On 1040 29MAR09, during an extensive cordon and search operation, my world went white. Bright shining light everywhere. I didn't even hear the explosion; my ears just went out immediately. Then the ringing started. It still hasn't stopped.
I should preface by announcing that everyone in Blue Platoon is alive and nobody is seriously wounded. In fact, the only Coalition Forces injured in the incident was me. I was walking down the road to one of my vehicles, accompanied by an Iraqi Army Captain (a great guy, easy smile, intelligent, speaks very good English), when everything went into slow motion. I remember walking, I remember everything flashing, and then I don't remember anything for about five to ten minutes. I'm told by my gunner (watching as I walked towards the vehicle) that the IED detonated no more than five meters from me. The IA Captain was standing in such a way that his body blocked any shrapnel from hitting me. In brief, despite all odds, I didn't get a scratch on my body. Not one. My friend was not so lucky. He's alive, and last I heard he's in stable condition. The shrapnel ripped into his arms and legs, tearing open some lacerations all the way down to the bone.
I can't remember what I did for the first five or so minutes after the blast, so what I report is what others observed me doing. Apparently I sprinted to cover, took cover, left cover immediately, and sprinted back towards the blast site, yelling at my gunner to "cover me." He screamed at me to turn around and head for a humvee, convinced I was hit and bleeding. I took his advice and dove into the seat and started calling up orders to the platoon. I'm told most of it was gibberish. Somehow I managed to establish a cordon around a mosque where someone thought they had seen a trigger man flee.
I resumed full consciousness in the middle of a conversation with the Commander. And when I did wake back up, I had no idea what I had been saying when I was still at some other level of consciousness. And I looked like a complete idiot.
"The cordon is in place, LT. What's your plan of action?"
"Hold on... wait... cordon? Give me a second... holy shit my head... what cordon?"
"For the possible trigger man! You were just giving me the description they reported to you!"
"There's a trigger man? Who said there's a trigger man?"
I've never heard of something like this happening before, but apparently it can. I completely lost five or ten minutes of time.
Short of a minor concussion, inflamed and swelling eardrums, a constant obnoxious ringing sound in the back of my head, and some dizziness and nasuea, I'm doing just fine. Thank God for that. I have no rational explanation for how everything around me was perforated with shrapnel and I didn't get a scratch. I've been amazed at my luck before, but this is unprecedented. I can't get my mind around it (maybe because the constant headache has impaired my thinking). I'm fine. I'm good. My joints hurt, my teeth feel tingly and loose, my head is pounding and my eyes have trouble focusing, but I'm alive. Not a scratch. Amazing.
In other news, platoon life continues as normal. Which is to say hectic and busy. I find myself missing my wife and my home more and more than ever (especially today). We're starting to think this madness might never end. We've got to get out of here. There is nothing healthy and sane about a world where random things explode all the time. Some of the guys are starting to push out on mid-tour leave (a bit early, I think), but at least it gives us the illusion that we're half-way done.
I read a particularly inspirational piece of bathroom graffiti a bit ago that may summarize the sinking feeling of despair.
"Anyone ready for some hot man on man action?"
And written underneath, in a different hand:
"Not yet. But soon."
