A Little About My Job

[duncan_o]

I work in a hospital on Kandahar Airfield in Afghanistan.  It's not a bad job--it's a good blend of the exciting and the mundane.  I work with Canadians, Dutch, British, Germans, Australians, New Zealanders, Afghanis, and of course other Americans, as well as a few other nationalities.  As an Army medic--a jack of all medical and soldierly trades

Comments

[sensoo]

Nothing wrong with that.

Hope you're doing well.

I lurk.

Leftovers

[duncan_o]

This particular incident is the one moment, more than any other, that has haunted me these past couple of years. Not for the gruesomeness of it--I saw worse--but my own reaction to it. Tragedy, and suffering, and death exist in this world. That will likely never change, and I accept this fact mostly without reservations. But to take pleasure in it? To gloat over the corpses of these two mothers' sons? There are people out there who loved those two men, and they will grieve the rest of their lives for it.

I don't know why they did what they did. Maybe they did it for money or god or country. Maybe they were forced to do it. I don't know, but in my head, I picture myself kicking the lifeless bodies of those two men. If they had been laying on the ground, I very likely would have.

I have never been as far away from home as I was then, or since.