Memories
Posted by Matthew on January 25th, 2008 filed in JanuaryNothing helps you bond with soldiers more than shared misery.
During my last trip to Iraq over the summer of 2005, I followed Stryker soldiers from B Company, 3rd Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment to a little desert outpost near the Syrian Border in the town of Rawah. It was a new camp with plenty of sand, piss tubes, flies, cots, dust storms, flies – really nice. We thought of having T-shirts made that said “Suck Fest in the Sand 2005: Rawah, Iraq.”
So anyway, now I’m at COB Speicher near Tikrit with another Stryker unit, the 4th Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment. I sit down next to Staff Sgt. Williams today on a bus heading to the dining facility.
After introducing ourselves, it takes about two minutes before we both realize we had chewed on the same dust together in Rawah more than two years ago. We laughed and shook hands like old friends. It turns out he’s with C Company, 4-9 now, the same unit I had already planned to hang out with tomorrow.
Sometimes it pays to suffer.
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