DECEMBER

…I was halfway home.
Everything I had on was new except my socks and underwear. Three days back at Fort Carson was just enough time to catch up on sleep, unpack my gear and shop for some civilian winter clothes.
Now I was walking up the jet-way after my short mid-morning flight from Colorado Springs to Denver.

I had a 90 minute layover at Colorado’s Stapleton airport before continuing on to Seattle. The air on the jet-way was ice cold, crisp and odorless. It still felt odd wearing so many clothes; New running shoes, blue jeans, a wool sweater and a new bomber jacket. As I strolled in line up the walkway I reached over my head to move the thick wool sweater away from my scarred neck. My cold hands shocked and soothed the skin at the same time; it felt good. I palmed the back of my neck as I walked into the large open terminal.

In the gate area, families and couples embraced and shed tears as they greeted loved ones for the holidays. New Army Privates on leave for Christmas walked in pairs and sat in isolated corners smoking cigarettes. Their green dress uniforms were stiff and new and looked plain, lacking a unit patch or training ribbon. Their eager yet innocent faces made me feel seasoned in their presence and put a knot in my stomach at the same time. I had gone from “that” to “this” in less than a year. I was still a Private, but not like them.

I walked a few gates from my connecting gate to a crowded airport café and bought a small cup of coffee. As I stirred in a sweetener at the condiment bar an Air Force Captain in a decorated flight jacket strolled up to me. He looked puzzled as he gazed at my new bomber jacket.
“Are you Air Force?” he said.
“No Sir, Army” I replied.
“What’s the patch?” he asked as he pointed at my left shoulder.
I snapped the lid back on my Styrofoam coffee cup and pulled back the plastic tab.
“It’s a Panamanian Infantry unit… I got it from a PDF soldier.”
The Captain tilted his head to examine it as I turned towards him.
“Nice,” he said. “When did you get back?”
“Three days ago, Sir…” I said as I began to shuffle out of the crowded café.
“Well welcome back… Have a good leave.” he said.
“You too Sir…” I offered a modified salute as I turned away and towards my gate.

As I approached my area, hoping for an open chair, I turned the corner to see almost all the seats available. I took a seat and noticed a small crowd gathering under a large elevated television set. After a few sips I was drawn to investigate. The cable news channel was showing images of a terrible plane crash. The silent screen flashed between an anchor in a newsroom and pictures of a PAN AM 747 nose section lying in a field. The caption across the screen said, “…Pan Am flight 103 …possible explosion…”

Someone in our crowd muttered, “Where is that?”

“Scotland,” someone else replied.

Staring up at the TV screen I continued to sip my coffee, thinking about the tension in Panama and about the other world events I previously ignored, growing up safe from everything in the USA.
I felt safe from violence in Grenada, Greece, Lebanon, Libya, and Honduras. War in Iraq & Iran, Russians in Afghanistan …now American passenger jets blowing up in the UK?
Here we were in a Cold War against the USSR, but our threats seemed to be coming from everywhere but Russia.

I turned back towards my claimed chair and gazed out across the runways as I shuffled around other passengers. Jets of all sizes taxied left and right as others took off in the distance; Icicles formed on nearby ledges just outside the terminal.
I plunged back into my seat and looked at the TV screen again from a distance. I thought about all of the US troops heading home for Christmas on that Pan Am flight... then I got a little mad.

I thought to myself, “If its terrorists, maybe it’s personal… maybe it’s for Reagan’s attack on those terrorist camps in Libya… We’re just a couple of weeks away from a new President… Reagan’s almost out and Bush is comin’ in… Maybe that’ll help make things safer…”

I finished my coffee looked closely at my plane as it taxied up to the gate.

Everybody did.