Well, another day in the life for me here. I swear, I am living the ground hog day movie. Every day, I wake up and life carries on the same way as the day before. It's hard to keep track of the day and I'm always sure it's Monday, or at least that's what it feels like. I wake up at the same time, only to fall asleep and wake up 3 minutes later. I even fall asleep at exactly the same time. I eat the same meals and I see the same faces. I have the same routine when I get to work.

And even despite all of that, I'm thinking about staying here for a little bit longer. I would like to say it’s because I love the scenery and the people (which isn’t a lie) but quite honestly, I'm kind of afraid of coming home. I know that I still have everything there... family... friends... the works. But I'm afraid to come home to place that has changed and well, knowing that I have changed too. It's pretty scary just thinking about transitioning back to civilian life. Every morning I wake up and reach to make sure my rifle is still laying beside me, and I can't picture a life right now that I don't sleep with my rifle or that I don't instantly reach into my pocket to put on my "cover" or a hat. I can’t imagine waking up to a loud noise and not thinking it is anything but a mortar attack.

I think that I just feel like I’ve spent so much time away leading an abnormal life compared to my peers, going back and being normal just seems scary right now. I know that I wanted to carve my own path and go through life in my own way. That's not to say that it is always on the back of my mind that the rest of my friends back home are going back to their sophomore year of college this week, and they have already started their lives. When they turn 20 this year, they will be in their sophomore year of college and will know where their life is going. They'll have decided their major and the like. And me well, I’m still in limbo because I haven't had the opportunity to start the rest of my life. I turn 20 in November, and I have no idea where I'll end up, what I'll be doing when I rejoin the real world. And well, they, they have a pretty good idea that they will be the best teachers and nurses out there (I have no doubt that they will excel in anything they do). And while they move forward with their lives, I make corrections on reports about tactics that are killing U.S. soldiers. While they calculate mathematical equations in their classes, I’m sitting here calculating the casualties of an explosion that occurred on the next FOB over. And while they fall asleep in their beds from a long day of school work and other things that occupy their day, my eyes and ears stay alert. Even when I’m drifting off to sleep I can hear the faint sound of a missile, real or imagined. It’s the darndest thing.

And for some reason, I just can’t get myself to apply to any schools. For the longest time, I couldn't figure out why I was resisting applying... because it was something that I thought I had wanted for myself. And I sent one of my best friends an e-mail of other plans I was looking into and this is what Courtney said to me:

"… And to be quite honest it's hard for me to picture you in college (that's probably not because you aren't supposed to be there, more just because you have never taken a normal route in life, and Jack I love that about you)…After the life you have been living and are going to be living in the next couple months, it's hard to think that you could just go back to a college type life style..."

I know that I’m not alone in feeling like my life has yet to start. There are other people here, like my friend Prince, who has yet to start his life. I know this because one night he wrote this to me:

“And, if I may ask, did you have a college first tag that you waived to go on this deployment? Because I did, and sometimes I worries me. In six months I shall be 20, see, and then, well I won't be a teenager no more. I'll just be a young man with no college education, working an entry level job in a faceless corporation. You know, I took this deployment because I didn't want to go through the whole big-fish-in-a-suddenly-large-ocean thing when I went to Bard College and its rich kids private school thing, and, because I assume you also chose to forgo some awesome college for a while, I'm asking if you ever, uh, well think that you're missing out or falling behind the curve on the whole "path" to yuppie-American success? Because I do. I think about a lot of things, though, so maybe I'm just crazy. Also: Did you know that if you put your PIN number into an ATM machine, you might get the HIV virus?”

I guess I have a lot of decisions to make in the next couple of months. And I know that no matter what I decide, I’ll have all the support I’ve ever needed in Minnesota. I think just writing this puts things into perspective for me, and just helps me to get my thoughts in order. Thanks for listening to me ramble.



<3 Jacki