A thought in my mind.

Another day passes and yes I know I need to start adding more chapters to this book I call my life. But I really haven't had the ambition too write honestly it's as if my mind is elsewhere, lost confused or just not there. But the one thing I have been thinking about over the past 20-30 minutes as I sit here and listen to the soothing sound of the ambulance idling, is that I owe some thank yous to people. To my family who know who you are so I'm not going to mention any names, Thanks I do mean that sincerely and honestly from the bottom of my heart you guys throughout all the bullshit have stuck by my side no matter what. Came to pick me up when my heart/life was shattered and I went down a path I am not proud to say that I did. Yet throughout all of that I still felt loved, missed and most of all wanted which was something I yearned for more than breathing, or a drink of water. To my close friends; Jesse, Haines, Siv, you guys again proved to me what it is like to have true friends. Jesse when the heart wrenching fighting started you without question were up there to help me and evy get the heck out of dodge with no hesitation or question in your voice. Or to listen when she belittled me about tiny things and I simply needed a voice to vent my frustrations. Haines, when I was in the hospital your face was a sight for sore eyes even with the falling out that you and I had at the time that you were able to put that aside to be there for me and make sure that I was OK and safe. And then in turn help me move and deal with one of the hardest things I have ever been through divorce as you have been down that terrible road yourself. Siv, as always brother the ear that listens and I do appreciate it more than words can describe.

So I have made it back to NY and in case I had not posted so I have officially gotten divorced. I have to say that was by far the hardest thing I have ever or will ever go through, as bad as losing a close friend in combat. A thank you to someone new in my life, who know who you are. Thank you for just being you I am honestly taken back by how sweet and understanding you are with how I compare things from then till now and constantly talk about my past which I'm sure has to bore you at points. I can honestly say thank you, you have helped me cross over hurdles in this short time I can sincerely say I never thought I would again. You have helped me heal my heart slowly yes but a start none the less, it is quite a breath of fresh air. So I have gotten that off my chest I feel better time for a smoke. On that note I bid you all farwell and goodnight as I protect the citizens of Greece,N.Y. against themselves.
Doc A signing off.
P.S.- Evy is doing well and is Fat and sassy

chapter 3

Well I know it has been a while since I had continued on my life book so here goes. We go on forth from may 2002 till we'll say about oh Feb of 2003, this time frame alot happened in my navy time I will say all of which minus minor hiccups was relatively good. So where I left off I do believe was that I had graduated from Field Medical Service school and was off to MCB Quantico for operation bulldog, for those of you who don't know what that is, it is an officer candidate school for the United States Marine Corps. This school takes college graduates or college students who are in there 3-4 year of college and starts and/or finishes that transformation into Marine Corps officers which is pretty cool to watch(now mind you there is more too it than just that but you want to find out more go visit a Marine Corps recruiting office and find out for yourself! I was a lowly little E-1 at the time responsible for over 50 candidates of just above listed individuals. A daunting task you may say for someone with 12 weeks of training and at the ripe age of 18 but I was up for the challenge. We did everything from 5-15 mile force marches to the obstacle course, to the sand pit(fun i might add) to marine corps martial arts you name the physical activity we did it, the typical day started at 0430 when we would muster with our DI's and go over what the game plan was for the day and then go about having a "sick call." We would then go about taking care of the marines on there various day to day activities, now mind you in Quantico, V.A. it was one of the hottest summers in recorded history, and the heat causalities were a dime a dozen, and so were the twisted ankles and various other injuries. The three months that I was there I learned more about being a corpsman than I ever did in school, so come august my time is up and it is on to my next duty station which is where alot of events happened. I checked into NNMC Bethesda on August 16Th 2002 now at the ripe age of 19 and got myself a promotion(which was automatic) to E-2, and I checked into where I was going to be working which just so happened to be Labor and Delivery. I will say it was an interesting transition going from taking care of 19-30 y/o soon to be marines to taking care of babies that I could count there age in hours versus days, months or years. I soon began to learn the ropes as I went along making sure to suck up as much information as I could, because I wanted to be the best I could be at my job. So the work life was going alright minus the retarded uniforms we had to wear and the estrogen count being way to high for it's own good I enjoyed the job. The home life was well something to be lacked in, I lived with a roommate who first off was an E-4 and a shitty one at that and didn't give one crap about keeping OUR room clean along with me. So along comes Mr. Haines one day I see him in passing ( he worked on labor and delivery too) and I ask him do you like your roommate? He says "no" He asked me "do you like your roommate?" I say of course no. So we became roommates, I did start dating Ms. Benkert at the time too who was going to school full time at radford university to study I forget what but the times were gearing up to be better so to speak. Come December of 2002 I go on a much needed Christmas leave to go home see the folks etc etc. I get a phone call from Mr. Haines to say "hey dude just wanted to let you know I am deploying tomorrow on the USNS comfort, so my side of the room will be packed up just wanted to let ya know. " I say OK and off he goes, this is also the time I get my first of 5 tattoos that I currently have, which if you know me you know what it says. Well come February of 2003 we all get told hey FYI your all going to be getting deployed to the USNS comfort in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom, I was excited but nervous at the same time, I would be forward deployed on a ship in a war zone! yes this is what I signed up for but not exactly what I was expecting. So we all get on our aircraft depart and get into baharan where we are to meet up with the ship. I get on board to meet Mr. Haines and this is where I meet my second best friend that came from the service, Mr. Sivengy. Haines and I are standing on the flight deck waiting for our bags to arrive when Siv shows up on board who Haines knows but I don't and blam that is that now I know two people on board this ship, which is a good feat I must say, of a ship with over 800 crew members. We shall continue with the story soon where I will talk about the war, and the memories that still haunt me vaguely today and all the ports that we enjoyed. SO until next time I am outta here.
P.S. In local news today I am happy to say I am back in good ol NY working on an ambulance yet again which is always nice and doing what I love to do.
Doc A. Signing off.

Chapter 2

2002,
A year for which I will have to start dividing up my year into months so this is what I am going to do for the rest of the chapters from here on in. This will cover the months of January thru May of 2002. So where to begin I always like to through interludes into things that I see may be fitting for the time. I have graduated boot camp by this point and have moved onto Hospital Corpsman A-school at NTC(Naval Training Center) great lakes. Where I began my time as a corpsman so to speak, a very proud and large group of services members that have been running strong since 1898 and are still running strong today. They consist of 22 Medal of Honor Receiptants as well as several other of the highest military honor to be bestoyed upon one person. Now you ask what is the importance of this particular fact? The answer is simple quite simple actually, we do not do our job for the glory of ones self but for the honor and pride of being able to take care of and be trusted with the nation's sons and daughters, husbands and wives. A task for which although yes large in our group is not handed out to everybody, we will gladly put ourselves in harms way to bring them home. A many of thousands of people today owe there thanks to the tireless and brave work of us hospital corpsman and so I digress.

January a cold windy winter in Great Lakes Il and the time is winding down as I progress through the weeks at school, I ask myself where do I want to go with this unique opportunity in life? Where will this take me will I end up with the marines? A many of questions with so few answers yet found. So came February of 2002 and on the 22nd of this month I offically became a U.S. Navy Hospital Corpsman a title which I wore proud, and a well earned week of leave before my next duty station. To where you might ask? Well to none other than Field Medical Service School, a school where they teach corpsman more advanced medical procedures and probably the most important thing for us devil docs how to work and coexist with marines. You sleep like them, you eat like them, you learn everything they can cram into our brains in eight weeks. It was a tiring and trying time but well worth it in the end. I graduated this particular school on May 28th of 2002 with orders to MCB Quantico for what I did not know at this time.


Doc A signing off.

Chapter 1

2001-
The year that alot of history as we know it was written, the computers were really coming into their own, the PlayStation was a giant among giants, every kid, cat, dog and fish had a cell phone, and I had made a big decision in my life, the time was February and it was a quiet cold winter in Hamlin, N.Y. when I decided that I wanted to serve for the country that I was so proud and honored to be a part of. I had narrowed my choice down to either the Marines, Navy, or Airforce. I was 17 at the time so the parents did have a say in what branch it was that I joined. I had to present my case and present I did, the Air force by far the most dangerous job I wanted to do was be a pararescuemen, these guys are the elite of the Airforce they willing go behind enemy lines to pick up down pilots and crew members and various other cool things. My parents ney'd that one to death, then came the marines now mind you I wanted to have a medical job, and that was my path and nobody was going to tell me otherwise, so I walked into the marines recruiters office and sat down with the Sgt. there and said Sgt. I want to be a marine! The Sgt responded with "well son what is it that you wish to do to become a United States Marine?" "do you want to be a grunt, Motor T operator, or perhaps and aircraft mechanic?" I looked at him with quite a discontent look as these were nothing of the sort that I wanted to do. I stated "no I want to be a medic with the marines and take care of them, I hear that is a pretty honorable job." The Sgt replied " why yes it is, it is one of the hardest jobs of the marine corps, however we do have a rate or as we call it MOS for that." I replied well then how do I go about becoming one." The Sgt replied " As much as I hate to say this son, this is what you need to do." " you need to walk over to the Navy recruiters office next door and tell them you want to be a Hospital Corpsman." I replied " a hospital corpsman?" Sgt replied "yes, the blood angels as they are called. They will go to hell and back to get their marines out of harms way and will stop at nothing even if it means that they do not come home." I replied " well that sounds like my type of job."


So off I went, I walked into the Navy recruiters office and did all the talking blah blah blah I want to be a corpsman when can I leave and etc.. Then came the hard part pitching the idea to the parents. I sat down and wrote down all the pro's and con's of me joining the United States Navy. I sat down with my parents and put my cards out on the table and surprisingly they actually went for the idea. The recruiter came over and I got signed up. I left on July 30th of 2001 for bootcamp nervous as nervous can be, I was away from home for the first time since I was born, I was alone, and in a stranger new place where people were going to be yelling and telling me what to do constantly. We started what we call 1-1 day (which means where they can start Physically training you) on my birthday something I learned real quick to keep quiet about. The days came and went and I be the laundry petty officer for our division. We had a umique division we were what they called a triple threat division, meaning that we had band, color guard, and a rifle team. I will say our rifle team was TOP notch to say the least. I played the trumpet so that is how I got to be part of that division.

This is about the part where live turned rather interesting, it was a cloudy morning in Wakegan Il and I was sent off by my RDC's(recruit division commander, or Drill instructor) to go get my dress whites tailored because that very next week we were going to be graduating a division. It was 7:25 or so when I was sent on my way over there, a typical quiet morning to say the least. So i spent the better part of the day in there and little did I know what was going on outside of the little space I was standing in. The twin towers had been attacked and fallen, the pentagon had been attacked, a plane went down in Pennsylania somewhere. Chaos/ terror had struck the US and we were in threatcon delta. I left the tailor shop at approximately 1330 or so, started my trip back to the barracks when it hit me, something was missing, I did not know exactly what but something was just not right. I didn't hear any divisions marching around on the grinder or cars cruising by on the streets, there was no air traffic above. It was just all too quiet, so I thought somehow I had missed something along the way and needed to get back to the barracks as quick as my legs would carry me. I got to the front door when I was met by one of the Senior RDC's who didn't particularly like me too much, made me drop and give him 20 pushups while he inspected my uniforms. I got upstairs and I asked our watch " what happened???, Where is everybody" he replied with a there all upstairs grab your shoe shine stuff and get up there quickly. I reported upstairs where I was quickly stopped by one of my RDC's she called me into her office and proceeded to be nice to me (something new trust me) and asked me to sit down as she had some news for me. I was told about the attacks that had happened that morning and that they were going to show a video tape from CNN of the second plane hitting the towers. I didn't believe her until I actually watched that video and the Chaplain came in to see me. See I was a New Yorker, and a Emergency provider in the state, so they thought that I should go home. I chose not too, and instead with a drive like none other proceeded to graduate bootcamp and proceed to Hospital Corpsman A School, now the rest of this story will be told in chapter 2 as it mainly happes in 2002 however I will say that the 2001 year pretty much went off without any issues other than graduation.

The big day was upon our division to be done with bootcamp we were set to graduate. There was one big obstacle that we had to get over 9/11 had just happened not but three weeks earlier and America was still bleeding from her wounds and the military was still in it's highest threat con yet to date. Were we going to get to see our families?? Better yet were they going to get to see us march??? The answer to the this question came to us two days before our ceremony, Yes boys and girls the Base CO has decided to let your parents on now mind you they will not be able to tour the base but they will be able to come on and see you all march. So we did our thing and my parents took forever to find but I did end up finding them. The rest is well boring so I am not going to touch on it but from there I literally went across the street to Hospital Corpsman A-school. Which as I stated before will lead us into the 2002 year of my career.
Until tomorrow
Doc A Signing off!

A story from the eye of.

Well first I must start off with the infamous Foreword. You know the section where it tells about what this here story is going to be about and blah blah blah so here goes. I have decided to write down my memories of war and the stories from the eye of a Hospital Corpsman during my time in Iraq in 2003, 2005-2006. I will keep names from this because well I do not have contact with all of my guys anymore so I do not have their legal permission to use them. I would like to first start off by saying some thanks here and well although I do not have their legal permission I'm pretty sure they would give it too me if I asked. I want to thank my mother and father Camilla and Doug Arthur who have been the most supportive parents as I traveled these rough seas called life. I would like to also thank my best friend from before the service Jeshua Smith, Jesse has also been there though alot of my hiccups in life and although he could have very well left he choose to stay. My other best friend and he is from the service would be none other than HM1 now Marc Sivengy, although our paths have crossed and uncrossed a numerous amount of times, he also has always been there to give me his insite on life and a calm thoughtful perception of what is real. I would not be complete without mentioned Mr Haines, Eric and I have had an interesting friendship to say the least, but he and I have been there through some of the worse times you could imagine and yet we are still friends. So to all of you thank you! You will always hold a place in my heart. I was born on the morning of August 5th 1983 in Ny and well yes this is where my journey had begun little knew what would ensue in the years to come. I grew up a relatively normal life I suppose all things considered, was a rather trouble child who from the start had always seem to have a chip on his shoulder. I came into teenager hood,then came into adulthood and what most would consider an unused path, it was by choice that I decided to join the navy and this is what I am here to write about so this is what if you choose to read you will read. The chapters will be as follows they will start off with 2001 when I joined till 2006 when I departed the navy(active duty that is) and continue onto to the point where I sit today.
I hope you enjoy!

a ship set sail,

A ship has set sail with my heart. I have no idea where it will go, and no idea if it will ever return just simply travel until it dies. I have no feeling left just emptiness, have you ever wondered what it would be like to feel nothing at all? Well I can tell you it does exactly feel as it sounds just like nothing. I've gone past the hate, sadness, loneliness to just plain absolutely nothing feeling wise. I rammed my head in the top of the shower last night and should have felt something as I remember doing it but instead I didn't. I just don't even care anymore, I really do wonder if I will ever regain my heart back or if somebody will catch it and bring it back before it gets too far away?? I cannot wait to go home, it is sadly looking like not until july or august time frame sadly but that is ok because well that will give me plenty of time to get ready I suppose. So for now I am going to rewatch the entire NCIS season 1-6 (not all at once). SO i bid you all aldue and good night

Doc A signing off.

The eternal question

SO I sit here at 0300 hours and I ask myself this one unanswered question which I know I will probably never get an answer too. Why holly did you do what you did?? why? I know this is question that will probably eat at me for some time to come, and for that sucks I will have to say but I wish I could get it answered. I know holly doesn't read this post so I don't know why I even bother to write this other than to get it off of my mind. I sit here alone, with my cat in a friend's house miles away from people that care about me like family(nothing against my friend because he does) but I just really want to be done with this, done with the divorce, done with Arizona just done. I want to restart my life and may it be successful and I find somebody who does actually care about who I am and what I do and what I've done. I know this sounds selfish but I am tired of pleasing people by being fake why can't you just accept who I am. I am a wounded vet who although is no longer serving has injuries that will forever haunt me. I highly doubt that anybody out there will ever understand or want to be part of my life. I am ok with that not saying that I necessarily that I want it to be that way but that maybe it has to be that way. I have hurt way to many people, with the demons I hide inside of me I just want to be normal is that possible for me? I cannot sleep as I am plagued by the failure that again has struck my life, wondered what's next I sincerely hope it isn't as bad as the last time. I really just want a woman that supports and loves me for the faults I have and the strengths that I don't and do have. I really crave to just be loved unconditionally like my cat does which is why I am so attached to her because she doesn't care if I yell, taunt or pick on her. I am her owner who feeds her and loves her and she wishes nothing else except for me to be happy and to be her owner. I know i am assosicating a cat to a human here but seriously is there anybody out there that is like that. I think possibly but will I meet them in my lifetime who's to know. So I will sit here again alone in my life as I grow a year older soon. I guess I am done bitching for now, I am going to try to sleep we'll see just how unsuccessful this attempt will be. In other news the VA was overly helpful today and that was quite nice, they gave me money for food, haircut, gas, and various odd's and end's. They are also going to help me pay for some of my bills which are definitely mounting up these days. Well for now I am off to try to sleep with a massive headache and hopefully I have a better day tomorrow. Holly I do hope you have a successful future since I have failed to be a good husband, that you may find someone who will be a better fit for your particular attitude style, I do also hope that you sit down and talk to somebody about your past you need to! Eric, Thank you as always for being there through the good times and the bad always shows how true of a friend you are and I sincerely owe you for what you have already done. Jesse, The friend who although went back to NY has been there through many of my life's ups and downs thank you to you too I do appeicate it and I also owe you my life for many of people envy having friend's such as yourself. I love you like a brother I never had and would do anything for you without question. Jennifer, I know we have grown apart over the years but I do love you! I am not saying this just because I am looking for a rebound, but I am sincerely sorry I left when I did to go to japan(i know i didn't really have a choice) but I really wished that I could gotten to know you more your a sweetheart and I am sorry I let you go. To my parents, man am I lucky to have you guys I know the earlier years in my life were rather trying and sorry for that. But you guys have stuck by my side like none other through all the good times and bad. The stupid decisions I have made and the good ones, I love you guys and I miss ya dearly!!
Doc A signing off.
P.S.- I have no intentions of hurting myself I will still be here just expressing my feelings so if your concerned relax your feelers I am ok I promise. I have too much life to live and too many people to help still to leave this earth.