Iraq Journals

I spent most of 2006 in metro-Baghdad, Iraq as a civilian member of a military unit. I worked for a major oversawing the daily missions of a tiny platoon. The engagement lasted 18 months as I had to leave home in August of 2005. January of 2007, I returned to the unit for Reverse-SRP (soldier readiness process). Between the those two dates, I travelled in eight countries and slept in 200 different locations.

While travelling and working, I kept a journal. As the years have passed, some of what I wrote can be put on a website and shared.

Mr Jones

Mr Brown and Mr Jones both in uniform as US soldiers, neither born in the US lived and worked amongst us. In this funny world where I did not wear a uniform yet was a member of a miltary unit, these guys did wear uniforms. They were not local interpreters (“terps”). Not too many answers for you, but two very interesting men.

The Night Before

I once lived a town away from poverty. There was a hill that had to be climbed. Up the hill one climbed past simple houses and chain-linked fences. At the bottom of this hill was the closest thing we had to a spa (Boston for “corner store:” overpriced milk, white bread and mix-ins for liquor.) These were my thoughts as a youth. That poor people had small urban houses with patches of green lawns and a spa at the corner. How little I knew. [Poverty doesn’t have a patch of grass and a fence.]

Reflections on the night before flying into Iraq for the first time. Read more about The Night Before