Day 164

I could spend the rest of the evening typing what "home" means to me, and even longer if I were to presume what home meant to others. Here, "home" has a distinct meaning. We all live in metal trailers, three rooms to a trailer, two people to a room. They are lovingly called Containerized Housing Units, or to use the Army acronym, CHU, pronounced "chew". I know I've already talked about the CHU, but for those of you who may not remember, the rooms are about the size of a college dorm room, except without all of the charm. To the vast majority of us, our CHU's are just that; rooms. Whenever we speak of home, almost always we are speaking of the United States. We all work, and then at the end of the day we say we're going to our CHU's. Rarely will anybody, at the end of another round of tedious monotony in front of a computer monitor but behind their desk, say they're going home. In fact, whenever anyone mentions that they're going home, they are always asked when their leave starts; when is their flight; where are they going? I think that, more than anything else here, is what keeps us going; knowing we're soon to be with our friends and family, at home. The United States is like a country with a split personality. On the one hand we want to remain isolated from the rest of the worlds ills, but on the other, we stand up to the bully in the neighborhood when he won't quit pulling on the cats tail. How many other countries in world history have conquered a country and then just up and left? Other regimes have always stayed and acted as "administrators"; we counsel, advise, arm, and when they're ready, we hand over the keys to the outhouse, pack our stuff, and go home.