Eleven years after...

This month marked eleven years since the 9/11 attacks.  I know I'm not the only one who feels this way, but not a day goes by that I'm not reminded of it.  Hearing sirens wail from speeding fire trucks down Calhoun street enroute to a CofC fire alarm is a constant reminder; so is attending a Stingrays game, looking up and seeing Mark Bavis' jersey hanging in the rafters.  Bavis was on flight 175, the second plane that hit the tower. 

I wanted to use this time to put my thoughts about this into words because I never have before.

I believe that there are days that people experience in which they never fully recover from and force them to follow another path.  I remember watching the television that morning, seeing the second plane slam into one side of the building and a fireball shoot out the other.

It's difficult for me to explain who I was before that day because I just can't remember.  So, I'll start from where I do remember. I joined the military because of that day. If you know me, then you probably already know that much about me.  I think an interest quickly turned into an obsession. Shortly after basic, I got to my first duty station. And shortly after that, this idea of Air Force members performing convoys in Iraq quickly became a reality.  It evolved, as so many things do in this life, and it culminated last year with an armored vehicle crossing the border into Kuwait, having a chain-link fence close behind it and a photo-op for those "involved."  It depends who you ask in this close-knit, band-of-brothers, because some enjoyed the hell out of it while others didn't. 

It's a tough thing to do, to dedicate six years to a mission, a way of life and then be told that you no longer need to perform that mission.  The adrenaline that you once got from riding in a tractor-trailer, chain smoking cigarettes as you meander through Fallujah in the pitch black now has to be found through other means.