"Did we do everything we could?"
In the battalion aid station the two medics mopped the floor, the blood merging with the water into a thinned red liquid as they pushed it along the tiles, fanning it out in tiny waves. The threads of the mop heads were dyed pink from the blood, and the mop bucket was filled with the ruby red water. They did not speak to each other as they worked. They only mopped and kept their heads down. The chaos and the noise had come and was gone now. The helicopters had come and taken away the torn-up men, away to the CSH (combat support hospital). Now the only sounds were the slop-slop-slopping of the mops along the floor between and under the raised stretchers, the dripping of the bloody water being pressed out of the mops into the bucket, and the sounds of their own voices in their heads.
"We did everything we could. Did we do everything we could? We did everything we could. Did we? We did. I did. I did everything I could. I did. I did."
After it was over, the OIC, Capt. Bottomly, came by to see us. He sat in a camp chair in our tent and grabbed a Tupperware container of Christmas cookies before he sat down.
"It was a fuckin' mess up there today, blood all over the goddamn place," he said, his mouth half-full of cookies. He snapped the rest of the cookie into his mouth.
"Yeah, we heard," Capt. Wilde replied.
Capt. Bottomly shook his head and turned to me and said matter-of-factly, "I mean we did everything we could, but a couple of them just didn't make it. Everyone did a good job, though."
"IA guys?" I asked.
"Yeah, IA," he replied, nodding, and popped another cookie in his mouth. His movements were quick and jerky as he sat.
"Are your people okay?" I asked. "Does them being IA make it a little easier on you guys?"
"Oh yeah, you can say what you want but a mass cal with our guys is way worse," he paused for a moment staring wide-eyed at the floor and chewing ravenously. "Fucks people up." He looked up to me again nodding, half squinting one eye and raising the corner of his mouth.
"Seeing females or children is probably the worst as far as the medics go, huh?" I asked, remembering he had said that to me once in the past.
"Oh yeah," he said, looking up to me wide-eyed from the floor where he had been staring. He wrinkled his brow and nodded his head, then stared back down to the floor, looking almost hypnotized by something we couldn't see there. He was still chewing furiously.
Ours is worse. A child is worse. A woman is worse.
This other medic I know can't get her out of his head. It was another bad day. She looked up at him as he was trying to save her. Then she only gasped and closed her eyes. She died soon after that, and I watched them load her body, and the bodies of the other two, onto the helicopters that day. I was just coming back inside the wire when I saw them at the helopad. I watched the others standing there saluting their dead friends as they were flown away, pieces of themselves floating up with them, swirling with the air in the rotors, leaving invisible holes behind, within them, where the pieces had been.
He makes the females angry now, he says. He tells us he can't even look at them, and they know he thinks they don't belong here. He was taught to love them, to protect them. His only sin was loving them, and men can be hated for that love in this day and age. One he never even really knew broke his heart because he loved them all. He tells us he knows that he was the last thing she saw in this world. She stole something from him in that brief moment when she looked into his eyes, desperate. He couldn't save her.
In the aid station the floor is clean now, the concrete tiles glistening, wet. The blood water has been poured out, back into the earth from which it rose. The air smells of bleach as the medics put the mops away, into the corner by the shelves of neatly stacked bandages and IV bags. The bleach could not make the mop heads white again, so they lean against the wall in faint shades of pink. The space is silent save for their quiet movements and still they do not speak. In their heads they hear the sounds of their own voices, "Ours is worse. A child is worse. A woman is worse. I can do this. I'm okay."
Comments
Jeff, This death and distruction you speak of is more than anyone should bear! My prayers are with you and the brave soliders who serve this Country. Stay Safe!!
Posted by: DGilmartin | March 3, 2007 8:12 AM
Jesus. Thank you for sharing this.
Posted by: Lurch | March 3, 2007 4:13 PM
It sounds like he's learned not to feel, which is the same thing we complain about in our own doctors. About treating us as a collection of issues to be solved.
I understand how you start down that path. Do you encourage it, as a measure to keep people up, even if they get distant, or do you try to get them back in contact with their emotions?
Posted by: ScottM | March 5, 2007 8:51 PM
Being in contact with your emotions out here is dangerous business. I encourage soldiers to use what ever mental stance gets them through this. It will be the coming home that will be hard for many, returning to the land of the feeling. I have encountered alot of anger and hopelessness out here lately and have found it to be contagious.
Posted by: Jeff Leonard | March 7, 2007 9:21 AM
I found this piece to be one of the most compelling you've written. I could easily imagine CPT Bottomly's anger and frustration. The combat loss of comrades leaves holes in the ranks but the holes within us are far more difficult to fill. Watching females die is worse because it reaches deep within us to our basic cultural imperatives.
The growing sense of anger and hopelessness that you mention must be a terrific challenge in your current assignment. Do you feel able to write about this in more detail, with emphasis on your efforts to deal with these emotions?
Posted by: Lurch | March 8, 2007 2:15 PM
A high ranking NCO confessed to me recently that he felt his spirit was broken out here from the things he had seen and what he had experienced...He also said "the unreasonable man will be successful", meaning, don't ask questions that make too much sense. My contact with him was in the middle of a week when I was outside the wire and alot of things were happening,some of which I cannot even mention, horrible things. But I related to probably too much of what he said and when the man with the broken spirit makes sense to you, you are in the same mental danger.
You see, at home a counselor does not go home with you to your disfunctional home or to your abusive spouse. The counselor goes home to their own life. Here, many of my fears are the same as theirs. We all want to go home to our families and while my being out with the soldiers gives me a certain level of credibility with them,it also makes me question whether or not I will make it home myself. Some days you feel good and you feel like you will, other days you get this bad feeling and you lose your hope a little. I have not lost all hope but sometimes I just misplace it for a while. So far, I have been able to find it again each time.
As far as coping, I work out constantly. I read alot and watch alot of movies. Those 3 things are probably the top 3 for most soldiers. (Although, one could argue that tobacco is in there too.)We are all in the middle of our deployments out here in my AO so that is a stressful and hopeless time for many anyway. It is like a marathon, 12 months in country...we are at the wall. And I have to say it is different to be at Liberty simply counting days (or counting Lattes)verses out here counting convoys you survived. A true threat of death messes with your mind beyond a mere displacement from your home. Sorry if that offends anyone. You are welcome to trade places for the next 6 months if you like...I need a Latte.
Posted by: Jeff Leonard | March 14, 2007 10:18 AM
Your powerful piece reminds me of a doctor I know who worked primarily with AIDS patients in the '90s. He handles a lot of terminal cases. He's a great guy and does saintly work, but when he talks about his work, it's often dispassionate. I think he needs that buffer. Whatever works for you; I can only imagine. Stay safe, best wishes, and be well.
Posted by: Batocchio | March 17, 2007 3:23 AM
Jeff, you continue to be on my mind. I often think about you and your family.
Your star patient, misses you but will be in high school before you return.
Please stay safe and take care of yourself.
Audean
Posted by: Audean Woollard | March 18, 2007 6:47 AM