Happy November dear loved ones,

In one more month I will be able to say that I get to go home next month.  Won’t that be 
glorious?  I am truly fortunate for the life I left back home.  I don’t worry or want for 
much there.  Traffic jams and early morning wake ups seem trivial these days.  It’s 
comforting to feel so content and secure.  Here I look into the eyes of young kids who are 
eighteen or nineteen that just barely left their mother’s arms right into this war zone.  
They are so brave and dutiful.  I was taking care of an eighteen year old army soldier 
from Louisiana the other day and he was courageous and respectful.  He’d barely been in 
the Army a year.  Every time I asked him a question or spoke to him he would finish his 
sentences with sergeant.  That is what he called me.  He had burns on his face, chest, 
and arms.  We had to remove his dressings and clean the medicine off of his skin.  Then 
we replaced it with this medication called Silvadene Cream.  We applied a quarter inch 
think layer of cream to his body and wrapped it up with sterile gauze.  It was a somewhat 
painful process for him.  His hairline line was rough as they had to shave it from the 
burns.  All the while I assisted the nurse in treating him I thought he was about 
twenty-five or so.  It wasn’t until the end that I knew he was only eighteen.  His eyes 
were a warm brown and he carried a stoic, exhausted look on his face.  He trudged through 
the dressing change only groaning occasionally.  I personally would have whimpered like a 
baby as the whole ordeal looked bitterly painful.  His braveness was touching.  The kind 
of thing that sends tingles of electricity through your arms and legs.  Being here has 
made me realize that life is uncertain and you never know when it’s going to end.  

Anyways, I hope you all had a wonderful Halloween.  If you didn’t stuff yourself with hot 
cider and pumpkin shaped sugar cookies, there is always next year right?  Thanksgiving is 
around the corner.  You all should start your shopping now.  We plan to have a big CASF 
family feast here.  I am not sure what sort of food will be served as we are at the 
mercy of the DFAC (dining facility), but never the less it will fun as we are all a 
big happy family.  I plan to make a slug of Oreo cookie turkeys for everyone.  It’s my 
Thanksgiving specialty this year as I am fresh out of sweet potatoes, marshmallows, 
and most importantly an oven!  Oh well…  

Now get back to the grind!!!

Love Always,

Dandy Smiley Face Pumpkin Pie with a dollop of Cool Whip (copy right)