Waiting

I have been waiting now for 12 days.  Waiting for what?  Anything.  I have gotten a few flight hours, but I have no real mission here.  I am supposed to move forward to another FOB, but we keep getting weathered out, or something else happens and I can’t go.  I feel so completely useless and its starting to get to me I think. 

I can’t get involved in any projects here because I will be leaving.  I can’t get into the schedule cause I am leaving.  I am not part of this platoon, so I have no spot here and I feel I am just getting in the way all the time looking for things to do.  Unfortunately, I just spend my time waiting and trying to stay out of the way, and not look like a total waste of human flesh.

I wish I could be home with my family.  I am sure my wife could use the help with a new baby that’s keeping her up all night.  Instead here I sit, a little frustrated, a little melancholy, without any real friends to talk to and feeling very much like a “Third Wheel.”  I have even wondered if the career move to aviation medicine was worth it. 

It doesn’t help that I am currently suffering under the FNG umbrella as well.  I have been in EMS and Rescue for 15 years, been in combat in the mud (more than most these guys can say), and yet whenever I offer up a suggestion, its summarily dismissed because there is no way I could know anything.  After all I am just the FNG.  I did at least explain our monitors to someone today and enlighten them on Cardiac Electrical Conduction.

I just hope things improve once I get settled in at my new “home.”  I just want to get into the regular flight rotation, do my job, and get this never-ending nightmare called Iraq – The Second Tour over with.

Done ranting and rambling…