milk, meat, soy protein, caffeine, salt and vitamin C on the formation of kidney stones.

It is seen that here the soldiers are more reliant on caffeine to keep them awake for long hour duty. The high intake of caffeine increases urinary calcium, which contributes to kidney stones formation. Iraq Soldiers are more prone to get dehydrated, the main reason for this dehydration has been stated to be long working in the hot climate in Iraq and the protective clothing that keeps their sweat from evaporating. Moreover, it has been seen that the soldiers here take fewer calories in comparison to what they burn. Even the intake of water and other fluids have been seen to be minimum that results in urinating quite often.

Iraq being more war prone area the soldiers here have really required to work quite hard. Hence, it becomes really difficult for them to guard themselves from Kidney stones. Taking more amount of caffeine and less amount of water leads to more concentrate and acidic urine that leads to formation of kidney stones gradually. In all it can be said that the soldiers in Iraq are on higher risk of developing kidney stones from other people due to their working conditions and atmosphere.

Eli will be returning to Iraq this week. He will leave home on Wednesday to fly to Atlanta and then on to Iraq. He's hopeful that his trip back will be as quick as Seth's. I will be traveling to North Carolina on Tuesday evening to take him to the airport on Wednesday. Katy will be unable to take Eli to the airport due to her graduate program at Elon. The picture above is Katy and Eli in front of McMichael Hall at Elon where Katy takes her physical therapy classes. Wednesday, Katy will be meeting her cadaver that she will be getting to know intimately over the next several months. All things considered I'm sure she would rather be taking Eli to the airport, but given her need to be at school I'll be filling in.
This next statement is made with the caution that in the military nothing is final until it's done..........that said, it looks like an early departure from Al Asad is in the works for the Virginia National Guard.....they are now planning to leave Iraq in the early weeks of April and Seth and Eli hope to be home by May. I know for Jan and myself, May can't come quick enough!

Email from Seth

2008-01-20T18:21:00.000-05:00

Dear Family and Friends,
My journey home began last Saturday morning at the Richmond airport. After some very hard and tearful goodbyes I boarded the plane on the way to Atlanta. It was hard to say goodbye again, but I felt good in the knowledge that this would be my last time saying goodbye to the people that I love the most. These next couple months will be the final stage in this deployment, and I plan on making the most of my time and not wishing the days away.
After arriving in Atlanta I found out that I would be stuck in Atlanta for the night, and would be put up in a hotel. I had no complaints, it was a nice opportunity to get some more rest. I spent the afternoon laying around in the hotel and watching Brett Farve and the Packers take apart the Seattle Seahawks. The next day I was able to get a flight, and the evening of the 13th I headed overseas. We stopped first in Germany, and then in Kuwait at Ali Al Salem Air Base. We spent the night in Kuwait, then headed to Iraq the next day on a military cargo plane called a C-130. Military flights are not intended for comfort, they are simply meant to get as many soldiers to a destination as possible. It was a very uncomfortable flight, but luckily it only lasted about two hours. After returning to Iraq on Monday January 14th I found out that our Squad was short on people, and that I was needed to head out on a patrol on th e 16th. This meant a full day of work on the 15th, and then up early for a trip outside the wire on the Wednesday. I did not have much time to catch my breath, and am still trying to fully get back in the swing of things and get adjusted to this schedule.
I am missing my roommate, but have enjoyed seeing all my buddies again and catching up. It is good to be back, because I know that the end is in sight. Not much has changed over here, and our mission, and convoy tempo remains pretty much the same. The squads are still picking up about two to three patrols a week, and are typically still getting one day off a week.
Leave was a wonderful time, and I want to thank all of you that helped make it so enjoyable. To all of my family and friends that I had the pleasure of visiting with it was great to see you all, and spend quality time visiting. There are many of you that I did not get to see, and for that I apologize. Fifteen days is just not enough time to see everyone that I would of liked. For all of you, thank you for your continued prayers and support. I am happy to be back, and ready to get this time over with. Before we know it I will be back home to the family, friends, and the life that I love. I hope this e-mail finds you all doing well, and having a great week. Take care and I look forward to talking to you all very soon,
Lots of Love and Peace from the MiddleEast,
Seth

Back at Al Asad

2008-01-15T08:00:00.000-05:00

Seth called me this morning....8 AM our time, 4 PM their time. He's arrived back at Al Asad after a fairly quick trip. Everything looks the same as when he left, just different dust. He'll get right back into the swing of things as he go out on a quick mission later this week. Eli still reports no progress on his stoney problem.

I remember this feeling...........

2008-01-14T08:27:00.000-05:00

For the fourth time we said goodbye to Seth as he leaves to play his part in the "War on Terror." It doesn't get any easier to watch him walk away and board a plane. Standing in the Richmond airport watching Jan and Brittany cry my heart broke again. I held Seth, told him I loved him and whispered for him to be safe. I hope God heard that plea. Airports allow service member's families to go past security and wait with their soldiers at the gate. There was another soldier boarding the same plane and I watched as a mother and wife said their goodbyes and cried on his shoulder. As we sat with Seth a gentleman walked up, shook Seth's hand and quietly said "Thank you." Highs and lows......saying goodbye, seeing gratitude expressed. I don't believe in our President, but I certainly believe in my son, all our soldiers and the inherent goodness and gratitude of most Americans.
Seth left Atlanta last night around 6:00 PM and barring complications will probably be back at Al Asad by Wednesday. Sitting at home last night after talking to him on the phone one last time and saying goodbye I realized how much this affects me. For the last two weeks I've felt like all was right with my world. Today, the aches and pains have returned, real and imagined. A heart does feel pain.
I know Seth is happy that Eli has a few more days at home, but he will miss his brother. Seth said that most people that share housing at the base are happy when their roommate is out on a mission, preferring some quiet time alone in their room. He and Eli prefer to be together and miss each other when they're out on separate missions. Seth will be looking forward to the return of his roommate.
Eli update.....there isn't any. He's still sitting at home, suffering, drinking fluids and hoping to pass a stone. Stay tuned!

Off they go........well, not quite

2008-01-12T17:12:00.001-05:00

Seth and Eli were scheduled to leave today from Richmond for their return to Iraq. We watched Seth walk down the runway and take off for Atlanta. The last we heard from Eli he was laying on the couch in Gibbsonville watching the football game. As Eli and Katy left home to meet us in Richmond, Eli was stricken with severe pains in his side. He had been having these pains throughout the week and this morning they hit with a vengeance. Katy and Eli took a detour to the hospital where a diagnosis of one large kidney stone was made. Eli was given pain medication and sent home with instructions to drink a lot of fluids in order to try and pass the stone. He's been given a reprieve and will be home for at least another week as he learns the meaning of intense pain. Stay tuned for more of the story.
Seth arrived in Atlanta to find that he will be spending the night there. He was given a voucher for a hotel and meal and told to report back to the airport tomorrow at noon to see what transportation can be arranged. He's not too terribly upset as this means he can watch the NFL playoff games today.....of course, he could have just stayed home another day and watched them in the comfort of his own house.

2008-01-11T08:39:00.000-05:00

I've been teaching a class at Church on Wednesday nights called "The Gospel According to Andy." It's kind of theology lite.....we watch an episode of the old Andy Griffith show and discuss the moral lessons in light of the Bible. It's more a fellowship time than anything else. Last week's lesson was on Jumping to Conclusions and the episode dealt with Wally's Filling Station being robbed and the wrong person being accused. When I was preparing for the lesson I came across something I had seen before and thought I would use it in class. Perhaps some of you have seen this before.
It's time to elect a new leader. You have three candidates to chose from. Candidate A has had two extramarital affairs, consults with astrologists before making decisions, smokes heavily and drinks 8 - 10 martinis each evening. Candidate B sleeps until noon each day, used opium in college and drinks a quart of whiskey each day. Candidate C is a strict vegetarian, drinks only the occasional beer, never cheated on his wife and is a decorated war hero.
Now the kicker here is that Candidate A is Franklin Roosevelt, Candidate B is Winston Churchill and Candidate C is Adolf Hitler!
I recently saw an addition to this...a Candidate D. Candidate D abused alcohol during his college and young adult years, went AWOL from the service, had three failed business ventures and only prospered because of family connections. Of course we're talking about my friend and yours...little George! I still marvel at the gullibility of the American voters. I guess if you wrap yourself in the flag and claim loudly enough that you're a Christian, that's enough for some folks. Whenever I see a car with a Bush-Cheney bumper sticker on it I want to ask the driver if they're embarrassed yet.

2008-01-06T19:43:00.000-05:00

It's been a busy eight days.....so busy I haven't had time to update my blog! It's been one continuous party with lots of places to go, people to see and things to do! We have until next weekend to enjoy having the boys on American soil. Seth and Brittany have been staying at their home in Staunton, while Josh, Eli and Katy have been with us. This past weekend we traveled to Smith Mountain Lake for a couple of days with just the family. Eli and Katy left the lake today to spend the next week at their home in North Carolina while Katy begins her PT program at Elon. Josh and Lillian are returning to Baltimore and Williamsburg leaving Jan and I with an empty house. Seth and Brittany will still be in Staunton and we'll see some of them this week as he fits us into his busy schedule. Next weekend reality hits once again as the boys return to Iraq. Seth said today he's ready to get back and get this finished. He noted that the visit just doesn't seem normal as he knows he's returning to Iraq. It's hard to pretend that everything is normal and fun with that hanging over their heads.
The slideshow to the right has some pictures from our visit. Enjoy!

Home at last.......

2007-12-28T08:30:00.000-05:00

After 60 hours in the same uniform, over 20 hours in the air, Seth and Eli returned to Reagan International Airport yesterday afternoon. A trip home, showers, time with the wives and a family dinner it was time for bed to catch up on much needed sleep. All is right with the world for the next fifteen days!

Jan's Christmas Letter

2007-12-28T08:29:00.000-05:00

December 2007
Dear Good Friends and Family,
It’s that time of year and although I am not in the Christmas spirit, I am home sick with some bug (high fever, everything hurts including your hair follicles) and sitting seems to be all I’m capable of doing. The upside is I am writing a Christmas letter and if it actually makes it into the mail I will have been in touch with those near and dear to me.
2007 will go down in the Lovell household as a memorable year. Seth and his love of four years became engaged last Christmas and we began the year planning another wedding. Eli and Katy, his college sweetheart, had tied the knot in 2006 on August 12 and began their senior year in college as newlyweds. Two weddings in two years can be stressful but because we love both girls and think the world of them, the stress was minimal compared to the joy we felt at the addition of two wonderful daughter-in-laws!
The wedding was planned for June 30 and all was progressing well until the best man, Eli, found out in April that he was being deployed to Iraq. A couple weeks later Seth found out that he was also being deployed. I cannot put into words the pain I felt each time I was told a son of mine was going off to war. You’re talking about a woman who cried in the middle of Wal-Mart the Christmas Ed tried to talk me into buying paint-ball guns for the boys. (They didn’t end up getting them that year but after having a year to adjust to the idea I did give in the next year.)
The boys were scheduled to depart for training in Mississippi towards the end of June. The wedding was moved up to June 9 and everyone kicked in to help. The church was available, the bride and groom and wedding party could all be there, and the minister could perform the ceremony. At the last minute, when nothing else panned out, good friends offered their scenic back yard for the rehearsal dinner. The wedding was beautiful and bittersweet. The minister talked about two people planning a wedding and a year’s separation at the same time. He talked about the fact that God does not promise us life will not be hard but he does give us the tools to deal with life’s difficult times.
This year God has given us wonderful family and friends to support us, to give us hugs when there is nothing to say, and to make us laugh when it seems like there is nothing funny left in the world. He has given us the power of personal conversation with him through prayer. He has given us three wonderful sons and two incredible daughter-in-laws who make us proud each and every day. He has given us each other to cling to when the expected call from Iraq is delayed a couple days and your mind goes to the worst places. And funny as it may sound he has given us ballroom dancing!
In the Spring, Ed and I began taking ballroom dance lessons. We found them challenging and fun. Little did we know what a lifeline they would be. Every Thursday evening from 8:00 to 9:00 we work on our ballroom dance steps. Your body and your mind are engaged and for one hour your mind cannot go to the crazy places. We walk out of the class each Thursday night and look at each other and smile. As our friend Betsy Dishman put it, “what better way to spend an hour than staring into the eyes of your spouse?” It truly is a calm in the storm.
Rule of thumb for a Christmas letter is one page but I think considering the year I’ve had you can excuse my ramblings. This will be going into page two.
Joshua is finishing up graduate school at William and Mary. He is studying to become a school counselor like his mother. I can’t think of a higher honor than to have Joshua join me in this profession. Between his internship this fall at an elementary school and this spring at a high school, a full time course load and an assistantship at the college he is one very busy guy. Now add to this the time he spends traveling back and forth on the weekends to Baltimore to visit the love of his life, Lillian, and I wonder how he does it all. In the midst of all this he finds time to call his parents regularly and visit more than he should. He will be glad when this year is over and his brothers are back on American soil and he is finished school and employed somewhere around Baltimore!
Brittany, Seth’s new wife is keeping the home fires burning in their home in Staunton. She is a full time student at James Madison University and works almost full time at our local emergency room as a tech. Whenever time permits she also runs with the local rescue squad and even if time doesn’t permit she visits her in-laws on a regular basis. She was a wonderful support during Seth’s time in Afghanistan and continues to be during this deployment.
Before being deployed Eli managed to graduate from Bridgewater College in May (unlike most of his classmates he didn’t need to worry about finding a job) and he and Katy bought a house in Gibbsonsville, North Carolina. Katy will begin a three-year doctoral program in physical therapy at Elon University on January 7. That is good news and bad. Good news because it will keep her busy while Eli finishes the last of his deployment and bad because she will start her schooling right in the middle of Eli’s two week leave.
Seth and Eli are scheduled to leave Iraq December 25 for a two week leave. We think they will be home sometime around the 27/28 of December but you never know with the Army. It will be great to see them but somewhat bittersweet as they are not home to stay. Seth had an interesting take on it in his last email home:

“… the thing I am looking forward to the most is something that most people would not guess. I am looking forward to saying goodbye to my parents and my beautiful wife when I return to Iraq. I know this sounds odd, but consider my reasoning. Since joining the military in May of 2003 I have had to say goodbye to my family, friends, parents, and wife a total number of seven times, at the end of my two weeks it will be my eighth goodbye. These farewells are not a simple “see you later,” they are painful, and everyone involved knows that it will be a long time before we are reunited. ... One lesson that I have learned in the military is that goodbyes are not something that gets easier with practice. Saying goodbye to my family in Gulfport was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do, and something I never want to do again. Saying goodbye in the airport when I leave to go back to Iraq will mark the final time in my six-year enlistment that I will have to say a hard goodbye. When I return to the states I will have less than a year left on my contract, and no chance of deployment. I will not reenlist for one simple reason, I can’t say goodbye again. Leave will be an amazing time for my family and me, but like everything in my life since I received word of my deployment, it will be bittersweet. I am looking forward to leave, and I am also looking forward to my final goodbye in the military.”

Ed has found a second therapy in blogging. You can find news about the boys as well as additional musings from Seth and Eli at www.lovellsoldiers.blogspot.com. The picture at the top of the blog and on the Christmas card was taken in Gulfport, Mississippi when we were blessed to spend five days together before they left for Iraq.
Two pages definitely need to be the limit even with my excused ramblings. As I write this letter, two of my sons are in harms way. We hope for a positive outcome but our Lord knew differently with his son. He knows the pain we go through and he truly does give us the tools to go through the tough times. We wish you a joyous holiday, many laughs, good times with family and friends and a true understanding of the meaning of the season.

From the Richmond Times Dispatch....12/26/07

2007-12-26T21:55:00.000-05:00

Military brotherhood: Honor spans 2 wars
Twin guardsmen in Iraq win praise for video telling story of decorated Indian Marine

Wednesday, Dec 26, 2007 - 12:08 AM
By PETER BACQUE
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER

Twin brothers serving in Iraq with the Virginia Army National Guard have been honored for a video they produced between convoy security missions in the combat zone.

Spcs. Eli and Seth Lovell were recognized this month for their video portrayal of Pfc. Ira Hayes, an American Indian who was one of the Marines immortalized in the photo of the flag-raising on Iwo Jima during World War II.

The 22-year-old guardsmen from Fishersville in Augusta County earned second place in the annual American Indian Heritage Month contest for their 10-minute program.

The Lovells focused on Hayes, a Pima Indian, to show the legacy of American Indians in the U.S. armed forces.

"It's overwhelming how much they contributed," said Eli Lovell, speaking from Al Asad Air Base in Iraq's Anbar province. "Our military would not be what it is today without the diversity that helps define it.

"It . . . forced us to think about the whole issue on diversity in the military," Eli said.

Hayes was the only American Indian in the six-man group of Marines in Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal's Pulitzer Prize-winning 1945 picture, widely regarded as the most memorable photo of World War II.

With Johnny Cash's version of "The Ballad of Ira Hayes" playing in the background, the Lovells' video tells the story of the highly decorated Marine's life, from his battles with Japanese in the Pacific to his well-documented -- and ultimately losing -- fight with alcoholism.

Hayes died in 1955 at age 32. He is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

According to the Defense Department, American Indians have historically had the highest proportion of military service of any U.S. ethnic group: 10 percent have served in the armed forces, triple the rate of any other ethnic group.

Eli is a combat medic and recent graduate of Bridgewater College. Seth is a gunner on the unit's armored security vehicles and a student at James Madison University. He also deployed with the Guard to Afghanistan. Both are married.

The Lovells are members of the Virginia Guard's B Company, 3rd Battalion of the 116th Infantry, from Woodstock and Warrenton. The unit is due to return home this summer.

A program of the Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute, the heritage contest was sponsored in Iraq by the Lovells' parent unit, the 507th Airborne Corps Support Group.

"The observance was conducted to enhance cross-cultural awareness among soldiers and civilian employees," said Sgt. 1st Class Michael James, an equal-opportunity representative in the Lovells' battalion.

Al Asad is a major convoy hub and, with thousands of troops and civilians, the largest U.S. military base in western Iraq.

Soldiers at the huge base, about 100 miles west of Baghdad, have phone and Internet access. "We joke all the time, 'It's not your daddy's war,'" said Seth Lovell, "and that's for sure."

Still, said 2nd Lt. David Leiva, the Lovells' platoon leader, "every time you roll out that gate, anything and everything can happen."

Because they are brothers, the unit tries to keep them widely separated during convoy missions. "We don't want to roll the dice more times than we have to," said Leiva, who comes from Washington.

But when not "outside the wire" in their heavily armored vehicles, "we actually find ourselves with a lot of down time," Eli said.

"One of our biggest enemies over here is boredom," he said, so the brothers welcomed the video project.

"It was kind of funny to be working on homework in a 'quote, unquote' combat zone," Eli said.

"You know," he said, "I find a lot of things weird to be doing in a combat zone."
Contact Peter Bacqué at (804) 649-6813 or pbacque@timesdispatch.com.

Merry Christmas, 2007

2007-12-25T22:24:00.000-05:00

I sometimes think we expect too much of Christmas Day. We try to crowd into it the kindness and humanity that has been lacking for much of the previous twelve months. We sing of angels and peace on earth, goodwill toward all mankind - but just for this one day. I prefer to take my Christmas in little pieces throughout the entire year. I want "peace on earth" to be more than just a phrase uttered on this one day. Why not peace on earth every day of the year? Why not goodwill toward men....all mankind, every day of every week. A man is at his finest towards the end of the year. He is almost what he should be when Christmas time is being celebrated. At Christmas, we're thinking more of others, less about ourselves. There is laughter and joy. There is less selfishness and more kindness. Why can't we spread that feeling over all twelve months?
May the spirit of Christmas bring you peace. May the gladness of Christmas give you hope. May the warmth of Christmas grant you love......May the joy of Christmas be with you and guide you for the coming year.
As I write, Seth and Eli are on their way home. We don't know anything for sure at this time. We don't really even know that they've left Iraq. We're counting on the magic of Christmas to bring them safely home to us, if even for a short time before they return to Al Asad. I hope my next post is about a joy filled reunion with sons, brothers and husbands. Merry Christmas to all.

Christmas at Al Asad

2007-12-25T07:35:00.000-05:00

Dear Family and Friends,

I hope this e-mail finds you all doing well and having a great Christmas. This is the last e-mail I will write here at Al Asad before leaving for Kuwait this evening. Eli and I are very excited about coming home, and can not wait to see everyone.
This was my second Christmas spent in a combat zone in a foreign country. It was my second Christmas away from my family and friends. It was my first Christmas as a married man, but instead of enjoying it with my wife I spent it with one hundred other soldiers who are missing their families as much as I am. Our 1SG and CO decided that they did not want everyone staying in their CHU all day long, and wanted to have a party. Their justification was that if everyone just simply had the day off they would just sleep all day and feel miserable. Many of the soldiers were reluctant to spend Christmas morning at the motor pool, and were not excited about this little get together. However, the party turned out to be a real success, and everyone involved had a great time.
It started with the 1SG and some of the officers handing out Santa hats for everyone to enjoy, then we had some snacks and just visited. The leadership had taken two flatbed gun trucks, and backed them together so their beds made a twelve-foot long stage. In front of the stage there were three giant barrels that had fires in them so all the men could keep warm. It was a unique setup. After about an hour of eating snacks and just enjoying spending time together, it was time for the platoons to perform some Christmas skits. Eli and I of course could not pass up the opportunity to take the stage, and along with another 3rd platoon member told some jokes and read some humorous poems. We got a great response from the crowd a s they appreciated our jokes and our little act. After we got done the other platoons performed their acts. They were all very humorous and got the company rolling with laughter. The final act was performed by maintenance, and along with their little skit their Platoon Sergeant sang a song about the true meaning of Christmas. It was a religious song that I had never heard before, but it was very well done. The SGT had an amazing voice, and had the whole company clapping their hands to the rhythm.
After the presentations the XO (the second in command for the company) handed out Christmas presents to everyone sent from the FRG (family readiness group). The gifts were very nice and thoughtful, they included a mug with the B CO logo, along with a B CO t-shirt and a number of other goodies. After the presents were handed out to everyone there was a raffle for some bigger presents, one of which Eli won. Finally the CO and 1SG talked to the whole company, followed by a brief message and prayer from the Chaplain. It was a good time had by all, and a special and memorable way to spend Christmas.
After the party Eli and I went to lunch with thirteen other guys from our squad, and had a great time just eating and visiting with one and other. While I was sitting at the table lost in my thoughts I noticed a number of soldiers sitting at tables by themselves. Eli and I are very lucky to have so many friends from our platoon. This coupled with the fact that we receive so much love and support from back home helps to make this time away from home easier on us. Noticing the soldiers by themselves reminded me that there are so many soldiers who are not handling this as well as Eli and I. For many soldiers who have not made many friends, and do not have much support from home, this is an extremely tough and depressing situation. Every time I see soldiers eating by themselves I feel bad for them, but it upset me even more on Christmas day. The men and women in our military are making many sacrifices, and are f acing many challenges. Please remember all of them this Christmas season, and keep them all in your prayers.
Lots of Love from Iraq,
Seth

What are we fighting for?

2007-12-23T19:17:00.000-05:00

According to Little George, our soldiers are in Afghanistan and Iraq to keep us safe from terrorists. Who's keeping us safe from ourselves....looks like we're fighting for the right to be stupid! We've lost over 3,800 soldiers for this? Doesn't it just make you so freakin' mad?

Irony in Iraq

2007-12-22T15:49:00.001-05:00

Hanging out with "Frosty". I'm not sure he has a snowball's chance in hell. The ultimate in irony....reading "In Harm's Way" while serving in Iraq......what a coincidence.

From the Virginia National Guard Web Site

2007-12-21T16:07:00.000-05:00

By 2nd Lt. David E. Leiva
B Company, 3rd Battalion, 116th Infantry

AL ASAD AIR BASE, Iraq – Two Virginia Army National Guard soldiers were recognized here this month for their video portrayal of Ira Hamilton Hayes, one of the Marines immortalized in a Pulitzer Prize-winning photo of the American flag-raising at Iwo Jima.

Twins Eli and Seth Lovell, of B Company, 3rd Battalion, 116th Infantry, earned second place Dec. 1 in the annual American Indian Heritage Month contest, beating out six other entries with a 10-minute long montage of Hayes, the only Native American member of the six-man group captured in Joe Rosenthal’s 1945 award-winning snapshot.

The event, a program of the Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute, took place in November. It was sponsored by the 507th Corps Support Group (Airborne), a subordinate unit of the XVIII Airborne Corps. First place went to the 541st Transportation Company, a subordinate unit of the 101st Airborne Division.

“The observance was conducted to enhance cross-cultural awareness among soldiers and civilian employees,” said Sgt. 1st Class Michael James, an equal opportunity representative who oversees these matters for the battalion under which B Company falls. “These observances recognize the achievements and contributions made by members of specific racial, ethnic or gender groups in our society.”

Inspired by the 2000 best-selling book-turned-movie, “Flags of Our Fathers,” the Lovells, of Staunton, Va., chose Hayes as an anecdote to introduce the contributions of Native Americans to the armed forces.

Using the late Johnny Cash’s rendition of “The Ballad of Ira Hayes” as a backdrop, the video went through the highly-decorated Marine’s life, whose battles with Japanese fighters were as well-documented as his fight years later with alcoholism.

“The song was so controversial, we knew it was kind of a bold presentation,” said Eli Lovell, a medic and recent graduate of Bridgewater College in Bridgewater, Va. “We didn’t how it was going to be received.”

Immediately following their presentation, though, Command Sgt. Maj. Sultan Muhammad, the top enlisted soldier of the 507th, hand-delivered two of his minted coins to the Lovells, a symbol used to improve morale, foster unit esprit de corps and honor their work.

“I don’t know if you’re going to win, but that was excellent,” said Muhammad, one of four judges, which included the 507th commander, Col. James G. Currie Jr.

That excellence was what Sgt. 1st Class Tony Elliott had in mind when he scrolled down his roster to find someone capable of best representing B Company. He settled on the Lovells, both good story tellers and aspiring high school teachers. Especially since the program was to be judged on recognition, presentation, creativity and knowledge of observance.

The twins then spent days collecting and assembling photographs and facts about the flag raiser and the ethnic group’s significance to military history.

“The Ira Hayes story is an American story,” said Seth Lovell, a gunner on the Armored Security Vehicle and student at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Va. “There was so much information about his life; he was as familiar as Brad Pitt in the 1950s.”

Among interesting details the Lovells culled from the U.S. Census Bureau: Ten percent of American Indians have served in the armed forces – three times the rate of any other ethnic group in the United States.

Hayes, however, wasn’t the initial choice. But with missions providing convoy security throughout Iraq – and some procrastination with their assignment to represent the infantry unit – the twins went with Hayes.

The Lovells had just finished reading about Hayes’ exploits in James Bradley’s book, an account of the six Marines whose photo on Mount Suribachi came to symbolize World War II.

The other Marines shown in the photo included Rene Gagnon, Harlon Block, Franklin Sousley, Mike Strank and Navy corpsman John Bradley. Only Gagnon, Hayes and Bradley survived the war. Sousley, Block and Strank were killed in a later battle. Bradley, the last living man, died in 1994.

Hayes died in 1955 at the age of 32. He is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

A Christmas Carol

2007-12-20T14:05:00.000-05:00

We took our seventh grade students to the theater today to see an adaptation of Charles Dickens "A Christmas Carol." Sometimes I amaze myself by my ability to turn just about any event into a political statement. It's a gift. Three things struck me as I watched the play. First, I decided early on that I liked the Muppett's version better. I'm not taking anything away from the Blackfriar Theater, but they just can't match the acting of all the characters in the Muppett version. It's hard to compete with the depth of feeling portrayed by Kermit as Bob Cratchett. My second and third thoughts turned political. Perhaps I should have stopped with my first thoughts. The play is essentially a morality play about a change of heart. Scrooge turns from his miserly, egocentric ways into a man who loves all and does his best to keep Christmas in his heart, each and every day.
Marley speaks, "Why did I walk through crowds of fellow-beings with my eyes turned down, and never raise them?
That line struck me in particular, because that's what I think we've been doing as a society for too long. We have the power for so much good, but we walk with eyes turned down. The purpose then of Marley's appearance as a ghost is, above all, to warn Scrooge and make him open his eyes to the rest of humanity, i.e. change his life. Our society needs a Scrooge-like reawakening. Perhaps that is what our next election will be about. It's time for a change. It's time to lift our eyes and see something other than the divisive trends of our current political landscape.
Anyone know where we can find three good ghosts who are looking for work?

Ken Follett

2007-12-20T13:51:00.000-05:00

If you've read my blog before you may have come accross an entry about "The Pillars of the Earth" by Ken Follett. Follett has been a favorite author of Seth's for some time. Seth sent a note to Mr. Follett recently letting him know how much he has enjoyed reading his books. In response, Follett office sent Seth a box full of Follett novels. What a kind gesture from someone who has nothing to gain by that kindness. If you've never read a book by Ken Follett, now would be a good time to run out to the bookstore to buy one....don't borrow it from the library...buy it. Give Follett another dime for his kindness! In addtion to being a good author, he is apparently a good person!

Email from Eli

2007-12-20T13:39:00.000-05:00

Dear Friends and Family,

Well, I am not the best about writing these group e-mails, but I figured I would write one before I come home for leave. Seth and I are both back safely at the base and have been officially taken off of missions as we await our flight to Kuwait for leave. Our projected date to fly out is the 25th (could not think of a better Christmas present then that) but it could be a day earlier and it could be a day later….who knows? Leave is sung to the same tune as everything in the military, nothing is definite until it happens.
Seth and I have been in Iraq for 91 days now. I have been keeping a journal and was reading over it the other day and counted up the number of days I have spent away from Al Asad out on missions. Out of 91 days I have spent 31 days out on the road. I thought that was an interesting fact.
I just got back from a three-day mission where we went to Baghdad and then to Al Taqqaddum, and then back to Al Asad. Here is how the mission went:

We left Al Asad in the afternoon at 3:00pm on Sunday and then over 12 hours later made it to Baghdad. It does not usually take this long, but we had some trouble with the trucks we were transporting, and at one point we had a truck slide off the road and get stuck. The roads we drive on are not the best and some are just non-existent.

We got to Baghdad and slept in a tent on cots beside the staging point for our convoy. We all slept late into the day as it had been a very long night. The First Sergeant (the non commissioned officer in charge of our company) had come along on the convoy as he is trying to go on a mission with every squad at least once, and he had not been out with this squad yet. He came and grabbed me at one point as we were two of the only ones up and told me to come grab some pizza with him and that he was buying. How could I turn that down? So, we went to the pizza hut on base and then sat around eating and chatting.

That night we hooked up with some transport vehicles who are stationed at Al Asad and had been outside the wire transporting tanks around Iraq for three weeks straight. We were escorting them on the last leg of their trip as they were dropping off supplies at Al Taqqaddum and then going back to Al Asad for a much deserved rest.
We left at 10:00pm and then after 4 hours we arrived at Al Taqqaddum and racked out immediately.

We spent the next day hanging out around base and then that night (actually the next morning if we’re being specific) at midnight we left Al Taqqaddum and after 5 hours on the road we made it back to Al Asad. When I walked into my can Seth’s alarm was actually going off for him to get up for a mission…perfect timing!

So, for the mission we were gone 62 hours from Al Asad and spent 21 of them riding around in the ASVs. I also got some chai tea at a green bean’s coffee, ate pizza at a pizza hut, watched a couple movies on my portable dvd player, and finshed my book, Ernie Pyle’s War. Its a rough life being in war...let me tell ya!

My wonderful in-laws sent me some WWII books, one of them being about Ernie Pyle. I thoroughly enjoyed the book and really enjoyed reading some of his columns. Ernie Pyle is famous for writing about the common man. He spent his time on the front lines and in the foxholes with the enlisted men rather then in the rear with the high-ranking officers. This won him and his column immense popularity. One of his columns talked about how the war was fought not by career soldiers but by perfectly normal men and women who were asked to put on the uniform and serve their country in a time of need. This war, to me, is much the same as the way Ernie Pyle described it because of the huge number of National Guard and Reserve troops used. I had a lot of good conversations with the guys I just went out on a mission with, and every one of them I asked what they did back home. We now have some Illinois Guardsmen attached to us, and so I was able to talk to them also. Here is just a sample of the diversity of common men and women we have over here serving our country.
A teacher from Illinois
A mailman (this is our first sergeant)
A manager at the Sheetz in Franklin County
An inventory specialist at a factory
A machinist
Two policemen
A manager at an outdoors store in Roanoke
And here’s the big one, 6 different people in that squad are in college and younger then I am!

Ok, enough rambling. If you have made it this far in the e-mail thanks for staying the course (no pun intended). Anyways, I thought you would find some of this stuff interesting; sorry for being so long winded. I can’t wait to be home soon and see many of you during my leave. Take care and have a great Christmas!
Love,
Eli

A Christmas Poem

2007-12-19T17:19:00.000-05:00

THE SANDS OF CHRISTMAS - BY MICHAEL MARKS

I had no Christmas spirit when I breathed a weary sigh.
And looked across the table where the bills were piled too high.

The laundry wasn’t finished and the car I had to fix,
My stocks were down another point, the Chargers lost by six.

And so with only minutes till my son got home from school
I gave up on the drudgery and grabbed a wooden stool.

The burdens that I carried were about all I could take,
And so I flipped the TV on to catch a little break.

I came upon a desert scene in shades of tan and rust,
No snowflakes hung upon the wind, just clouds of swirling dust.

And where the reindeer should have stood before a laden sleigh,
Eight Humvees ran a column right behind an M1A.

A group of boys walked past the tank, not one was past his teens
Their eyes were hard as polished flint, their faces drawn and lean.

They walked the street in armor with their rifles shouldered tight,
Their dearest wish for Christmas, just to have a silent night.

Other soldiers gathered, hunkered down against the wind,
To share a scrap of mail and dreams of going home again.

There wasn’t much at all to put their lonely hearts at ease,
They had no Christmas turkey, just a pack of MREs.

They didn’t have a garland or a stocking I could see,
They didn’t need an ornament-they lacked a Christmas tree.

They didn’t have a present even though it was tradition,
The only boxes I could see were labeled “ammunition.”

I felt a little tug and found my son now by my side,
He asked me what it was I feared and why it was I cried.

I swept him up into my arms and held him oh so near,
and kissed him on the forhead as I whispered in his ear.

“There’s nothing wrong, my little son, for safe we sleep tonight,
Our heroes stand on foreign land to give us all the right,

To worry on the things in life that mean nothing at all,
instead of wondering if we will be the next to fall.

He looked at me as children do and said, “it’s always right,
To thank the ones who help us and perhaps that we should write”

And so we pushed aside the bills and sat to draft a note,
To thank the many far from home, and this is what we wrote:

“God bless you all and keep you safe and speed your way back home
Remember that we love you so, and that you’re not alone.

The gift you give you share with all, a present every day,
You give the gift of Liberty and that we can’t repay.”

2007-12-18T20:03:00.000-05:00

Anybody who has looked at my blog has no doubt how I feel about George Bush. A teacher at the high school who is notorious for his wicked sense of humor gave us an early Christmas present designed to provoke a little laughter. You can always count on friends to help you through the tough times. I haven't had time to mount it properly, but plan to have it waiting for Seth and Eli when they come home for leave. Thank you, Sandy!

Routine?

2007-12-17T08:51:00.000-05:00

Jan and I had a revelation the other evening when we realized we didn't know where our children are! You remember the commercials that were popular on TV for awhile? It's ten o'clock....do you know where your children are? Well, I know they're in Iraq. But, for a little bit, we've lost track of whether they're inside the wire or outside the wire. I had been really good about keeping track of when they're outside the wire on a mission and I'd be in waiting mode to hear when they had returned to their base. We got an email from Eli the other day that said "I'm back on base." I didn't even know he'd gone! It's not that I'm taking a cavalier approach, because I worry....My God how I worry! I think it's a coping mechanism....I'm not allowing myself to keep constant track of what they're doing. I think we're so desperate for "normal" and "routine" that shutting down the mind to my son's comings and goings is the only way to achieve a little peace of mind.
I do know that they're both outside the wire right now......on what we think is their final missions before getting ready to come home for leave. It's going to be so wonderful to hold them, and see them with their wives - if only for a little while.

Saying Goodbye..........one last time

2007-12-10T07:34:00.000-05:00

Dear Family and Friends,
It has been awhile since I last wrote, and for that I apologize. Life has been very routine, and there really has not been much to report. We either spend our days out on the road helping to move supplies, or back at the motor pool working on our equipment and trying to stay busy. Eli and I spend our spare time watching movies with friends, reading books, playing games, and just doing anything we can to make the time go faster. Our leave at the end of December is quickly approaching, and it is getting harder every day to contain our excitement. I cannot wait to get home and be able to give my parents and my wife a hug. There are so many things I am looking forward to, it would be to long of an e-mail to try and list everything. To list just a few, I am looking forward to my mom’s cooking, to being able to pet my dog Abby, to drink a beer with dinner, to hold my wife’s hand while driving in my jeep, wearing my Cohort jacket with a flannel shirt underneath, laying on my couch and watching TV with my wife, going to church at Tinkling Springs, watching a Wilson basketball game and wishing I was on the sidelines coaching, being able to hug all four of my grandparents, enjoying time with as many friends and family as I can fit into two weeks, and many other thing as well. The list could go on and on, there are so many things I am looking forward to during my time home.
But the thing I am looking forward to the most is something that most people would not guess. I am looking forward to saying goodbye to my parents and my beautiful wife when I return to Iraq. I know this sounds odd, but consider my reasoning. Since joining the military in May of 2003 I have had to say goodbye to my family, friends, parents, and wife a total number of seven times, at the end of my two weeks it will be my eighth goodbye. These farewells are not a simple “see you later,” they are painful, and everyone involved knows that it will be a long time before we are reunited. Every time I have had to say goodbye it has been at least a month and a half before I see my loved ones again. Typically it has been longer, and sometimes for as long as seven months. One lesson that I have learned in the military is that goodbyes are not something that gets easier with practice. Saying goodbye to my family in Gulfport was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do, and something I never want to do again. Saying goodbye in the airport when I leave to go back to Iraq will mark the final time in my six-year enlistment that I will have to say a hard goodbye. When I return to the states I will have less than a year left on my contract, and no chance of deployment. I will not reenlist for one simple reason, I can’t say goodbye again. Leave will be an amazing time for my family and me, but like everything in my life since I received word of my deployment, it will be bittersweet. I am looking forward to leave, and I am also looking forward to my final goodbye in the military. It will be painful like they all have, but it will be the last.
I hope this e-mail finds you all doing well and having a good start to your holiday season. Eli and I have been listening to Christmas music to try and get in the mood. Our Christmas present will be a flight out of here on the 25th, the best present we could of asked for. Have a great week, take care, and I look forward to talking to you all soon,

Lots of Love from Iraq,

Pearl Harbor..............

2007-12-07T08:25:00.000-05:00

Last year, George W. Bush issued a proclamation remembering the more than 2,400 Americans who lost their lives at Pearl Harbor and all those who gave the ultimate sacrifice during World War II. While I've never hid my feelings about our current President and the harm he has done to our country and our military, I do think it is worthwhile to read the proclamation.

A Proclamation by the President of the United States of America
White House News

Sixty-five years ago, more than 2,400 Americans lost their lives in a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. On National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day, we think of those who died on December 7, 1941, and honor all those who sacrificed for our liberty during World War II.

On that peaceful Sunday morning, our country suffered a vicious, unprovoked attack that changed the course of history. Though our Pacific Fleet was nearly destroyed, our citizens were inspired by the great acts of heroism from those who survived and from those who did not. In the days that followed, our grief turned to resolution, and America embarked on a mission to defeat two of the most ruthless regimes the world has ever known. We pledge to always remember the character and sacrifice of the brave individuals at Pearl Harbor. Their selfless service helped deliver a great victory for the cause of freedom and, ultimately, transformed adversaries into the closest of friends.

After the devastating attacks on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt declared, "We are going to win the war and we are going to win the peace that follows." In the 21st century, freedom is again under attack, and young Americans have stepped forward to serve in a global war on terror that will secure our liberty and determine the destiny of millions around the world. Like generations before, we will answer history's call with confidence, confront threats to our way of life, and build a more peaceful world for our children and grandchildren.

The Congress, by Public Law 103-308, as amended, has designated December 7 of each year as "National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day."

NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim December 7, 2006, as National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day. I encourage all Americans to observe this solemn occasion with appropriate ceremonies and activities. I urge all Federal agencies, interested organizations, groups, and individuals to fly the flag of the United States at half staff this December 7 in honor of those who died as a result of their service at Pearl Harbor.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this first day of December, in the year of our Lord two thousand six, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-first.

GEORGE W. BUSH

If you are a student of history, you know that there is much discussion about whether Pearl Harbor was "unprovoked." We were engaging Japan in an economic war, we shut down the Panama Canal to Japanese shipping, we had embargoed goods and services to Japan. Some historians argue that we placed most of our Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor to provoke Japan into something that would justify our entry into World War II. Whatever your feelings about the politics leading to Pearl Harbor, we honor those men and women who were simply doing their job. There's a terrific parallel to that today. Whatever you think of the politics, we honor our soldiers and thank them and their families for their sacrifices.

On top of the World

2007-12-04T07:48:00.000-05:00

What's your pet peeve?

2007-12-03T12:25:00.000-05:00

I remember when the boys were young, times were not always very settled around the Lovell household. Putting it nicely, the twins were a little trying at times, full of energy and quite rambunctious. A friend once remarked, that when she felt a little overwhelmed by her life, all she had to do was think of us and her life didn't seem so bad! I always felt it was a kind of service we provided to others....."well, our life sucks, but we could be the Lovell's." Yesterday in Sunday School we were doing a lesson on complaining. We started the lesson by going around the room and listing our pet peeves. It was an interesting list.....
Women driving minivans full of kids while putting on make-up and talking on the cell phone
telemarketers
people who slow you down in the lunch line
rude people
people who talk in the movie theater
George Bush (guess who said that!)

The list went on and on with people having little trouble finding a pet peeve...we all had them, sometimes a whole list of them. As I listened I thought about how blessed we are to be living in this country where our list of pet peeves have nothing to do with survival. Things are so good for us we can waste our energy being ticked off about people slowing us down in the lunch line or talking in the movie theater. What we need is a little perspective. I don't want to be the one providing that perspective like I did for the friend when the twins were little. But I also want to remember this lesson when Seth and Eli are home from Iraq. Right now I can push aside life's little irritants, because I've got bigger things to worry about. But when my children are home, safe and settled will I still have that attitude...will I still count my blessings instead of focusing on my pet peeves? I really feel that God is using this experience to make me a better person....I want to remember these lessons.

Boring and Stressful

2007-12-01T09:14:00.000-05:00

We had a Saturday morning phone call from the boys. Life has been a little on the slow side with few missions taking them outside the wire. Seth again spoke of how different this deployment is from his time in Afghanistan. Time on the base can be a little slow and boring, but that contrasts with the stress of going outside the wire. Seth and Eli took second place for their native American presentation. I asked Seth if they were robbed, but he explained that the winning company had a full-blooded Indian and they built a tepee with fire pit and she dressed in traditional garb and led them through a typical day for a Native American in the 1700's. How can two white boys compete with that? The boys continue to sound really good and we're all looking forward to Christmas. Seth did warn us, however, that with the Army nothing is definite until it's done, so leave could still change.

Can Bush walk and Chew Gum?

2007-11-30T12:28:00.000-05:00

Little George has spent the first seven years of his presidency spreading death and destruction throughout the middle east, alienating friends and encouraging foes...quite a feat. Now, after hosting a peace conference in Annapolis, Maryland he seems intent on doing what no other president has had much luck with....bringing peace to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Let's face it, he's not very good at this whole peace thing. When asked if this would be the focus of his last year in office, his current press secretary Dana Perino had this response:

MS. PERINO: There are many -- the President has a full plate, from making sure that America keeps safe from terrorists, ensuring that there are the institutional tools in place for the intelligence community and our law enforcement officials to keep us safe; we have 160,000 troops in Iraq; we have tens of thousands of troops in Afghanistan -- I don't have the exact number off the top of my head.

We have a lot of issues that we're working towards. We are dealing with Iran, in terms of a multilateral effort, in order to solve that situation diplomatically. We're trying to solve the situation in North Korea diplomatically, and we're on that track to do that. We're trying to get Pakistan back on a path to democracy. There are a lot of issues that this White House can focus on, and we can walk and chew gum at the same time.

It's comforting to know that Little George can walk and chew gum at the same time....it's good to know that he has some skill to fall back on when he's no longer president.

Sean Taylor vs Any American Soldier

2007-11-28T07:34:00.000-05:00

There's not much disagreement on the matter.....Sean Taylor was a thug. He was in and out of trouble with the law from a young age and continued his bad-boy image at the University of Miami and with the Washington Redskins. If he hadn't been big, strong and able to run fast, he never would have made it to college and beyond. Taylor grew up in a violent world, embraced it, claimed it, loved to run in it and refused to divorce himself from it. He isn't the first so-called sports hero to have his life and/or career end prematurely and violently. It's terribly sad, but hardly surprising. I want to point out, before people get upset with me, I said "Sean Taylor was a thug." By all accounts he was getting his life straigtened out. I don't know if this is true or simply people saying nice things about the dead. I don't know Sean Taylor....all I know is what I read in the papers and hear on the news. But I do know he wasn't a hero. I'm sorry he died, and I feel bad for his family and friends and his little girl.
An amazing amount of grief has been demonstrated over Sean Taylor's death....where is the grief over our real fallen hero's. People that only know Sean Taylor as a football player have been holding candlelight vigils and speaking about what a terrible loss it is....
You want to see terrible loss? You want to see the death of real hero's? You want to see unspeakable saddness? Go visit this site of honor...see the names, read the biographies of our hero soldiers. Then lets have a talk about Sean Taylor.

Stepping toward Christmas

2007-11-26T08:29:00.000-05:00

Thanksgiving is out of the way and now we're stepping toward Christmas. There's a short story called "The Golden Thread" about a young boy who encounters a witch in the forest one day. As he laments not being allowed to anything and wishing he was older she hands him an egg-shaped ball with a golden thread sticking out the bottom. She tells the boy that the thread is his life. If he wants things to pass quickly by all he needs to do is give the thread a tug and he will find himself down the timeline of his life. Well, predictably enough, the young boy uses the thread to speed past the unpleasant and boring parts of his life. "I wish I were out of school," "I wish it was the weekend....." So on and on! He quickly finds himself at the end of his life realizing that he hadn't really experienced anything. One's life is the sum total of all experiences....good, bad, boring, exciting.
I find myself in the boy's situation. Seth and Eli will depart Iraq on Christmas Day heading home for leave! It's hard not to wish the next five weeks over as quickly as possible and the next 6 months finished! I'm continuing the process of being molded into a more patient, positive individual. I just wish I could hurry up and get there!

2007-11-25T07:58:00.001-05:00

2007-11-23T19:58:00.000-05:00

Thanksgiving has come and gone, but giving thanks continues on a routine basis. Seth and Eli enjoyed Thanksgiving day on the base, but left the next morning for a quick trip outside the wire. We know that they're back inside, so thanksgiving continues. It's always good to know they're back and safe. Katy and Brittany joined us for Thanksgiving dinner and my thoughts throughout the day were primarily in the past and in the future. I remembered holidays past with the boys...and looked forward to future holidays with the entire family. I am constantly reminded to keep my head up and my eyes on the horizon.....

Camp Korea?....email from Eli

2007-11-23T19:56:00.000-05:00

Dear friends and family,

Seth and I got back last weekend from spending several days at a place called CKV (Camp Korean Village), which is up by the Syrian border. I thought since we have a strong contingent of South Korean military in the Coalitions Forces that maybe this was where they were based.....nope. Not sure why the name was what it was for this small base....but one of the Marines we asked that was stationed there said it was named by Marines...so who knows?
The drive to CKV was long...for several reasons. The first reason is simply because it is several hundred miles from Al Asad to CKV..and several hundred miles in Iraq is a very very long trip. Usually we spend most our our trips on unimproved roads where it is slow going, but one of the good things about this trip is we were on a four lane highway for most of the way. The other reason it was a long trip was because of the size of our convoy. We were attached to an 82nd Airborne convoy with over 200 vehicles. We were transporting TCN (third country nationals). Most of these men were Arabic and we only had a handful of interpreters, so there was a language barrier. What was impressive and reassuring about rolling with the 82nd and this size of a convoy was we had air support with us the whole way. At one point we came to unexpected stop (it turned out a TCN truck had rolled over) and all the sudden we saw from our vehicle a helicopter from each side of the road come swooping down to see what the problem was. I have no problems going on a convoy with over 200 vehicles if we have air support with us.
The drive took 12 hours. We did not get to CKV until the evening, and we had the next day off before we went back out. The weather was cool at CKV, as the high during the day only got up into the 60s. During our rest day we all huddled around a computer and watched the movie We Are Marshall and we also watched some episodes from Planet Earth, which just shows that infantrymen enjoy an educational experience every now and then. After watching We Are Marshall we were all in the mood for some football, so we went out to where our gun trucks were parked, got ourselves a couple cases of non-alcoholic Coors, put some country music on the speakers we have rigged up to one of the trucks, and just relaxed and threw football. It felt like a perfect fall afternoon......the weather, the company, drinking near-beer, listening to Brooks and Dunn, and throwing football, everything was good except the location.....in Iraq and a matter of miles from the Syrian border.
We were supposed to be going out on a mission tomorrow, Thanksgiving, but our mission got rescheduled, so instead of eating an MRE tomorrow we get to enjoy some turkey. It won't be as good as my mom's thanksgiving spread.....but none of the food over here is as good as home. We still have work tomorrow. I have a briefing at 8:30, am organizing a new shipment of medical supplies we just got in, going to the TMC (troop medical clinic) to pick up an order and drop off an order to the optometrist.......just another day in the life of a medic.
Katy has her last day of work today at Village Grill where she has been waitressing for the past four months, and she is going to spend the month of December babysitting her nephew, Charlie, who was born in September to her brother and sister-in-law, Sam and Elizabeth Herr. She has been very eager to spend some time with her nephew, so this will be great for her. She starts graduate school in January, so she will become a very busy person...hopefully she'll have time to talk to me on the phone as that i the highlight of my days. I will hopefully get to see my lovely wife soon as it looks like Seth and I will be home on leave sometime shortly after Christmas.
I thought I would share some updates from the war front and the home front. I hope you all enjoy a wonderful thanksgiving and know that what I am the most thankful for, over here and when I am at home, is my family and friends. So, enjoy your turkey, go Packers, go Cowboys, and go UVA! Take care!
Love,
Eli

They Did Good!

2007-11-20T11:11:00.000-05:00

Got an early morning call from the boys to report that their presentation on Ira Hayes was well received. Alcolades from everyone including the bigwigs....This is a copy of an email Seth sent to his Uncle Tom:
We did a presentation on a Native American named Ira Hayes, who helped to raise the flag at Iwo Jima. We did a power point talking about him and his life, and then we put together a slid show on Windows Movie Maker that showed pictures of his life and the flag raising. The slide show had an old Johnny Cash song as the background music, the song was about Ira Hayes called "The Ballad of Ira Hayes." It was a competition that was actually judged by the Division Commander and the Division Command Seargent Major. There were also a number of other high ranking officers there to watch. There were eleven other companies that were represented and did presentations as well. ! When it was all over the Seargent Major came up to Eli and I and told us it was the best presentation he had ever seen, and that we had his vote for first place. He then gave us each one of his coins, which in the military is a big deal. Eli and I were very pleased with the response we got, and enjoyed doing the presentation. It was nice to have something to work on over here.

Just another day in paradise.........

2007-11-20T07:38:00.000-05:00

A couple of myths about Thanksgiving:
1. The Pilgrims celebrated the original Thanksgiving in November....just like we do. That first celebration was probably sometime between September 21 and November 11. It was quite a celebration however as it lasted for three whole days! The Pilgrims probably based their celebration on their old English harvest festival which was usually held on September 29.
2. Thanksgiving was celebrated every year after the original feast. Abaham Lincoln made Thanksgiving a national holiday in 1863 with his Thanksgiving Proclamation (only slightly less famous than his Emmancipation Proclamation and his Let's Go to the Theater Proclamation!) Franklin D. Roosevelt set the fourth Thursday in Novermber would be celebrated as Thanksgiving.
3. The Pilgrims invented Thanksgiving. Many civilizations have celebrated harvest festivals for hundreds of years. In the Middle East, people offered wheat to the "Mother of Wheat." During the middle ages Europeans celbrated the Feast of Saint Martin on November 11 giving thanks for the harvest. The Aztecs celebrated a corn goddess. Honoring the harvest is a tradition that spans many cultures.
4. The Pilgrims were celebrating a bountiful harvest....actually, NO. The harvest of 1621 was pretty miserable. However, the Pilgrims were thankful to be alive. I once read a quote that said the Pilgrims made seven times more graves than huts. No Americans have been more impoverished than these who, nevertheless, set aside a day of thanksgiving

This will be our second Thanksgiving with a son in a combat zone. When Seth served in Afghanistan we had an empty seat at our table. This year we'll have two empty seats but I'll still be thankful. I'm thankful for my sons..all three of them. They have always made me proud. Not because of accomplishments or anything they have done. I'm proud of them because of what they hold in their hearts. This Thanksgiving I'll be grateful for all my family and friends that support us with thoughts and prayers. I'll be thankful for all the men serving with Seth and Eli and the bonds of trust and friendship that are being formed.
And something to think about on this eve of Thanksgiving.....Grace isn't something to utter or chant before your meal....it's a way to live. I've been challenged lately to live a life full of grace and I thank God for that challenge. I would like to think I'm being molded into a more patient, appreciative person. The work in progress continues. A very Happy Thanksgiving to one and all!
Seth and Eli will enjoy Thankgiving at Al Asad before heading outside the wire on a weekend mission.

Correcting the old man

2007-11-19T18:48:00.001-05:00

What follows is an email from Eli, correcting a few of my mistakes....

Since I love reading your blog and I check it almost daily I noticed a few errors in your thing about Ira Hayes....first of all this was mine and Seth's idea to do the presentation on Ira Hayes inspired by both reading the book, Flags of our Fathers. We were told to do something creative talking about Native Americans and their contributions to our military, and we decided to just talk about this story. Now, John Bradley did not take the picture, it was Joe Rosenthal who was an AP photographer and just happened in a 1/40th of a second capture that picture. When he sent the film off he didn't even know if he had taken any shots. John Bradley was a navy corpsman who was one of the six, not five, flag raisers. The first flagraising was done ceremoniously with the men posing and what not. Then, one of the marine commanders decided he wanted that flag to hold on to, so they sent another group to put a second flag up. They hoisted the second flag up the same time they took the first one down, and Joe Rosenthal just happened to capture that frame. He actually thought he had missed the kodak moment. Most people did not even realize that the six men who were in the photograph were part of the second flag raising, none of them were a part of the first. However, its images and not deeds sometimes that capture the public and that was surely the case here. I am sending you the slide show we did, a frustrating process with our internet connection and trying to download pictures and movies to put in here (none of the movie clips worked out) but I ended up learning how to use movie maker and had a lot of fun with it. Let me know if you got it and were able to open it. By the way, I have and always will think of you as my hero. I am very lucky to have both you and mom in my life and look up to the two of you very much. I love you.
Eli

Still helping with homework.....from 8,000 miles away

2007-11-19T07:39:00.000-05:00

The Army likes to celebrate diversity.......at least that's how it appears. Seth and Eli's company celebrates diversity by focusing on a different person, race, culture, gender - whatever - every so often. Different soldiers are asked to make some kind of presentation to help highlight the accomplishments of different people or groups of people. Seth and Eli were asked to do a presentation on Ira Hayes, a Pima Indian from Arizona whose claim to fame was helping raise the American flag on Iwo Jima. As they've prepared a power point presentation I've had numerous phone calls:
Can you help us find some pictures?
Can you download this song for us and email to us?
How do you insert a song into power point?
Would it be better to use Movie Maker?
8,000 miles from home and I'm still helping them with their homework! Actually it's been kind of interesting learning about Ira Hayes and thinking about what makes someone a hero. Ira's story is truly a tragic one. You can tell it's a tragic story because they made a country music song out of it sung by Johnny Cash.
Born Ira Hamilton Hayes in 1923 on the Pima Indian Reservation in Arizona, he dropped out of school and joined the marines in 1942. Life on the reservation was tough by any description and Ira saw the marines and the war as a way to better himself and help his family. On February 19, 1945 Ira took part in the landing on Iwo Jima and the assult on Mount Suribachi. On February 23, Ira helped raise the American flag on the top of Mount Suribachi. Two days later the same group of five men raised the flag a second time so photographer John Bradley could capture the event. Of the five men that raised the flag, Ira and two others survived the battle for Iwo Jima. The three men were hailed as hero's and brought back to the United States to help sell war bonds.
Ira was wined and dined, toasted as a hero when in fact he felt nothing like a hero. He was only a guy who helped raise a flag and watched his comrades die. He was just lucky to be alive when so many had died. Ira turned to alcohol to dull the pain. After the war he tried to lead a normal life, but didn't have much luck. People continued to seek him out as the hero who raised the flag. He appeared in the John Wayne movie "Sands of Iwo Jima" playing himself raising the flag. An interesting aside...the movie used the flag that was actually raised on Mount Suribachi. Referring to his alcoholism, he once said: "I was sick. I guess I was about to crack up thinking about all my good buddies. They were better men than me and they're not coming back. Much less back to the White House, like me." After the war, Hayes accumulated a record of some fifty arrests for drunkenness. On January 24, 1955, Hayes was found dead, face down and lying in his own vomit and blood, near an abandoned hut close to his home on the Gila River Indian Reservation.

The story of Ira Hayes got me thinking about what a hero is. Ira was hailed as a hero for simply raising a flag. If it hadn't been for that photograph nobody would have noticed this Indian from Arizona....he never would have been called a hero. But he was a hero. Not because he raised a flag, but because he served his country. Seth and Eli are my hero's....they chose to do something to help their community. What does it take to be a hero....it's a larger view of the world than simply what's happening to me and what's important to me. I'm proud to say that I'm surrounded by hero's. Friends and family that care about and for others. Don't talk to me about football hero's or celebrities. I really don't care what Brittany what's her-name is up to. I have a different definition of who is important and what is important.

The Ballad Of Ira Hayes

[CHORUS:]
Call him drunken Ira Hayes
He won't answer anymore
Not the whiskey drinkin' Indian
Nor the Marine that went to war

Gather round me people there's a story I would tell
About a brave young Indian you should remember well
From the land of the Pima Indian
A proud and noble band
Who farmed the Phoenix valley in Arizona land

Down the ditches for a thousand years
The water grew Ira's peoples' crops
'Till the white man stole the water rights
And the sparklin' water stopped

Now Ira's folks were hungry
And their land grew crops of weeds
When war came, Ira volunteered
And forgot the white man's greed

[CHORUS:]
Call him drunken Ira Hayes
He won't answer anymore
Not the whiskey drinkin' Indian
Nor the Marine that went to war

There they battled up Iwo Jima's hill,
Two hundred and fifty men
But only twenty-seven lived to walk back down again

And when the fight was over
And when Old Glory raised
Among the men who held it high
Was the Indian, Ira Hayes

[CHORUS:]
Call him drunken Ira Hayes
He won't answer anymore
Not the whiskey drinkin' Indian
Nor the Marine that went to war

Ira returned a hero
Celebrated through the land
He was wined and speeched and honored; Everybody shook his hand

But he was just a Pima Indian
No water, no crops, no chance
At home nobody cared what Ira'd done
And when did the Indians dance

[CHORUS:]
Call him drunken Ira Hayes
He won't answer anymore
Not the whiskey drinkin' Indian
Nor the Marine that went to war

Then Ira started drinkin' hard;
Jail was often his home
They'd let him raise the flag and lower it
like you'd throw a dog a bone!

He died drunk one mornin'
Alone in the land he fought to save
Two inches of water in a lonely ditch
Was a grave for Ira Hayes

[CHORUS:]
Call him drunken Ira Hayes
He won't answer anymore
Not the whiskey drinkin' Indian
Nor the Marine that went to war

Yeah, call him drunken Ira Hayes
But his land is just as dry
And his ghost is lyin' thirsty
In the ditch where Ira died

Guarding the potty

2007-11-16T17:15:00.000-05:00

I've had a number of people ask me about the picture of soldiers guarding the Portapotties..........really happened! Someone wrote something in a portapotty that the commanding officer took offense at. His punishment....make Seth and Eli's platoon stand guard 24/7 until everybody had a chance at this shitty assignment. All he wants is a little RESPECT.

Good News, Bad News, Maybe No News....

2007-11-16T17:04:00.000-05:00

It's been kind of a slow week at Lovellsoldiers. Not much news to report. I do know that Seth and Eli are running around somewhere outside the wire (up North is the word I get) and hopefully will return to Al Asad this weekend. We live for those phone calls when we know they've been on a sightseeing trip. It's always a relief to know that they're safe and sound. In a previous post I noted that plans seem to be underway for leave in December...well hold on now...you know that in the Army nothing is definite until its over and done with. There seems to be some indication that their replacements are ahead of schedule and may be arriving in March. At least that's the word from the battalion commander. If replacements do indeed arrive in March nobody really knows what that means. Do our boys come home early? Your guess is as good as mine. The big "IF".....if their orders are changed to come home earlier than expected then there won't be any leaves granted. Of course, I don't put it past the Army to not give leave AND keep them in Iraq until July.
Now here's the kicker. If Seth and Eli came home in June or July they would be out of the National Guard before they would be eligible for another deployment, BUT if they come home in March or April they could conceivably be deployed again before getting out in May 2008.
My advice....pay no attention to the man behind the curtain pulling all those levers and making all that noise. What will happen will happen. Right now we've got bigger things to worry about - like just getting the hell out of Iraq with all limbs and emotional stability intact.

Guarding the Potty and other pics

2007-11-12T10:48:00.001-05:00

What's a commanding officer to do when someone disses you by writing on the portapotty wall that you're bipolar? Apparently it calls for a command decision....guard the portapotty.

All the comforts of home....if your home is the top of an ASV!

Eli with Haditha Dam in the background

Most recent email from Seth

2007-11-11T19:09:00.001-05:00

Dear Family and Friends,

Just a few random thoughts from Al Anbar:

Today Eli and I both received combat patches for serving in a combat zone for
over thirty days. It is my second combat patch, but it is still meaningful. Our
Battalion Commander and Battalion Sergeant Major came to talk with us about the
importance of this day and our service. They also wanted to wish up a happy
veteran’s day, a holiday that will carry significance for us for the rest of our
lives.

Yesterday was the Marine Corps Birthday, they were founded in 1775. Every year
they have a big to do when their birthday comes around. They had steak, lobster
tails, Cornish hen, and all kinds of other treats in the chow hall. Not to
mention music being played, a huge display of carved fruits, and the statue of
the flag raising at Iwo Jima. But to top it all off they had beer at dinner for
everyone… except for us. Our group Battalion Commander (who is a Muslim) did not
believe that we should be drinking alcohol, so forbade us to do it. Some of the senior leadership here really knows how to crash a party and stomp
out morale.

I enjoy talking politics with random people in our unit because it is nice to
hear the opinions of other people. Some times I say things just to hear what
kind of response I get. I recently asked one of my fellow soldiers from the
101st airborne what he thought about the possibility of Hillary Clinton and
Barrack Obama being president and vice president, his exact response was, “I
don’t think a woman and a black Muslim should be allowed to rule the United
States of America.” I hope this soldier does not represent the majority of
Americans, especially since Obama is a Christian. A little disturbing to think
about how uninformed some voters truly are.

Our last patrol was the longest that I have had to drive an ASV in one day. We
spent eleven hours straight driving. By the end of the trip I was extremely sore
and tired. After eleven hours you would think that we would of ended up in some
distant region near Iraq’s border. The truth is eleven hours of driving took us approximately ten miles from
Al Asad. Where we were sleeping we could see the lights of the base. We had to
cross the Euphrates, and the only accessible route that wasn’t damaged was all
the way up north at the Haditha damn. The bridge that should have given us
access to the outpost we were heading to had been destroyed sometime last year.
There is no doubt when driving around Iraq that this is a country at war.

I miss home everyday, but some days are worse then others. Days with
significance make me think of home the most, days such as birthdays, holidays,
anniversaries, and other special occasions. This past Friday was mine and
Brittany’s five-year anniversary since our first date. I would of loved to have
been at home taking my beautiful wife out for a celebration of our time
together, instead I just sent her flowers. Five years ago, when I was seventeen
and Brittany was fifteen, we went out to Scotto’s for a pizza, and what would be
the start of a wonderful relationship. We were joking on the phone about how the next five years
will be so much better, because I will actually be home for more than half of
them. I’m a lucky man to have such a wonderful wife.

I hope this e-mail finds you all doing well and enjoying your weekend. Take care
and I look forward to talking to you all soon,

Lots of Love from Iraq,
Seth

Feel good story.......not so feel good story

2007-11-10T07:48:00.000-05:00

Here's two related stories. First I watched a story on Good Morning America the other day about the money that is being donated by people to help our veterans and our military. Bottom line in the story is that there are a lot of good organizations soliciting money and doing good work. Unfortunately there are a number of organizations and people who are taking money primarily for themselves. Here's a link to the story and the list of national organizations that get a grade of "F" for failing to earn our trust. A not so feel good story if there ever was one.
Now to the Feel Good. I am constantly amazed and uplifted by the generosity of people. People who just want to help and just want our servicemen and women know that they are appreciated. Meredith is the wife of a soldier in Seth and Eli's platoon. She and Brittany have become friends through this shared ordeal. Meredith was concerned about the sleeping conditions for our soldiers.....lumpy mattresses that have already been heavily used, no pillows unless you brought one with you...things we take for granted, but mean something to a weary soldier. Meredith made up some posters and along with Brittany posted them around Harrisonburg and the hospital where Brittany works....they asked for help sending mattress toppers, mattress pad covers and pillows to our soldiers. The upshot of all this is this week Meredith and Brittany sent 40 boxes to Meredith's husband...one box for each soldier in the platoon. The boxes contain things to make their sleep just a little more comfortable..not just physically comfortable, but emotionally comfortable knowing that so many people are caring about them and loving them - sometimes total strangers, but caring for them. Sweet Dreams indeed!

A Subway is a Subway is a Subway.....NOT

2007-11-09T08:23:00.000-05:00

I spent enjoyable half hour or so yesterday afternoon talking with Seth. That conversation was followed by an early morning call this morning from Eli. The boys had been out on a mission and when Seth called yesterday they had just returned. They had delivered supplies to a distant FOB (Forward Operating Base) spending the night there before returning. It is a small FOB and Eli spent the night in the ASV while Seth slept on top of his ASV. Today, after sleeping in until 10 AM they ran some errands going to the PX to pick up some things and Seth went to get a haircut. Apparently he's tired of Eli cutting his his hair and wanted something different....how different can you get when you have no hair? He wanted to get a fade, which is different from a high and tight which is different from Eli's buzz cut.
They enjoyed lunch at the Subway today. Maybe "enjoyed" is too strong a word. Subway in Iraq is a little different from Subway in Fishersville! What good is teriyaki chicken without teriyaki sauce? And how can you not have pork products? One kind of cheese, eight different subs.....a lack of choices, but it's still Subway and a nice change of pace. A day off today, light duty tomorrow, off on Sunday except for attending a ceremony to receive Combat Infantry Badges then a probable mission next week.

The morality police take aim at the Pentagon

2007-11-05T12:16:00.000-05:00

Every time I stray from my goal of being news and politics free I feel the need to apologize. I know some of my reader's are devout Republicans...heck some of you may even be card carrying members of the morality police. But I've always believed that even Republicans like a little porn now and then....especially in the privacy of your own bedroom. Anyway, sometimes I come across a little tidbit of news that just too good not to comment on. This piece of news strikes home because here in Staunton we're dealing with our own "Porn" issue.
According to an article in USA Today, dozens of religious and anti-pornography groups have complained to Congress and Defense Secretary Robert Gates that military bases are selling adult fare such as Penthouse and Playboy. Now this is a problem because ten years ago, our Republican majority in Congress banned the sale of sexually explicit material on military bases. Believe it or not, the Pentagon has a committee to review material to see if it is sexually explicit. They say they use appropriate guidelines to review materials for sale. What we have is a difference of opinion. The pentagon's Resale Activities Board of Review says Pentahouse and Playboy are not sexually explicit.....I don't know about you, but in the days when I read Playboy (taken from under my father's bed) I was reading the articles, not looking at pictures. Based on my experiences I would have to agree with the Board of Review.....However, Donald Wildmon, head of the American Family Association, thinks otherwise....he's supporting our troops by watching out for their moral failings.
Now this is interesting stuff to me because Staunton just got its first porn store a couple of weeks ago. It's a huge deal, with the local Republican party making this into a campaign issue and some straight-laced, tight-lipped local women hosting protests. Our Commonwealth Attorney is indicting the store owner and vows to run this store out of town. I'm just glad to know that we have no other pressing issues so our Commonwealth's Attorney has time to devote to this important issue. It's almost as if we don't have any shootings, rapes, drug or gang activity to worry about.
What's wrong with people when the only thing they have to worry about is what someone else is watching or reading behind closed doors.