Travelling...

I finally got to call home late that evening after I had some food and kind of woke up. So I called my Dad. Since I had been over there he always had his phone on so if I got a chance to call he would be available. When he answered I told him what happened and then he 3-wayed my mom. He thought it would be better for her to hear it from me instead of a doctor calling that wouldn’t give her any information. When I talked to her she was very upset. I tried to assure her that I was fine and going to be coming home soon because of the injuries. I really didn’t explain them at the time because I didn’t want her to worry anymore than she already was. As you can probably imagine everyone was both happy that I was alive and sad that I had been hurt. No one wants anything to happen to you but in war there are always casualties. This was something I knew long before going over there.
Early the next morning I was put on a C-130 and flown to Kuwait City, Kuwait. When I arrived the Air Force Pilot said they were switching me to a C-5 and then flying me to Germany. The whole switching process took about 10 hours all together. Now this normally wouldn’t be that big of deal because the military is all about waiting so I was definitely used to that. But if you remember, they stripped me of all my clothes, gave me a wool blanket as cover, it was hot and it wasn’t comfortable. I am a dreamer, and out of all the places I dreamed of going none of them included me being butt naked under an itchy blanket and being carried around like some king on a throne. Just in case you were wandering you don’t get this added bonus from Expedia.
The flights were horrible and if you have never ridden in these planes you will now know why people want to jump out of them. First of all when you are Medi-Vac’d (Medically Evacuated) you are put on a special stretcher that (is very uncomfortable) can be hung in the center of the plane. They are stacked side by side, four rows up and depending on the plane about eight rows long. In order to do this you are literally inches from the person above you so it is almost impossible to get out. So you can imagine how hard it is if you need to go to the bathroom. What’s that you said you can’t imagine? Ok I’ll explain it to you. The Nurses have these special boxes (that oddly resemble Chinese take-out boxes) they unfold and become a (very hard to use lying down) bed pan box. Now since the time I got hurt to the time on the plane I had been given an IV and a lot of fluids. If you don’t know in Iraq it is about 130°F and it is a very dry heat so you sweat 95% of all the water you take in and rarely have to visit the bathroom. In the plane however you retain all water because of the cold and as a natural occurrence you have to GO. The second thing is the planes don’t have insulation so you hear everything and it is freezing. If that doesn’t sound bad you just wait.