Home and Loving it!

It feels amazing to be home. I can't really describe how awesome it is to be back from a deployment. The little things in America are some of the things that I appreciate the most. For instance, the sweet clean air here. The air quality around Baghdad is very poor - dust, gasoline fumes, burning trash, and who knows what else. I went for a run down on Ruston Way along Puget Sound within a day or two of being home, and although I ran slowly I felt like a million dollars. The mundane act of buying coffee at a Starbucks and not having to go through a language barrier is another example of something great about being home. I could go on and on... It's hard to understate what's great about being home. The most important thing about being home, is home.

This weekend I'll be going to the gorge and enjoying some live music, some good beer, and and some quality time with Shayna.

Deep Breath--he's home!

As you all know, Justin came home a couple weeks ago. It's been absolutely great to have him here. I had this worry in the back of my mind that maybe things wouldn't go back to normal, maybe it would take some time to adjust, etc. All of which were unnecessary fears, because it's been nothing but perfect. It's like we never skipped a beat, and things are back to normal; as if we didn't just spend almost a year apart.

I did learn one thing about the Army and the redeployment process: it takes a long time to get our boys home. From the delayed planes in Iraq, to arriving in Maine and not having any pilots to fly the guys from Maine to here, and then finally, waiting 3 hours in the gym while Justin was just a few miles away. But it all was worth it...

Since Justin has been home, we've just been getting back into our routine. This weekend we'll take our first weekend trip over to the Gorge to see Dave Matthews Band. (If you haven't been to the Gorge--it's AMAZING!)

The Gorge

We have a couple weekends planned to go see Justin's parents in Oakland, CA, and then of course the wedding in October. It's coming quickly! If you haven't checked out our website, it's www.JustinandShayna.com. It has information about the wedding--although Justin's groomsmen keep changing with all the deployments going on!

We also have our honeymoon tickets purchased. We are going to a small island called Roatan. It's near Honduras and is just gorgeous. We'll be gone for a week, which I think is the perfect amount of time. Anything longer than that and I get a little homesick.

Volleyball season also started (for those who don't know, I'm a high school varsity volleyball coach) and that's taking up a lot of time. I absolutely love the girls, and while the fact that almost all my of my varsity squad graduated last year scares me, I think we'll have a great year. Justin's been a good sport and has been tagging along at practices to hang out and work out in the weight room. 

Other than that, I just couldn't be happier to have him home. I have more motivation, am happier, and more in love than ever. I'm really happy we'll never have to do another deployment--I never want to have to say goodbye to him for that long again!

Coming Home Very Soon!

Heya,

I've basically completely forgotton about updating the blog , but here's my update:

Currently counting down the days to going home.

The overall situation in Iraq is pretty much focused at my level, and maybe for the Army as a whole, on packing out. Due to our great planning, this isn't as painful as it potentially could be. This in turn has given me the time to think about how excited I am about coming home.

There are a laundry list of items on my agenda of things to do at home; food to eat, beverages to drink, and thankfully a short list of people I want to spend time with. Some of the highlights of my first few weeks home will be weekend adventures in the Northwest with Shayna, seeing Dave Matthews at the Gorge over Labor Day, learning to golf (Shayna currently shamelessly schools me with a golf club - which is completely untenable), and just relaxing in general. After three deployments, the prospect of simply being home without another deployment looming out there is refreshing.

Reflections on Iraq....

Currently, I'm sitting in my trailer living quarters waiting for word on a flight to take me from here to another airbase and from there to America. I expect to be in America early next week. I leave Iraq this time with a very different feeling than I left Iraq in 2004. In 2004, it was very clear to me that I left Iraq in a condition where much work remained. Today, I feel unequivocally that my work, our work, is relatively done here. That's a good feeling.

Contrasting the two deployments, 2004 versus 2010 could not have been easier. In 2004, the Iraqi Army didn't exist. The armed Iraqi's I worked with were little more than death squads who shared a mutual distaste for Sunni militants, but for different reasons. The civil war in the dark 2006-2008 period illuminated that most of those Iraqi "National Guard" groups I worked with in 2004 were probably the progenitors of future death squads. The populace in Iraq in 2004 in Diyala (a rural province mostly) weren't as jaded as the Baghdad citizens I dealt with in 2010. It feels like Iraqi's have grown weary of violence, but for the most part they prefer American security forces to their own privately, because they trust us more than their fellow Iraqi. That's a lingering effect of the civil war where neighbors killed neighbors, and thousands were killed each month. But, in public the Iraqi politicians want us to leave. I was turned back at numerous check points in Baghdad this year because they didn't want an American presence. Iraqi politicians want to assert Iraqi sovereignty. There was no such concept of that in 2004. Most importantly, unlike in 2004, I never had to fire my weapon in anger this deployment. And that's a good thing. I attribute that to the numerous Soldiers between 2004 and 2010 who had to fire their weapons far too often. Thank Ben, Mike and Dan for taking care of those guys. Most importantly for you fellas, I have heard numerous Iraqi Army NCOs and junior officers talk nostalgically about the "good" days fighting side by side with the Americans in Baquba, Sadr City, Falluja, Abu Ghraib, Ameriya, Adhamiya, and other dark corners of Iraq. It's not the fighting that the Iraqi soldiers relished, they relished working with us that closely.

So, as I leave Iraq, I feel better about the country than I did in 2004. I feel better about what we as a Nation have done here. Regardless of why we got here, how we initially made this place hell through our missteps, we have at least righted many of those wrongs and put this place on a better footing than I thought possible in 2004. It was remarkable to see tens of thousands of Iraqi voters walking back from the polling stations as I guarded the ballots. The ghosts of George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson would have been proud on our efforts here the past few years. They have been far from perfect, but they are laudable. Not all Democracies are perfect, but at least Iraqis have a chance now and the bleakness of the civil war period has passed. I think the ghosts of the men that I knew, men like Christopher Cash and Dan Whitten and Larry Buaguess would look at Iraq and say - "This is good enough." A ticker tape parade isn't necessary, the military knows what it accomplished and didn't accomplish in Iraq and we're proud of it.

Happy 4th of July

Hi everyone-
    I hope you had an amazing 4th of July. This was my second 4th in a row without Justin, but it is reassuring to know I'll never have to spend one away from him again. I have had some amazing friends and family to get me though this deployment, and today was no different. My coworker Brittany (who has become a very close friend of mine), her amazing husband, Devin, my Aunt Rayne, cousin Ben, Mom, stepdad, brother Galen, and his wife Sarah all came over today. It was nice to finally have the place unpacked and be able to have people over. We all just lounged around, talked, and enjoyed each other's company.
   Other than the 4th, things have been running as normal. As most of you know, I am the head volleyball coach at a local high school, and our summer practices began last week. I missed my girls, so it was good to see them. As I mentioned above, I'm finally done unpacking our new place, which had been taking up a lot of my time. I have never moved anyone but myself before, and had no idea how much work moving both me and and Justin would be, but it's all done! Here are some pictures of our place:

I don't have any pictures of the upstairs, but there is a cute guest bedroom with an office up there.
 
   Overall, things seem to be going really well and truckin' right along. The Jdate website has decided they want to do a TV show about us--for Jewish Life Television. They are going to interview us via skype next week--too funny! Who would have thought a dating website could have changed our lives forever?
    Justin will be home in a month and a half, and the time go fast enough. We are looking for mid-August as his return date, and then Justin and I are looking to just relax and enjoy getting back into our routine.  I couldn't be more proud of him and what he's doing, but I hope he also know how much he is missed and loved back home. All your support has been tremendous, and we are incredibly thankful!

An end in sight!

So, it's been officially announced that sometime in mid-August I'll be returning home. That means I officially have less than two months left in Iraq. I'm glad it's finally coming to an end. The deployment hasn't been as day in and day out dangerous as previous ones, but it's still choppy out there. Lastly, it's obviously terrible missing home. After this deployment, I never again will have to miss countless major events in my life! 

We're about to celebrate 4th of July here. Last 4th of July was spent in the heat of Louisiana at the Joint Readiness Training Center getting ready for this deployment. One year later, here I am.  However, at least I know that I'm close to the end and not just in the preliminary stages.

What else.... Planning some weekend trips, BBQs, and such for when I get home. I'm certainly looking forward to going to the Gorge and seeing Dave Matthews Band with Shayna. Anyways, time moves slowly when you have so much to look forward to in life!

Justin's in Iraq - Again!

Hi Everyone,

First off, I think this is a great way to keep up with everyone that I don't necessarily have email addresses for. So, I'll try and update this a lot. Facebook isn't a great mechanism for lengthy life summaries, so let's give this blog a try!

Today was the Army's 235th Birthday, which I celebrated by drinking 2 Budweisers. Normally, U.S. troops are absolutely not allowed to drink, however this year and I think last year, U.S. troops in Iraq were allowed to drink on the Superbowl (2 beers - highly controlled), this year I was on R&R in America though. It was a good treat for me and my troops.

One of the biggest challenges in Iraq is the heat obviously. There are very few ways to avoid it in the summer. However, one proven way is the A/C unit. My A/C unit was recently replaced, which I think has my room down to a frigid 68 degrees. After a long day, that feels awesome. Another funny thing is that the heat is so tremendous that there's no need to even turn on the heat in the shower, even the cold water is really hot (courtesy of the water tanks being exposed to the sun).

I spend most of my free time during the day either reading at my desk, writing Shayna, exercising, or watching a TV show before bed. Right now though, the World Cup is showing on the Armed Forces Network. Which means my evenings are spent watching soccer when the time is available. Some days though there is very little free time. In my experience in my previous two deployments, there are busy days and there are slow days but most days are slow days. And, you know what? That's a good thing. A slow boring deployment is a good thing.

Two days ago (on Sunday), I had a Company Commander's Symposium with the Brigade Commander, Division Commander, and some other random folks. It was a pretty cool event because it brought together in one room every Company Commander in my Brigade (about 30-35 of us) to talk about things in Iraq, the Army, and the next few months. We concluded the Symposium with a good dinner, cigars on the lake adjacent to the Al Faw Palace, and watched some other Captain wiff a golf club into the lake. The latter actually was probably the most memorable portion of the symposium.

Overall, things are slowly slowing down here. The one thing that I wish would hurry up is when I get home. I can't wait to make up for lost time with Shayna and the rest of my family and friends in America!
   -Justin

Jumping on the bandwagon...

Welcome to our blog! Lately it seems like just about everyone has been writing blogs, and I love reading them. With Justin gone, and so many changes going on in our lives, we thought a blog would be a great way to keep friends and family updated. (Okay, "we thought" is a little bit of a stretch. I thought it would be great, and Justin is amazing and goes along with all my ideas like a champ!)

If you're reading this, chances are you know all about our lives up to now, but for the few who don't, here's a quick synopsis:

Justin and I met in early 2009. We hit it off immediately...I actually came home after our first date, called my mom, and told her that I was done--Justin was the one for me. From that moment until the day he deployed, we spent every day together getting to know each other more and more, and just enjoying life. Then last July Justin and I took a trip up to Victoria. While driving around our first day there, Justin decided he wanted to go to Butchart Gardens. It's a gorgeous place with 7 different "styles" of gardens inside. We were almost through the entire place, and with no more gardens to turn to, I turned around and saw Justin down on both knees, his hands on my hips, and he asked me to marry him. Without question, it has been the best day of my life, thus far. Here's a photo from a few seconds after I said yes:
Since then it's been a bit of a whirlwind. Justin is a Captain in the Army, as most of you know, and deployed as a Battery Commander to Iraq on September 12th of last year. Such a tough day.
I have to say, I don't know how couples and loved ones coped as well with war without the computer technology we have now. I have been lucky enough to be able to skype Justin almost every day since he's been gone. It's so surreal seeing his face and realizing he's away in a war zone. It's been incredibly tough with him gone, but we did have an amazing time when he came home for two weeks at the end of January. We took a trip to NY to see our jdate billboard (see the www.justinandshayna.com wedding site if you haven't heard about that), meet more of Justin's relatives, and spend a lot of quality time with each other.

Since Justin first deployed back in September, there have been a lot of changes:

• I started a new job as a clinic manager at a private Speech and Language therapy clinic
• My high school volleyball season has come and gone and is starting up again in a couple weeks
• Justin has had his battery go from three different bases in Iraq to finally settling at Liberty
  
• We both turned a year older...although Justin is the only one looking 30 in the eye next year!
• Ben and Eva had a beautiful baby girl, Rachel. I know Justin's very excited about being an uncle
• One of Justin's best friends, Mike and his wife, Kim, also welcomed a baby girl, Lauren
• I moved us from the condo into a house in Tacoma...I of course got Justin's skype approval of the place first.
• His redeployment date has changed about a billion times
• Perhaps the biggest change is that Justin has decided to get out of the Army next year. He's been doing nothing but Army since he started at West Point, so while this is probably a big shock to most, it's a decision he's made and I love and support him. I may be a little biased, but I think Justin will be amazing no matter what he does in life.

Also...wedding, wedding, wedding. We are getting married October 24, 2010 in Seattle, WA. I've been quite the proactive bride-to-be, or have at least attempted to do so. As a result, pretty much everything is planned for it already. We will have a Jewish Military wedding, in a very funky area of Seattle called Capitol Hill. I can't wait! Justin has been great about letting me pretty much make all the decisions and been there when I have needed his help. (But hey, let' be real, what's he going to do, shake his finger at me on skype if he disagrees with something?!) I kid, I kid. It's been a joint effort--he's been there in spirit. :)

Of course, I'm forgetting a ton of things...as you can see it has gone up and down and all over the place. We are looking around August for Justin to come home, and it can't come soon enough! He's my best friend, the love of my life, and nothing is the same without him here. I have to say, I am beyond proud of him, and admire everything he does. Justin is an amazing Officer who is on his third deployment and truly fantastic at his job. I can't imagine doing what he does every day, and I am continuously impressed by him.

Here is Justin on the left, with another Battery Commander, Tom, and our friend Jay:

Justin will be writing his update soon, so keep your eyes peeled!