The end is near

I am retiring from the US Army. I have been doing this for about 21 years and it is time to end a great career. I have been in three wars and I am getting to the point that when I get up in the morning I feel all my bones telling me that it is time to retire.
My life since the war has been very busy. We are getting all our equipment from the ports, getting it in shape for the next time we have to go somewhere.
War has become a part of my dreams. There are not bad dreams, just very vivid and full of stories. Once I was dreaming that I was playing soccer with the Iraqis, on a corner kick I went up for a header and the Iraqi was pulling on my shirt, so I elbowed the Iraqi player and I didn't score the goal. Next morning my wife tells me that she had a bruise on her butt.
Another time, according to my wife, I was sleep walking around the bed and hit something with my foot. Next morning I felt a sharp pain on one of my toes and saw that it was purple and felt broken.
It is very hard for me to sleep through the night and the only time that I sleep well is when I am so exhausted that my body collapses on the bed.
A few weeks ago my friends, who were in Iraq also, and I were outside around a chimenea drinking beer when from a couple kilometers away came loud explosions. It was right at 10 PM so we knew that it was what we call Time On Target (TOT). It was the National Guard firing their artillery in a training Exercise. All our wives looked at us for a reaction and a "flash back." There was none and we just kept drinking and telling stories.
My friends and I are just trying to live the best we can with what we have learned over the last year or so. As bad as I had it over in Iraq at the jail, there are friends that were in worst places. Some of them were hit with IEDs five or six times. One of my officers lost three HUMMVs to IEDs, but never a soldier.
Everybody has something that will hunt them for the rest of their lives. In my case I think it will be the fact that I grew to love my Iraqi friends and I left them. I lost soldiers and I lost Iraqi friends. One Iraqi friend, Hassan, gave me a cross two days before he was killed. I will guard that cross as long as I live. Another friend had two young boys and wanted to have them married my two little girls. I said yes to him and, as a joke, I told my wife to get the girls ready for marriage. He was also killed in the same attack.
Once I collected all the body parts of the suicide bomber in a bag, I placed slices of bacon inside with a cross and a book of christian prayers. A few days later I heard that some dogs had eaten the remains of the suicide bomber.

Thanks for letting me vent.


AMERICA I love you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!