Justin Tilley
 

      The last weekend before my trip to Afghanistan. I sit at Cafe Alex, a wonderful restaurant in Fairbanks. I sit with my notebook writing a few letters, thinking about the road before me. Monday I leave for six months away form everything that I have made for my self in Alaska. I'm sitting alone, afraid, worried, thinking about my family, my mother and my friends, and I'm a little drunk.

      This place brings a peace over me that I needed. Ed is playing the piano wonderfully, nice light jazz to ease the tension in my mind. I came to hear him play, and I came to eat like a King, sampling many things from the menu and trying a few different wines. It was a wonderful meal. It always is.

      Most of all I came to this restaurant to think.

      I have deployed with the military before, but it was nothing like this. I went to Kuwait in late 2000 after the USS Cole was attacked in a harbor somewhere south of Saudi. This was the foremost thing on my mothers mind. She was very worried as any mother would be, but I wasn't. They told us that the threat was low for the most part and people have been deploying to Al Jaber Air Base in Kuwait for years after the First Gulf war, there were no stories of terrorist attacks in that area, not to say that there were not people that didn't want us there. The threat wasn't enough to worry me, or enough to keep us on the installation while we were in country. We felt pretty safe there. This time, it would be different.

       Afghanistan had become a regular stop for the A-10's. For the past two years Airman have been deploying with their units, setting things up for the next team to come though. The base had become much more established since the first squadron to come through in 2001. Most of the terrorist activity had become quite when it came to Air Force members, at least that is what we told ourselves, and our family. I didn't have many worries that I shared, but I was well aware of the risk, as well as the rocket attack that injured an Air Force member when the rocket landed near and aircraft about to take off near the end of the runway. I had seen the video that someone had recorded. I wasn't even there, but the sound of that inbound rocket would forever be in my mind while I was there, and I listened for it daily. I was worried about many things.

      As I sat I noticed a pilot sitting at the restaurant, he was only a few tables away. He was leaving with me on Monday. He piloted the Aircraft that I helped support. He was the one taking the real risk. He sat with his wife or girlfriend, I wasn't sure. I couldn't help to notice her beauty, however it couldn't hide the worry that she had. Her sadness was plan on her face as they tried to ignore what was right around the corner and enjoy a meal. At times she would look at him with longing eyes, hopping surly that there was a way that she could keep him with her when Monday brought the sadness that many these past years have felt.

      The other side of my table was empty. My thought went from the future and my trip to wishing that I had someone that looked at me the way she looked at him. To talk about nothing and ignore what Monday would bring. I found my self asking why it had to be this way. I was already away from my family, which was hard enough, now I leave a town that has held my life for the last two years and I'm not close to one person that could share this moment with me.

      I wondered how many Americans would leave this country, with out anyone looking at them saying good-buy. How many every day left America to fight a war that they may or may not believe in or even understand, taking with them the loneliness in there heart.

      Tonight was a sad night...

      Tomorrow Monday will be a day closer, and at 6:20 AM on March 22nd, 2004 I will take off from Fairbanks on a week long journey to Bagram Air Base, north of Kabul. I will see a part of the world that only the military can show you. I will go there and do my job as I have done in Alaska and North Carolina for the past 4 years. I will support the pilots that will do the fighting, for the freedom of others.

      I won't have to take up a post and fight, I don't think I could shot any one if I had to, and that makes this a little easier, not by much though

Caleb is currently in Alaska continuing his work until his separation in December.