Five years ago tonight...

...I laid in bed, tears silently and slowly trickling down my face, as I listened to our President announce that he had already ordered our bombers to begin striking targets in Iraq. Operation Iraqi Freedom had begun.

Thousands of miles away, James was crossing the berm from Kuwait into Iraq. I can only imagine what must have been going through each of those soldiers' minds. They were no longer at NTC, they were not in the field, they were crossing enemy territory entering a war. They did not know what lay before them, but proceeded to do as their training instructed them, all the while forging ahead towards Baghdad.

James has many stories he shares of those days and weeks that led to an almost 8 month deployment on that initial invasion. He has many more stories that he talks of only around his fellow soldiers that were there with him. And I'm sure he has some stories that stay locked inside. The horrors of war.

Tonight the media officially says it is the five year anniversary of OIF. To hear James talk of it, though, he doesn't believe OIF1 should be considered the same thing as the invasion. He feels he, his men, and his unit were the Iraq Invasion, whereas the units that relieved him months later began the first OIF. Since then he has seen time in Iraq for OIF3 and now OIF5. The guys from his unit that have done all three (the invasion, OIF3, OIF5) have taken to adding a decimal to the end of their OIF number to symbolize how many deployments this makes for the unit. For exmple, this being James' and 3rd ID's thrid deployment to Iraq, they designate this deployment as OIF5.3.

How I dread to think that before too long he'll be going for OIF7.4. That does not have a nice ring to it at all.

In happier news, though, we're in the homestretch (or so it seems) to this deployment. Little by little we've gotten through it and the end is in sight. I can't say for sure when but before summer he'll be home!

As I remember this night, five years before, I thank God that He has watched over James during every single day, watched over us, and been the strength for all of us to make it through.

And I pray that the next five years brings James more time at home than our country has allowed him during the previous five. As proud and happy as he is to serve, sometimes it would be nice to tell Uncle Sam, "Not now, my family comes first for once."