FOB Smart at 1800 - Tuesday
More wind and dust today, although nothing like yesterday. I'd say today was fairly routine and slow. The Persian New Year celebration by our local partners delayed projects yet another day. It must be nice to celebrate so many holidays, both religious and nonreligious in nature. Tomorrow and beyond bring more missions and more opportunities to make a difference in the lives of our local partners. I enjoy this aspect of my life here more than anything else while here, save for speaking with my little boy! We completed no engineering missions outside the wire, but we did complete yet more paperwork. Our paperwork, never-ending that it is, is nearly automatic for each and everything that we do here. I attribute much of this to bureaucracy, some to construction management in general; the rest even to busy work.
I was leaving my office this morning to walk around the FOB and observe progress on certain construction projects. I usually take a bottle of water with me and a digital camera. The camera goes into my right pocket and the water into my left pocket - I am right-handed. The camera went in and so did the bottle. However, before I had readied myself to leave, I had apparently taken a sip of my water and did not replace the cap tightly - which I never fail to do. This time, with the cap just resting on the top of the bottle, I went to place it in my left pocket, like always, upside-down, and instead of subconsciously proceeding with my egress routine, I felt an entire bottle of water rush down my left leg, into my boot, and it was cold! In my good-natured, self-deprecating, and self-effacing manner, I laughed and shared the funny story with my inner team. A good laugh no doubt; since I had no other uniform, I changed into civilian clothing briefly, washed my uniform, and carried on. It was a great day for me no doubt!
Another day is fast approaching to an end. I enjoy these afternoon-to-evening moments. Dinner is soon served in our DFAC, another calming atmosphere is quickly enveloping the FOB, and I am ready once more to say goodnight to my son as he greets his day with all the verve and zest a 4-year old normally musters. My day count is incredibly low now - less than 32.5 days until I leave Afghanistan.
143, Kaesen.
Good night and good day.
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| JL Summerlin with his windswept hair... Taken on 20 Mar 2012 |
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