In the review mirror

Taking Leave of a Friend

Blue mountains lie beyond the north walls;
Round the city’s eastern side flows the white water.
Here we part, friend, once forever,
You go ten thousand miles, drifting away
Like an unrooted watergrass.
Oh, the floating clouds and the thoughts of a wanderer!
Oh, the sunset and the longing of an old friend!
We ride away from each other, waving our hands,
While our horses neigh softly, softly…..

Li Po


We are heading home today. There will be a great deal of waiting, standing in line and waiting. Patience and more patience and waiting to sleep. Our goodbyes have started some are obligatory and others are laced with sorrow. There are never enough words when it comes from the heart.

Needs a hand

“It takes him 20 minutes to jerk off and he is doing it four or five times a week.” Johnson said.

“Wow!“ I said.

“ I don’t mind him jerking off but it should take him ten minutes. I can handle ten minutes.” Johnson said.

“Can you play Jackie Gleason’s music for young lovers maybe it will help speed it up.” I said.
Johnson wasn’t listening. We live in B-Huts that are eight men to a building. We are separated by ¼ inch plywood living in an 8x10 space. Privacy is an illusion and right now Johnson is having a problem.

“How about “Pillow Talk” by Sylvia” I said. “I will download it for you.” I was too old school.

“Why can’t he just hurry up and finish it off. I am not unreasonable but it is bugging me.” Johnson said.

“You don’t think music is the answer? Janet Jackson?”

“For me all I need is Jamie Lee Curtis. She is my dream girl.” Johnson said.

Who was going over the edge first Johnson or his over zealous masturbating neighbor. I wanted the thought out of my head before I went to sleep. Everyone has a weapon here and I didn't want to wake up to the sound of gunfire. Blessed are the peacekeepers.

"Hey Johnson would Carrie Underwood do the trick for him?"

Al and Jean taking coffee.

I was very young when I read Albert Camus’s “The Myth of Sisyphus” and I will be very old if I ever reread it. Camus and Jean Paul Sartre sipping coffee on the Left Bank of Paris talking about life, existentialism and politics. How they suffered. In his essay Camus asks why not suicide? A nice tight intellectual dialectic with a hint of ennui. Later after coffee they might have discussed male pattern baldness.

William Styron thoughts on suicide have nothing to do with ennui. In his essay on depression and suicide “Invisible Darkness” Styron deals with his personal experience with depression. He believes people take their lives to escape the very real and tangible pain of depression which he terms the “Invisible Darkness.” A pain so great that suicide becomes the only option.

The message on the computer was highlighted in red for a possible suicide attempt. Last year I did three possible suicide attempts while working in Kuwait. This year in Afghanistan I’ve lost count. The soldier was a woman somewhere in or near Kandahar. She had e-mailed her mother that something had happened in her unit and to say good-bye to her family. She wanted her mother to take care of her of nine year old daughter.

What happened in her unit that she wanted out? Was it the physiological creeping darkness of depression that entered her body. Or did something or someone violate her in way so profound and damaging that she couldn’t make it anymore? Or maybe she entered a world without love? There was a rupture.

The air conditioner is on at our office in Bagram. Ten days ago the snowflakes were large and the base was filled with sloppy mud. Now, it is hot and summery. After delivering the message of a possible suicide I stared at the computer screen letting the coolness of the blue ether settle in. Now, I'm waiting to hear from command if she is safe. Kandahar would be hotter and dustier more oppressive with summer coming on. The Spring called for an offensive on the Taliban. Drones were already flying into Pakistan dropping bombs. Bagram was attacked twice in the last week killing one. The trees bud, the snows melt and to everything under the sun there is a season .. It appears to be the season for war. I am waiting for a call from command...

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serenity now

Grant McClinock is a photographer, a fisherman and my friend. He is as fine a fisherman as I know. He casts with grace and precision, orchestrating the fly and fly line to the right rhythms of the current. As a photographer, he is angling for the moment when light breaks through a pin pricked sky or casting for the simple tranquility of a fisherman, his dog and a trout stream. When he intercepts this moment through the aperture of a camera, he captures time and space. He fuses together the physical world of air, earth and water.
The following photos all have great beauty. They all share some intrinsic truth found in accurately capturing the moment. When I look at Grant's photos, I long for both the time and the place the images reveal. His work inspires a feeling that is clean and pure, running right to the soul. This is the same feeling many of us have when we find a trout on the other end of the line.

The landscapes depicted in his photos are the places we fish at Lewis and Clark Expeditions. Fishing is and always has been more than fishing. While pursuing trout, we are also seeking the moments when the world and everything in it softens. It is a world with a trout exploding from the surface, but it is also the first explosion of pollen from a river bank. It is a river adorned with caddis flies at twilight. Grant's work bears witness to a beauty that is both profound and mysterious.

At Lewis and Clark Expeditions, we can get you to some of the places that can hold you in awe. Plus, we can throw a few fish into the mix.

We encourage you to discover Grant McClintock's work at www.grantmcclintock.com. We also encourage you to come with us and catch the feeling and emotion that is trout fishing with Lewis and Clark Expeditions.

An unabashed ad for Grant and Lewis and Clark Expeditions.

www.lewisandclarkexpeditions.net

friends with the past

Li Po was born just north of Afghanistan in Kyrgyzstan which I believe was mountainous country. I first discoverd him in Ezra Pound's Translations almost 40 years ago. Li Po was a wandering spirit that found both favor and disfavor with his emperor. Li Po's world was war, exile and beauty. At times he wrote from the far edges of the empire with his mind floating like a wide cloud which still touches me.

He understands some of the inherent sorrow of being in a distant land. He understand the strong bonding friendships of being on the edge of the empire overlooking "the thousands miles of dead grass." He gives me calm and his poetry has always been a sanctuary for both my mind and spirit.
And he was a fishermen.

Hard is the Journey


Gold vessels of fine wines,
Thousands a gallon,
Jade dishes of rare meats.
Costing more thousands,

I lay down my chopsticks down,
No more can banquet,
I draw my sword and stare
Wildly about me:

Ice bars my way to cross
The Yellow River,
Snows from dark skies to climb
The T’ai-hang mountains!

At peace I drop a hook
Into a brooklet,
At once I’m in a boat
But sailing sunward….

Hard is the journey,
Hard is the journey,
So many turnings,
And now where I am?

So when a breeze breaks waves,
Bringing fair weather,
I set a cloud for sails,
Cross the blue oceans!


Li Po

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Master Sargeant

     Johnson is on his meds and sleeping. The Master Sagreant would like to see Johnson somewhere other than Bagram. He would like to see him on a remote FOB, or Jalabad or at an IHOP in Alaska.

     The Master Sargeant is 44 from Puerto Rico and is all Army. His army. He looks and moves like a middle weight. He talks like a Master Sargeant not profane like in the movies but a directness filled with certitude. There is zero indecision in MSGT. He prays before every meal making the sign of the cross and attends mass every Sunday. The Catholic Church has a chain of command like the Army. The Pope is the Commander in Chief and is infallible. Orders are orders. The Cardinals are the officers. Bishops are the NCO’s handling the priests and the rest of the parish. This structure aligns with the MSGT’s sensibilities.
     We eat together everyday at six. He is from a family of 16 and the cardoard tray we use as a plate is full. He eats each serving one at a time: carrots, then potatoes, then fish, then salad, then dessert - compartmentalizing.
     He says - Robert Clemente was the greatest ball player from the islands and Puerto Rico then Roberto Alomar. Clemente could pick off a base runner from right field. He brought his mitt and a baseball over here but hasn’t thrown a pitch.
     There isn’t a question about the army, the base or his unit that he can’t answer. This is his army, his base and his unit. God, military and family clearly defined all the moving parts are his responsibility. His job is 24/7.
     He reads Neruda and sends his wife love poems. Just when I thought I had him pegged comes the curve. The MSGT is capable of the unexpected
     He wasn’t with the 3-61 Cav at COB Keating on October 3 but he knew them. They were TF Warrior and passed through his world. When I asked him about it he says, “the fighting went for twelve hours.”
“What happened ?” I ask.
“The Afghans walked off,” end of conversation.

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Trout streams

Trout generally live in the most beautiful places on the planet.  They live in clear, clean water that does something to the soul.  Some people can just sit, stare and take it all in.  I like to move with the interior rhythm of life.  So, I pick up a fly rod and cast to a different beat and time.

There are too many mountains, creeks, streams and rivers in Afghanistan not to hold a few fishermen.
A few them will also seek solace in the movenment of water.

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But their feet are cold

Johnson looked at his weapon and said, “ I thank God, I never had to take a life.”


He has already left the country in his head. He has 90 days to go and is working on his resume. But, he was working on his resume when I got here four months ago. Like the rest of us he is a work in progress.

Today, he hates the Army and Afghanistan. He tells us, “the country is a piece of shit and worthless.” The other soldiers are silent and uncomfortable it’s a conversation they’ve already had and it is pointless. They are here to execute policy not debate it. Early in the day Johnson was trying to explain the Hegelian Dialectic to his Sergeant. The Sergeant wrote off Johnson months ago. Today he told  him to get some medication so he could sleep.

Johnson is homeless in his unit and is drifting. He used to get some of the Afghans he worked with boots. Command fears that if you give them boots they will start to piece together uniforms and infiltrate the base. Or they wear the boots and are marked as collaborators when they are on the other side of the wire. A no win unless you need the boots.

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Johnson's War

Johnson was with Task Force Warrior and stationed out of Colorado Springs, Co. His Russian wife enjoyed looking at the peaks of the Colorado Rockies. Johnson loved America and it expanse. He didn’t ski but wanted to learn. He didn’t fish but enjoyed being near a mountain lake or a river. He loved Applebee’s going to Costco and Toy’s and Us.


Nuristan was deep in the mountains. Applebee’s, Costco and Toy and Us were not coming anytime soon to Afghanistan. On October 3, 2009 eight from Task Force Warrior died in a firefight that started at dawn and ended at dusk. Twelve hours of adrenalin. There were 45 American soldiers and 25 Afghan soldiers. When the Afghan soldiers felt the coordinated Taliban attack they walked off. They were retreating before the shots fired. The battle started from the local mosque with grenade launchers, automatic weapons and mortars. There were as many as 300 Taliban at the gate.

It was called COB Keating a remote outpost not far from Pakistan. The local field commanders warned that it should be closed because it was vulnerable and had no tactical or strategic value. The base was situated in deep bowel that geographically gave up the high ground. Even if was geographically vulnerable you could count on effective artillery and air support. Except it wasn’t coming on October 3.

Johnson would wake up singing off key. He liked Al Green’s - Let’s Stay Together. Johnson’s voices would screetch out, “Happy and Sad. Let’s stay together.” You tolerated Johnson’s voice not for the sound because there was little or no music to it but there was joy. The joy could be infectious unless your were trying to sleep.

Here Is That Rainy Day Again

It’s rainy and I’m listening to Freddie Hubbard play - Here Is That Rainy Day Again. He is extenuating the notes on his trumpet then comes the release followed by emotion. We are slogging through the mud today at Bagram which means flights will be cancelled and soldiers will play a waiting game.



Most of the soldiers will be in 100 man tents. Bunk beds right next to one another. A bunk bed then another then another then another…. They listen to I-pods, play an electronic game, watch DVD’s or unplugged read a book or just stare at the ceiling. Regardless of how connected you tried to be - cell phone calls, skype computer viewing or e-mails home is going to be different. Home is a place they haven’t been because you block it out to make room for the next day over here. Home is the dream while your killing time waiting ….

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