I am sure everyone has seen those videos of service members coming home and the tear-jerking welcome as their families run to embrace them again. As touching as those videos and commercials are, they pale in comparison to the real thing. It is hard to put into words all the emotions that come rushing to the surface when seeing loved ones for the first time back in your home country after countless months away. As heartwrenching and painful as the goodbyes are, the hellos are an experience I will never forget. What gets lost in all the spectacle is who can make those moments hit a little harder.
The days before leaving my last deployment were stressful but not because of the normal deployment things. I was stationed in Africa at the time and 2 months before my squadron was called back to Qatar temporarily. However, it took us almost a whole month to get the Africa detachment set up so the squadron wasn't keen on tearing it all down only to come back a couple of weeks later. So they needed an officer with a security clearance and who was comfortable with dealing with classified information. Considering the fact that my crew had left a month earlier and I was left behind for precisely those reasons it was no surprise when the second crew and entire maintenance department left this time, I was the only possible choice. So there I was...alone...in Africa. I am going, to be honest, in the beginning, it was great! It felt like the beginning of Home Alone because I had no parents watching over me and I could do what I wanted (within the limitations of the base still). Having free time on deployment is a very rare thing so this was a welcomed relief. However, the days turned to weeks and then to months and the squadron never came back. Sleeping in a shipping container with no internet and the only entertainment on base was the gym started to drain on me. At this point in my Naval career, I had some nerve damage in my lower back where I would lose feeling in my right leg so not even the gym was a viable option. I am a social creature and not having a daily purpose or having anyone to talk to started to get very old. I did watch a lot of movies on my laptop which was nice for a while. Pinocchio is a much darker movie than I remember! Now all things considered I know I am EXTREMELY lucky that my deployment was chill and boring and I was basically forgotten about. I am fully aware that everyone that has deployed has had it worse and I am not complaining about it but merely setting up the scene and the state of mind I was in.
Whenever a deployment draws to a close you are filled with a mix of emotions of nerves and excitement. This was escalated for me in this case. I was excited to hang out with people again, I was excited to see my family again, and I was excited to see any other color than brown again. It was weird knowing this was my last real deployment and I spent the majority of it not flying like I had hoped I would. It was also nerve-wracking because my squadron still was not back in Africa so I had no one to relieve me. With no one to relieve me, that means no one to watch over the classified spaces which means, I wasn't getting relieved. This isn't just a problem because I wanted to go home, this was a problem because I had to leave the deployment early because I had a new set of orders. I had to move from 2.5 hrs north of Seattle to about 2 hours south of Washington D.C. Literally across the country with my family and I am in Africa and my house wasn't packed up. If I left on time I would have two weeks to complete all that. Plenty of time...if I am not in Africa.
2 weeks before I am supposed to leave I finally receive my plane tickets from Djobuti Africa to Qatar. I would spend a few days there to check out of the squadron then a 15-hour flight from Qatar to Chicago, layover, then to Seattle. One issue remained. No one was coming to relieve me.
One week to go and they finally made the decision on who to send. Luckily it was one of my great friends in the squadron. He got in 36 hours before I had to leave. Not a lot of time to catch up and barely enough time to get him up to speed with all the requirements of operating here. I spent the whole day doing turnover with him then got on the bus to head to the Djobuti Airport. Thus the beginning of the stressful stretch of getting home had begun.
We weren't allowed off base for a multitude of reasons so it was kind of exciting and a little scary to drive through those gates while it was still dark. We were stopped outside the airport gates and ordered out of the bus and patted down. It was here that I was convinced I would be captured and understood why we went through the training we did. Luckily nothing more happened and boarded my flight to Qatar. While it was great to see my squadron again, most of them thought I had left months ago and were shocked to see me. Being back at the main deployment site everyone was swamped with work and flights so I tried to check out as quickly and efficiently as I could as to not bother everyone. Crazy enough one of my best friends in flight school happened to be in Qatar for the week! He was a Marine aviator and I ran into him by accident on my first deployment in Japan. Random and crazy experiences are kind of like a calling card for our friendship. It was crazy to see him here! It was incredible to catch up with him and share stories. Since I didn't have a ride to the airport the next day he offered to take me so we got to hang out a little more.
Like every time we are together something happens and turns an uneventful errand into a story. Once we left base and made our first few turns the GPS died. We were now lost and had to guess our way to the airport in a country where we can't read or speak the language. We made it to my flight just in time but I still had to check-in. We said our quick goodbyes and I drug all of my gear and suitcases that had flown out here with on my own aircraft that now I had to fit on a commercial one. I was, of course, overweight so I had to do some creative packing to mix up the weights and I finally made it but I had to carry my flight gear with me. As I was walking away I remembered I had a KaBar on my gear so I had to sprint back to the front desk and check it in my luggage. My flight gear was originally in my check bag because it had knives on it but it was too heavy thus leading to all this unnecessary drama. I am now running very late and went to the first of three security checkpoints and they found my parachute line cutter that I had left in my gear so I gave that up knowing I could get another one in my next squadron. I made it through my next 2 stops as quickly as I could and made my flight as they were doing the last call for boarding. I was one of the last people on the plane and was dangerously close to missing my flight. I had no options if I missed it. I settled into my seat at the back of the aircraft and prepared for my 15-hour ride to Chicago.
Landing in Chicago was an amazing experience for me in many ways. I was not only one step closer to seeing Lindsay but I was back in America. If my next flight got canceled it would have sucked but I spoke the language here and could read the signs and I was no longer on deployment. I was done. I wouldn't go on anymore. I had done my training and I had been overseas multiple times for months on end, I had over 1,000 hours in my aircraft and I was so proud of accomplishing everything I wanted to do. While airports can be stressful places and everyone is hurrying around, I couldn't wipe the smile off of my face. The full weight of this didn't hit me though till I got to customs. The agent called "Next", in a monotone voice without looking away from her screen. I carried all of my luggage with me, handed her my military passport and she looked up at me. "You coming off a deployment?"
"Yes ma'am," I said with a smile. She looked up from my passport, handed it back to me, and smiled. Then she spoke two words that I have heard a million times but never hit me with such force until that moment.
"Welcome home"
Welcome home. Even typing it now I tear up. Welcome home. Such a simple phrase that has so much power when you have truly been away for a stretch of time. I was home. I may not have been in my home state or city or even house but I was home. America was my home. I had come back, and a random stranger who I will never see again and probably had no idea how important those words were to me at that moment, delivered 2 simple words that would stay with me forever. It was genuine and not a forced or rehearsed response. She meant it. They say you truly don't know what you have till you lose it and I firmly believe that now. After months of being in Africa with my squadron and by myself, I longed for "home". Not necessarily the house or the area but the feeling, the country. I held back tears as the emotions of such a simple phrase were unleashed inside of me and I smiled and thanked her.
As I continued through the airport on a new high I only wanted one thing. An American Burger and heavy dark beer. After eating galley food for the last several months I wanted a truly American meal to really celebrate the end of deployment and I was lucky enough to find it. There may not be whiskey in this post but I think a heavy stout still counts! Satisfied and still riding Cloud 9, I boarded my next flight to see my wife in Seattle. Our first welcome back from deployment moment was right out of a storybook. I landed back on my base waving an American flag out of the window of the aircraft, got off and we ran to each other and embraced while I was still in my flight suit. That is literally out of a romantic movie. As amazing as that one was though this one felt a little different. She was my wife now, not a girlfriend or fiancee. This was the last one we would have to endure so this welcome home was special because I was "home". To be honest, I was sad there would be no pictures of this one because Naval photographers wouldn't be there but we would take a selfie after. Once again the American people came through. I got off the plane, got to baggage claim, saw her sign, and ran over to her. After I let her go a family came over to us and handed Lindsay back her phone. They were so excited to see one of those moments they stayed by Lindsay to take pictures. Again random strangers taking time out of their day to do something so simple yet so meaningful. We thanked them and they thanked me for my service and welcomed me home.
I don't know if those people will ever truly know the impact they had on me that day. Those small moments took almost no time and very little effort but gave me lifelong memories and pride. Do you know what else I took away from that day? How many times in our lives could just being nice or saying something like "welcome home" sincerely change someone's bad day or have a profound impact on people's lives? I am not great at doing this all the time but ever since that day I have tried to pay it forward. If I could make one person happier then I have done just a fraction of what those people did for me that day. Find your "welcome home" moment.
Cheers!
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