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10 SERGEANT CATHERINE LORFILS HOW EVERY SOLDIER LEAVES Excitement boiled in my stomach as I finished the last of my packing. Pushing and kneading my ACUs and personal hygiene items into my duffle bag left me with beads of salty sweat on my brow. I dipped my combination lock around the eyelet of my duffle with a second sigh. I peeled open the Velcro that kept the pocket on my uniform sealed to make sure I had my ID card. I felt around my neck for the tiny steel beads from which my dog tags dangled. I checked the room for the last time. I had left nothing on the counter but my keys. I imagined that the phone would ring and the person on the other end of the receiver would announce that my flight had been canceled. I would drop my packed green duffle bag with a thump and run around my apartment leaping for joy like Charlie Chaplin, with both legs swinging, one side to the other, as I leapt and clicked my heels together . The problem was not leaving home, but going to yet another country that has been at war for decades. This time it was Afghanistan . Twice I had already been to Iraq, where people I knew, hung out with, and admired were killed. I looked down at the black metallic bracelets that I wore on both wrists and thought about all five of my friends who had perished over in the big sandbox: Staff Sergeant Seale, Sergeant Mennemeyer, Sergeant Clark, Corporal Zamora, and Corporal Ellis. They too had packed up their belongings and traveled to war, but they hadn’t come back. I shook my head. I should be thinking about going to aid in the liberation of the Afghani people. I should be calling my family and friends, saying good-bye and telling them I would be okay, even if I wasn’t so sure. The sound the front door made as it clapped shut signified the end of “civilianhood” and the beginning of 100 percent “soldierhood .” I backed the car out of my parking spot and headed to the main intersection, 41A, on my way to the Personnel Terminal hangar at Fort Campbell, Kentucky. I swung the heater knob on the dashboard clockwise to calm the shivers that had less to do with December and more with nerves. The streets seemed overly HOW EVERY SOLDIER LEAVES 11 gloomy too; the wind blew leaves and scraps of paper every which direction. Once in the terminal I walked smack dab into my platoon sergeant . He directed me to retrieve my weapon from the armory and then return to his location. As I turned I felt a vibration on the lower portion of my right leg. Nerves again? No, this time it was my phone. “Where are you?” said the voice. “I’m getting my weapon at the PAX terminal,” I said. “I’m here in the center near the rows of chairs.” I couldn’t believe my ears. This was my third deployment. I had gotten used to being sent off by the unit’s Family Readiness Liaison because I have no family nearby. I felt a little special knowing that someone cared enough to show up for my departure to hostile territory. We sat side by side in two orange plastic chairs in the middle of the terminal. “I’m going to miss you,” he said. “When will you be back on leave?” I said I didn’t know, that I planned to go to Australia for leave. His heart seemed to sink a little. “So, next December, then?” “Sure,” I replied. Then came the crackling voice of the loudspeaker: “Formation will be in five minutes. Say your final good-byes to loved ones.” Final good-byes, I thought. Families are already panicky about their soldier’s well-being, and hearing the word final had to scare many of them. The noise in the terminal resonated with “I love you, baby,” “Come back to me,” “Stay out of harm’s way,” and “Call me when you land.” Children hugged their fathers or mothers as if squeezing them into their bodies. Soldiers used their thumbs to wipe tears from their wives’ or husbands’ faces. I turned to my friend, who engulfed me in his embrace. I would not lose control, I told myself. “I’ll e-mail you. Don’t worry,” I said. But this man knew that sometimes you should worry, because...

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