Chapter 5 - Bhakti

I deploy to Fallujah a week after I get my orders. Luckily, my parents and siblings are able to come to say goodbye. This deployment is 13-months, so I’ll be gone for quite a while.

My family is understandably concerned. When my parents were in the Corps, there wasn’t major bloody and long lasting war like the one that is happening in Iraq right now. This is going to be a very dangerous mission and it's completely possible that I won’t come back. It seems to affect my dad, in particular.

As they are leaving my father pulls me into a long and extremely tight hug. He doesn’t say anything and I barely hear the sobs that begin to rack his body. But I feel them. Right down to my soul, I feel my father’s fear for me.

It’s almost like our roles are reversed. I have to calm and comfort my father, letting him know that, while I’m going to be very active in the Corps’s mission throughout my time there, I wouldn’t be near the fighting. I will be treating those that fight, but I wi