Fallujah, Iraq, Jan. 5, 2011~

God, I don't know why I am even here.  I mean, it's nothing like I imagined it would be.  Out in the middle of nowhere, in some desert, fighting a war that seems to have no definite end or reason ... seeing some of my buddies (and even civilians) blown up to bits ...  makes me wish even more that I was back home in Iowa, on the farm, with my family.

Homesick.  Oh, God, I am so homesick!!  I want to taste hamburgers or French fries: the food they have back on the base is shitty at best, and what they call "American" food tastes anything BUT like the food back home.  It's gross.  It's nasty.  And it's a wonder more of us aren't sick from the runnin' shits or the twitchy belly .... it's horrible!!

I will only be able to write in fits and spurts because you don't know when there will be enemy gunfire or people comin' at you, screaming in Arabic.  And if I am in a building, I don't know how long the power will last; seems the power is like everything else here: unpredictable.  I hate it here.  I wish I had never signed up to join the military, but I wanted to follow in my big brother Nate's footsteps, and now that I'm here in a war zone, I am starting to regret that decision.

It's incredibly dry here.  Dry and dusty, and sometimes fierce sandstorms come up that blacken the sky: it can be noon or two in the afternoon here, and the swirling sands turns the sky black as midnight.  Sometimes there's rain or even thunder and lightning in these storms; it's rather scary!

Probably the worst thing about this experience (besides people dying, of course; that is THE worst!)  is the spiders.  Oh, the spiders!  You're talkin' SERIOUS arachnids here, folks.  Spiders about as big as your head or hand, that follow you (to get out of the hot sun, I guess) and get into your shadow.  It's like they are chasing you.  It's really creepy!  And who knows what one of those suckers might do if they get a hold of you?? I would rather not find out.  I see one, and it's all I can to keep from becoming unglued.  If there is one thing I fear, it's spiders ...

Saw one the other day crawling on the tent wall while waiting to go to sleep and I nearly tore the tent apart trying to get away from that thing!  It was huge!!!  Biggest spider I have ever seen!!  (((o.o)))

Well, I'd best get to my station; radio crackling to life; they need me.  Don't know when I will write in here again, but hopefully it will be soon.  Until later, this is Cara Bordeaux saying so long; over and out!

~Cara.

To be continued.