A SOLDIER'S STORY
A Letter Home
By
Franke Gracia
Dear Uncle Art,
I sure did think the transition from a hostile, dangerous environment to a safe, secure one was going to be easy, but I was dead wrong. Instead of being deliriously happy like I expected, I feel mostly confused, and lost.
For example, why doesn’t my brother drive down the middle of the road like he’s supposed to? To lessen the impact of an IED. And why doesn’t he drive faster? That’ll make the timing more difficult for the IED triggerman. And how could he just drive by that dead animal on the side of the road like that? Doesn’t he know we’re supposed to stop and pull security while our gunner uses his binos to check for wires coming out of that carcass?
I’m confused. Uncle Art, I’m having trouble sleeping, and I feel lost all the time. I listen to the news and hear reports of casualties overseas mentioned ever so briefly, usually as the last item, almost as an afterthought – “Oh, by the way, three more soldiers died, but don’t let it ruin your day or anything. We’re just kind of obligated to report it.”
And I was reading a Dallas newspaper recently and found the story of two soldiers killed in Afghanistan buried far in the back pages. Just a blurb. A few lines. About the same importance as the latest on Brittney Spears, or maybe which apprentice got canned. I hear folks say that the news of casualties from overseas is just too depressing. I’m confused. I suppose we should tell families when their loved one loses his life in the defense of his country not to make too big a deal about it – it’s too depressing for everyone else.
Uncle Art, why does it seem to me that only a few are doing the sacrificing and the fighting, the bleeding and the dying, while the rest of America goes on about its business, oblivious. More worried about “American Idol” and the price of gas than the price in blood we are paying overseas?
Uncle Art, I’m confused when people say we’ve got to fight over there so we don’t have to fight here. I thought the war on terrorism was being fought here in America too, every second of every hour of every day, in the living rooms and kitchens of tens of thousands of families with loved ones in harm’s way.
Uncle Art, I sure don’t know how to relate to people who vigorously call for fighting and sacrifice – provided of course they’re not the ones that have to do it.
I’m so confused Uncle Art. Maybe you can explain to me why my commander-in-chief tells the insurgents to “bring ‘em on” from his safe air-conditioned office, while ordinary Joes with parents that have no connections to get them easy duty have to bust down doors, not knowing what’s on the other side. Or drive their Hummer down IED alley.
And Uncle Art, it sure is hard to respect a man who repeatedly decided he had “other priorities” more important than serving his country in uniform. And why does my Secretary of Defense have to be told that if I had taken the big dirt nap in Afghanistan it was not OK to send my family a form letter? I’m not too bright Uncle Art. Things like that tend to confuse me.
Uncle Art, I feel lost. I feel like I want to buy a cabin out in the middle of nowhere and just get away from everything and everybody. Maybe take up drinking and smoking, quit shaving, get a double-barreled shotgun and some torn T-shirts and do it right. Uncle Art, did you feel that way when you came back from Korea? Alone in your own country? Uneasy and uncomfortable around even your closest family and friends?
Mom told me your health had not been good lately, and I was deeply saddened at the news of your passing just as I returned stateside. It’s almost as if you held on long enough just to know that I was safe home again. Well Uncle Art, I’m sure not confused about one thing. I feel closer to you now more than ever before, even in death, now that we are both veterans of our own respective forgotten wars.
This will be hard, Uncle Art.
Overseas, I had no time to think about anything but my mission and my troops. Maybe that was a good thing, because now I have plenty of time to think about other things, and it’s very confusing. I don’t even recognize that fella in the mirror anymore. I hope it will just take time. I hope. I sure do miss you Uncle Art.
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Franke Gracia lives in Temple, Texas and was deployed in Afghanistan with the National Guard from May 2005 to April 2006. He is a math professor at Temple College and is very close to his family that includes two brothers and two sisters. He earned a bronze star while he was deployed, which he gave to his mother. As to why he decided to write this series of articles he says, "I hope folks who read my scribbling will gain a greater appreciation of what a citizen-soldier goes through during a deployment."
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