Kyle

I got word yesterday that Kyle, a student of mine, died in a car accident that also killed another person whose name I do not know. I can’t begin to understand why God chose to take these two people from us, from their families, from this world.

I’ve lost a grandparent and a father in the last few years and there’s no guessing, no explaining, no understanding why it happens when it happens. The only way I can cope is by remembering how blessed I was to have known, and shared the world with them while they were here.

In Kyle’s case, it’s pretty easy to see how blessed we were to have shared our part of the world with him. As his teacher, he often reminded me why I chose the profession. He often reaffirmed that decision. He was original, spirited, and often found the motivation that many students lack in the weirdest of places. He wasn’t the traditional A student, but he managed to find personal interest in his studies that led to inspired, creative, occasionally controversial views, and that drove him to produce good, original work. He wasn’t motivated by the grade, he was motivated by his own personal interest. That’s something many students have trouble finding and it frustrates them as they try to be good students as much as it frustrates their teachers who try to provide as many opportunities to create that situation as they can.

Kyle tapped the same motivation as a member of our school’s yearbook staff. A couple of summers ago, Kyle showed up to volunteer to sell advertising for the yearbook. He’d just finished his freshman year. Our sales staff numbers had been dwindling and Kyle was surprised to find out he’d have to take a leadership role. The sales drive was not without frustration and disappointment for all involved, but Kyle stepped up, recruited more help, put in the hours, and occasionally made us all laugh when we needed it most. Without his efforts, that yearbook probably would not have been created... or we would have had to charge something like $90 a copy to cover the expense of printing it.

It was this same drive in Kyle that sometimes put him at odds with teachers and classmates. When he believed in something, he explored it, and pushed those around him to explore it with him, especially when they disagreed with him. For a young man just beginning to understand what personal conviction meant, Kyle handled this amazingly well. He might leave you angry with him one day, but he’d always come back and see how you were doing the next. He often surprised me by coming back and explaining how he’d found a way to understand my perspective, a day or two after emphatically, but respectfully, arguing with me. Most adults don’t have the guts to do that, or maybe they just don’t care as much as Kyle did. Many adults even criticize young men like Kyle for having little respect, yet they also criticize today’s youth for not having the conviction that Kyle had. I know he respected his peers and his teachers because he cared enough to question us. He cared enough to push us beyond the easy answers. He cared enough to come back the next day and make sure we were still friends.

Often the source of these “discussions” with Kyle was the unfairness of the world. He was just beginning to tackle these tough questions. Like most teenagers, his initial interest in deeply philosophical queries came as the result of how the unfairness affected him directly, but it never stopped there. On his bad days it might have paused there, but he always readdressed it after cooling down. He was never satisfied with himself, or how he’d left others until he knew they were in a position to pick up such conversations again when they inevitably arose. How he knew at such a young age that these issues would arise again and again amazes me. Maybe he didn’t, but he knew it was better to leave things on good ground than bad. He knew the personal connection was more important than being right. In order to spark the same drive in others, he would occasionally play with fire on the bridge, but he always came back to make sure that bridge wasn’t burned. He always left it better than he found it.

I know my world is better now than it was before Kyle found it. How I will keep it that way is my next challenge. I do not know and I can’t even imagine how Kyle’s family and the Russia community will move on. I wish I could help them. I do know that God has never put a challenge before me that I couldn’t handle. It doesn’t always seem that way at first, but He always steers us in the right direction. Right now, I have serious doubts about my ability to do justice to Kyle’s memory... about how I will live my life differently as a result of Kyle’s positive influence. This doubt is similar to the question of how a just God could take Kyle from us, but God has never failed me in the past even when I know I’ve fallen short.

To the families of both victims of this tragedy: Please know that our thoughts and prayers are with you. People on the other side of the world that you don’t even know are thinking about you right now. The strength you will find to overcome this inspires and humbles us.

Check out the hat! 

Watch out for that big cat!

Dozer boys... and girl.


Earlier this week (or was it last week?) we decided it might be fun to become easy targets, so we all gathered around a big yellow piece of equipment and stood there for a while. Laurie decided it would be a good time to take a picture to send back to the Wharf Lounge in PC so she and Mike held up a sign for them. They threw a big party for us before we left and they always whip up a good lunch on drill weekends. Oh, and they have beer there. I sure miss home.

It's probably hard to tell, but some of the people in this picture are actually smiling. You see that around here once in a while now that we've passed the halfway point. Or maybe it's cuz Toby was in the country?? Tonight we'll be visited by Dean Cain, Amanda Swisten and Kelly Hu at the Friday Night Fights, where our own Shamoken Mike will attempt to continue the Air Force's winning streak by beating up an Army kid in a 3-round brawl... er boxing match. The Friday night fights arent' really on Fridays cuz that would establish a pattern for the enemy but we call them that anyway. They're on different nights. Pretty clever, eh?

OK, I have to get out of the office now. I'll type at ya later.

Luth

Parts r us

When it rains...


After four full attempts at finding our place in the Army supply system, we finally managed to receive some stuff. The other day an entire pickup truck load of mostly shop stock items came in. I'd already turned in my resignation (which was ignored) and vowed that if I had to re-order our entire log of 400-plus items and growing, for a fifth time, I'd never be seen in this office again, but it seems like the persistence finally paid off.

Only about a third of this pile belongs to us. One of the great things about the Army's system is that maintenance sections get to be the order point for all "Class IX" or maintenance and repair supplies, so we get to order everyone's stuff for them. In the Army, a supply clerk is assigned to maintenance to take care of this whole process, but it's all we can do to get our supply folk to drop off our "order disks" and pick up stuff when it comes in.

Of the third of this stuff that does belong to Vehicle Maintenance, none of it will take any of our collection of deadlined vehicles off of the deadline list, but try explaining that to someone who sees us unloading parts and wants their truck back. Most of the pile is shop stock that should have come with the Darby equipment package, but like vehicle historical records, manuals, and previously ordered parts, still hasn't made its way to us 7 months later. Ah well, life goes on.

So we got some parts in. Today is a good day. I managed to get some more pictures to load up and I had a great breakfast with Greg, Bob, Daryl and Todd. We switched things up and went to the DFAC #2 where I enjoyed French toast with peaches, succulent ham, fried potatoes, grits, and sliced kiwi as well as OJ, powdered milk and strong coffee. Greg unknowingly sat at a table reserved for contract workers and their escorts so we all followed his lead, but decided to move after everyone sat down and someone noticed the sign on the table. Our new table already had two TACOM reps at it and the one recognized me and asked if I had any luck finding a fuel injection pump for an Air Force-only air compressor... on Sunday morning... at breakfast... on my day off. They're both pretty good guys and they've been helpful, so it didn't bother me nearly as much then as it does as I sit here typing about it. In fact, I hadn't seen them in a while and it was actually a friendly, pleasant, brief exchange.

After breakfast we headed over to the local mall (PX, barber shop) where we got our hair cut, did some shopping, but no buying, and then came back to the office to catch up on some news on the TV and email. And I guess that's about it. So I'll stop boring the living crap out of you now and move on.

Luth

Toby & the red hat

What, no picture?! Surprise, the second method of posting pics to this blog has now failed as well.

Well, if you go to AF.mil/photos, you can find a picture of Toby Keith wearing a RED HORSE hat. According to the story I heard 10th hand, one of our guys waltzed past the security line and stood waiting to present the hat to Keith. When asked what he was doing, our guy said, "we were told to wait here to give this hat to Mr. Keith."

Whoever questioned our guy said, "oh, he's busy with (the general audience) right now, but if you wait back here, I'll send him over when they're done."

So they apparently got to actually give him the hat in a small group. It's pretty cool that he wore it since we're not allowed to. Not only that, but he's surrounded by Army folk wearing an Air Force unit hat. We probably don't even represent 1% of the military population on the ground here and he's wearing our hat!

Too bad I couldn't post the picture here on my 'blog. I'll keep working on it though.

Later,
Luth

Another Sunday

...And the only good thing I can say about it is that we’re one week closer to going home. I think it was John’s wife who mentioned his “Sunday best” in a comment on the “Busted” post, and that’s kind of funny now cuz the old, unofficial PT gear has become the Sunday uniform. Unlike the new, authorized PT gear of nylon running shorts and polyester shirts, the old stuff is comfy and has pockets so it’s what we all wear. The chief just walked into the office and said “I see you’re all still in your pajamas.” And that’s kind of how it is. By the way, the old stuff is cheap at the AAFES online store. Good quality, low prices. Get it while it’s hot!

Yeah, so uh... Sunday. We sat by the fire again last night. The RPG/mortar attacks seem to have

slowed down (knock on wood), we still can’t fix much ‘cuz we’re not getting much in the way of parts from supply (but I’m keeping busy re-ordering everything for the 4^th time,) and nothing has really changed. We joked about the movie Groundhog Day on our last little visit to the area, but it’s come full circle now. In that movie, Bill Murray’s character, Phil Connors, undergoes a series of identity crises. He goes through a dark period, even becoming suicidal, and finally, upon realizing his potential as a human, wakes up and it’s actually a new day.

I hope our remaining time here is long enough to get us through the dark period many of us are in right now. I hope, after being exposed to this, that my brain will function at least at the level it did before I came here. I’m truly worried about what will happen once I’m actually able to accomplish something through my efforts. I don’t know how I’ll be able to handle getting an answer to a simple question without having to explain what I’ve already tried and why I’m so bent on doing it the way it’s supposed to be done. Nor will I know what to do when someone asks me a simple question, and is satisfied with the answer. I’ve grown too used to hearing someone explain why they came to me, why the answer, though accurate, is unacceptable, and then waiting around or asking the question 20 more times until I finally convince them that the answer is the answer and it won’t change simply because they ask me 20 more times... or send someone else in to start that whole process over again. I know I’m forever tainted, and I can handle that. I did this to myself by re-enlisting. But I hope I’m at least able to function in a place where, when I need, say, a spark plug, or a ¼ x 20 bolt, I have a glimmer of hope of actually getting one.

So... that dark period. If we follow the Groundhog Day analogy, then the dark period should start easing its way into some real personal growth. Perhaps this experience is like an intervention, or even basic training, where the victim or student must first hit rock bottom, be broken all the way down, in order to be rebuilt in the proper form. In the movie, things get pretty bleak before they get better. Phil Connors makes some darkly humorous attempts at suicide, including an attempt after kidnapping Punxsutawney Phil and trying to take the furry forecaster with him. But the character’s desperation finally gives way to his learning to play piano, performing aptly-timed first aid techniques, and eventually even getting the girl. He even develops some great techniques for dealing with a pesky insurance salesman he can’t remember from high school. Maybe we’ll all come out of this as evolved as Murray’s character. Maybe this is just one step closer to the self-actualization/transendence at the top of Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

Yeah, that’s it... so here I am at round 37 of convincing myself this is a good thing. I will make it a good thing. When you can learn something from a situation, you are better for it. That which does not kill us makes us stronger... blah blah blah.

Luth

Corrections and stuff

Hey, I've been steering you guys dreadfully wrong. Those last few pictures were originally supposed to accompany the "What's Important" post. "Bloom" was the title of the picture of Laurie and the Chaplain that inspired the "What's Important" post so that title was in my head when I tried to link everything up... so, to clear it up once and for all: "Bloom" and "Uniform of the Day" (basically two pictures thinly disguised as posts via long captions) were originally to have appeared in the "What's Important" post. Were I actually computer literate, I'd probably be able to figure out how to edit this whole menagerie and fix all of that, but isn't it more fun to have to go searching through everything to find all the correct references? It's like the teasers newspapers put on the front page, only completely without forethought or calculation.

It's another wonderful day off here at (unspecified location). Bob, Greg and I did the lunch, shopping, get our hair done thing and then stopped in at the office to email, web surf, etc. The weather is sunny and just a little too warm when you're in that sun, but otherwise completely tolerable. It was cool last night and many of the vm guys sat around a fire outside of Motel 6.

The Army offered a stress management class that I didn't attend, but last night, while staring at the fire and laughing with the guys and feeling more peaceful than I have in a while, I asked Kutch if they mentioned sitting around a fire in the class. He said they did not. I said they should have. He said, "yeah." And then we just stared into the fire some more. What's the deal with a fire? And how come nobody says you're stupid for staring at one like they say when you stare at a TV? How is it different other than conversation, fresh air, and the knowledge and skills required to start it rather than just pushing remote control buttons... ok, I guess that's part of the answer to my own question. Anyhoo, I only joined the fire crew for about a half hour before I was so relaxed I had to go to bed before I fell asleep in the chair. Normally that wouldn't have been so bad, but this chair, sitting in the stones, kept sinking forward and as I would relax more, it teetered on dumping me out of it.

In addition, my new all-nylon Air Force PT shorts only cover my thighs sufficiently while standing up, which is the position I was in when applying bug repellent. While seated, a significant portion of my upper thighs and lower ass was, apparently, exposed. I now have matching mosquito bites on each cheek and another on the front of my left thigh - is that graphic enough for everyone? They are the largest mosquito bites I've ever seen. I believe I'll lose weight as they heal. So far they haven't itched more than any others, but I'm sure that will follow.

So I excused myself from the fire and retired to my room where I dove back into Kite Runner by Kahled Hosseini, a book Todd read and told me I'd like. It's a fictional story based on the author's life growing up in Afghanistan before the Taliban took over. It's so well-written that I can't stop reading it. Granted the cultural differences between the narrator's life and mine make it semi-interesting, but there's nothing more signficant (until the Soviet invasion) in his childhood that makes it any more fascinating than anyone else's childhood. It's just that easy to read. It's one of those books I purposely read slowly to enjoy every page of. Obviously, there are bleak moments... don't be fooled into thinking it's all poppies and kite flying, but so far it's just really good. Sorry, didn't mean to put you through all that just to say Todd was right.

OK, that's probably enough for now. No wait, this just in: Todd's wife suffered such a horrible bare-footed pressure-washing incident that they had to call in the coroner! I guess she lived though cuz she was instant-messaging him about it as I finished this up. More on that as the releases are signed.

Luth, out.

Uniform of the day

This pic was also supposed to accompany the "Bloom" post.  It was taken specifically in response to a request from my daughters for more pictures of me.  I was modeling a new version of the hot weather office uniform complete with PWD.  The Chaplain was particularly taken with the new style desert boot with heat dispersing toe fins (aka magnetic darts stuck to my steel toes).  I apologize to folks who are not my family and who don't want to see pictures of me.  You'll just have to bear with them and me.  They're my #1 fans even when I suck so they come first. I also apologize to anyone who expects us to be in actual uniforms 24/7. Type at ya later.

Luth

Flyin' High

Okay, so I wasn't really high, but Dramamine and Nyquil are as close as I can legally come. (Kidding, of course) This is the only pic from my little vacation (see Notes for my fans) that wasn't confiscated. Kidding, of course, but I don't want to push my luck with this whole picture thing just yet. If it works more than twice, I'll put up some more pics of my co-workers. I'm a little leery though cuz that was my intention weeks ago and I only got half of them up before it all came crashing down around me, so again, no promises. Good to see me again, eh?

Bloom

I made Chaplain Owens and our beloved Laurie pose for this a while ago with the intent of putting it up with that post so you'll have to refer back to the Bloomin post in the archives to see what this is all about. I won't make any promises about posting any new pics though, that would be way premature at this point!

Notes for my fans

Hey guys and gals!

I've heard a few complaints that I'm just not keeping up with this thing like I should. That's a good sign. It means someone's actually looking at it. That's why writers write. Well, technically that's only one small part of it. Some writers write for money, some because they have something to say (that's clearly not the case here!) and others for all kinds of reasons. For me, it's related to the the idea of having something to say but it's not nearly that uplifting or valuable. It's more of a neurosis. It's a compulsion to download before something really messy happens. My friends and co-workers can only take so much of it verbally so I write instead.

On increasingly rare occasions, I am able to channel this neurosis into creative works that sometimes, again increasingly rarely, are actually entertaining to some readers. But lately there just hasn't been much to say. I'm back to the old, "if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all" thing. And there's no way in hell I could say anything nice about what I'm doing here. I quit keeping a journal 'cuz I can't even bear to rehash the day's events for posterity. I really don't ever want to relive these days. I just need to be done with this shit.

I thought I could get by, placate my fans, with posting an occasional picture and making inane comments about it, but that too has gone the way of just about everything else I try here - it doesn't work anymore and I can't seem to fix it no matter how much effort I throw into it. I'll continue to look into ways of remedying that, just as I'll continue to do what it is I do here. It's just that now, I don't suffer under any false ideas that it will help or amount to anything. I'm cool with that.

Now, before any of you read a cry for help into this post, or at least a sobbing for pity or attention, don't. I don't need pity or cheering up or anything like that. I'm perfectly fine with my current state of affairs. In fact, on a personal level, I'm as clear as I've been in a long time. There's no hidden message here. As I said, I'm cool with it. So fear not, legions of fans, I shall survive, perhaps even overcome. It's just that my definition of surviving is different than it was when I got here and thought I'd find gainful employment. My perspective on "overcoming" has been slightly adjusted.

Having said that, today is a good day. I just got back from a little working vacation where one objective was clearly met: I actually missed this place and was glad to be back. I got talked into attending this junket by being told, "it's only a ten minute flight and we'll be back before dinner."

Do I even need to say, the flight was over an hour and we didn't get back for dinner?

Due to the weather, we lost our return flight. That meant we fell off the radar altogether and had to beg, borrow, and steal a ride home after accomplishing nothing and spending the night in transient quarters, racing to the terminal every few hours to see if we could go "home." Apparently the system for transporting individual or small groups of people has a lot in common with the system for acquiring parts and supplies. Bad weather? Not enough rank? Hold your tongue wrong? No soup for you! Based on my experiences thus far, I can't believe we haven't lost more people in this endeavor. I don't mean in combat, we're actually pretty good at that, but simply, literally lost folks until they found their way back to another unit or post or something. I'm glad I brought cash, credit cards and a civilian passport!

The flights were cool though. I got to see a lot of stuff most people only see on TV and I got to see stuff that's different from what I've seen in the last 3 months. And for two days, I literally couldn't come in to this office.

OK. Type at ya later.
Luth