I have three children, a 12 year old girl, Meggan, and two boys. Joshua is 5 and Brian is 9. I knew Josh would take the deployment the hardest. I can't even go to the store without him almost crying to come along. He is very attached to me. Brian is also very close to me, but he is old enough to understand I have to leave so I can make a safer life for him and the Iraqi children. As far as my daughter Meggan, she is tough. However, she is still my little sweetheart. I am her daddy, and I am sure she will also have a hard time missing me. We have not had much time alone because the boys are so hooked on me. She is my baby.

This day is the hardest day I have ever faced in my life. One side of me, my heart is being ripped out, I am leaving the ones that I truly live for. The other side of me is a warrior. I am leaving to defend freedom for my children and a new people I know nothing about. As I stand in formation, Josh starts crying. I am trying so hard to hold back the tears when I see my little best friend in this state. I tried so hard to make him understand why I have to leave. The time is here when I must say goodbye.

We are ordered a left face, then forward march. I am on my way. I give one last look at my family, then switch to the soldier in me. I am ready for battle. We begin to double time towards the plane. All of us are filled with a litle fear of the unknown, lonelyness, and motivation to gets these bastards that are taking us away from our loved ones. I have to tell you, we did not sleep much on the plane. We land in Czech republic. It is a beutiful morning. We spend about an hour here. It is time to board again. The next stop is Kuwait City Airport. It is mid-morning as we decend. Right before we land, I see anti-aircraft missle batteries at the end of the runway. Reality sets in, this is for real.

I spend about 2 weeks in Kuwait, in-processing, getting issued additional equipment, and picking up our vehicles at the port. It is time to move north. I am the SGT. in charge of the wrecker. So, I am in a slow moving vehicle. The drive to the border is quiet and lonely. The only thing I think about is my family. We stopped at the border rest area, where we got fuel, food and water. You can feel the intensity in the air. Everyone is filled with questions about what lies ahead. The time came to continue north. We arrived in Baghdad airport about 3:00 in the morning. It was a queit ride, no incidents to speak of. Well, day one of our tour is over.

I came here, thinking I would be a mechanic, just like back at Bragg. I could be no further from reality. I am assigned to drive a gun truck, escorting both civilian and military convoys. Here, we are all infantry or MP's. After seeing the poverty here, I am sure we are doing the right thing. The Iraqi people seem to love us for what we are doing. There is so much great things going on over here. I see schools popping up, with teachers that are women. There are water treatment plants where there wasn't even running water.

I have had many close calls, passing too many IED's to remember. I drove through an ambush Christmas Eve, that was meant for us to go into on the way to the Green zone. The bad guys were just setting the ambush zone up when we were on our way back to the airport. We came from behind them, without them knowing. We suprised them because they expected us to come towards them. They did not know we have already passed and were returning to base. Fortunately, the trailers on the return trip were empty. Our mission was to dump fuel at the Green zone for the helicopters. We had two trailers of gasoline and one of diesel fuel. If they hit us on the way in, it would have been realy nasty. They would have had a long field of fire at us. Thank God there was no one killed in my convoy. The worst injury was a small cut on a soldier's face from glass that exploded.

My welcome home was incredible!! I landed at Dallas airport. The fire department had the trucks on the runway, shooting water over the top of the airplane while we went under the streams. When we got off of the airplane, there were about 300 people there, clapping for us and cheering. It made all of the hard times worth it for me. I had no idea what the country would think about me when I returned to the United States. It was kind of a scary feeling. A ticket lady told me that they made an announcement on the speaker in the terminal. They said if anyone has a few extra minutes please come to gate, whatever it was, and welcome the boys home from Iraq. It was awsome!! So to end this, I am just glad to be back home with my family, I am discharged now. I did not want to ever leave my family again. I did my time, just as many more before me. I thank God he kept me alive to see my family again. I ask, please never forget those that have fallen to make an oppressed people free and stop terrorism where it has been raised. God Bless everyone in uniform and all that support us.

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