They leave in daylight and return home at dark. This is supposed to help them leave what is grueling behind them.
Bradley stood up at the table in Outback Steakhouse in Sebring, Florida, on my 39th birthday, as if to make a toast to me, the one who gave him life. But instead he said he had an announcement that would change our lives. My delicious medium-rare prime rib and a succulent baked potato oozing with butter and sour cream sat on my plate in front of me. All I could hear was the sound of my daughter shifting in her seat next to me, my husband taking a deep breath, someone at the table swallowing, dishes clanging in the kitchen, and Bradley clearing his throat. I noticed he had gotten his hair cut that day and not by me, which struck me as strange, as I was the only one who cut his hair. He had on my favorite shirt of his, an orange-and-white striped polo, and jeans. From somewhere down the table, Papa Hicks said, “Let him speak. Come on, the anticipation is killing me down here.” Bradley announced that he had joined the United States Army for five years as a military police officer. I could not breathe: the last few bites of my dinner were getting cold. So many scenarios ran through my mind. Is he going to go to war, is he going to be okay? When will I be able to see him, talk to him? I had not gone one day without seeing him since his birth, what was I going to do without him. He was my rock, the one I could count on in times of need. A shoulder to cry on. What was he thinking? We were in the middle of Operation Iraq Freedom.
He was sworn in a month later at the age of 19. As we stood there in St. Petersburg, Florida, at the MEPS station and watched him recite the Pledge of Allegiance and take his oath of office, I had tears swimming in my eyes. My baby really was leaving. In January 2008 he completed his basic and specialized training at Fort Lenardwood, Missouri, where the snowflakes were the size of a small dinner plate. This was the first time he had ever seen snow. We flew into Missouri the day before graduation to avoid being snowed in and rented a van and stayed in a hotel about five miles outside of the base. The next morning there were icicles the size of lightsabers hanging off the van and ice at least four inches thick on the windshield. We nearly missed the graduation, but made it just in time.
They showed a video of all the soldiers entering a makeshift gas chamber; they went in with a gas mask on and were told to remove the mask and stay in the building as long as they could stand it. I kept watching to see my son come out, still nothing, now I’m panicking and asking my husband, “Where is Bradley?” Finally he comes out with two other boys laughing and exiting with tears, snot, and spit flowing. Naturally he had to be one of the last just to prove he could stay the longest.
The very next day he was to pack up and report to Fort Stewart, Georgia, his first duty station. From there, one day he called to inform me he was being deployed in one week. I was in shock sitting at my desk at work, staring at the wall, not able to utter a single word because there was a knot in my throat. I tried holding back my tears that were certain to flow any minute. As a single teardrop hit my desk calendar, my only thought was that my only son was going off to war to fight for the very freedom I took for granted every day.
When the dreaded day came, my family loaded up in the vehicle to head for what might be the last time we would be able to hug Bradley. There were bleachers set up for fellowshiping with our soldiers and other families going through the same anxiety we were, easing each other into the moment that we would say good-bye for one year or maybe the last time. I didn’t want to let Bradley go. His sisters clung to his shirttail. His eyes were red-rimmed. He didn’t want to leave us either. It was so hard not to show emotion to make it easier on him. There were not enough hugs to prepare for what we were about to experience. The platoons, dressed in sand-colored desert digital camo, were called to order and one by one the soldiers left their families to line up in formation. I could not believe the actual moment had come, and the tears flowed like twin rivers down my cheeks. Throughout the deployment ceremony, many high ranking soldiers gave words of encouragement to families and soldiers alike, and the chaplain prayed over the platoons. Finally, the soldiers got in full battle gear and marched off to board a Blue Bird bus ready to embark on a one-year deployment in Iraq. There is nothing more painful than watching a child march off to war.
We were able to mail letters and care packages. The letters were kept light since I didn’t want to sound down. I always let him know how his sisters were doing and what was going on with them. We sent pictures in abundance so he wouldn’t miss a single event. In the care packages I sent boxes of Charmin with aloe (a necessity), Slim Jims, homemade cookies and brownies, Udder hand cream, tons of chapstick (every flavor), bottles of Gatorade, Hershey bars, Reese’s peanut butter cups, Jolly Ranchers, M&M’s, Starlite mints, Tootsie Rolls and pops, and Starbursts. The post office had a flat rate on the boxes as long as they were going to a soldier. Bradley and his entire company enjoyed the goodies each week as they were unable to get these things where they were. This was the one way I could make him and his buddies feel like they were home, though far from it.
The only visual form of communication was Skype once a week on Sundays for about ten minutes. Every Sunday, I sat on the edge of my seat at the pub table in the dining room with the laptop sitting on the wooden tv tray next to the internet router to get optimal signal. Facing me, the screen was set up on the Skype home page waiting for the signal that Bradley was calling. During one of our calls, I heard mortars going off. Bradley ignored it as if it was not happening, then I heard yelling “get down get down” then total blackness. I sat in a folding chair trying to figure out what just happened. I wanted to sit there in the same spot until the connection resumed. I looked up on the wall where a picture hung: my three children, Bradley, Amanda, and Amber, looking back at me with smiles on their faces. But the connection was lost and I had no idea what happened.
I tried to reach out to the Red Cross to see if there was any word about what might be going on at FOB Normandy, to no avail. For the next seven days every time there was a knock at the door I feared it was the men in dress greens coming to tell me my son was gone. The following Sunday when I heard knock, knock, knock on Skype it was the most wonderful sight to see my son in one piece smiling like everything was fine. If I could have reached him I would have shaken him until he realized that I was on the brink of a breakdown waiting to see his face. I know he shielded me from the worst of it so I wouldn’t worry. He said, “Oh it was nothing, Mom, just a couple of mortars going off in the distance.” But I knew good and well that I heard them right outside of the underground shelter he was staying in. This went on for 48 more Sundays.
One year later I stood in the same exact spot where I had said good-bye to Bradley; now, I waited to see my boy come home. Behind the bleachers in the pitch black forest thick with fog, one by one the soldiers who made it home safely emerged like phantoms, no longer boys but men. It was difficult to remain in the stands as they rounded the field and joined again in formation as the lieutenant major welcomed each and every soldier back. I searched the crowd of soldiers, not able to see my son, and then his eyes looked right at me. There he was smiling at me, and I cried tears of joy and relief. When the platoons were dismissed there was a flood of bodies on the field, some in uniform, most in civilian clothes. I am not sure that I have ever hugged my son so tight. I feared he was a mirage or that he might leave me again. He was in fact real in my arms. I didn’t want to let him go.
This ritual is supposed to help them leave the grueling battlefield behind them. They leave in daylight and return home at dark.
