“Hey, is Col. Brooks or Ms. Georgia around? I wanted to see them before I take off.”
“No, they moved over to the Sports Dome until the other building gets done”
I didn’t go over to the sports building. It’s always super busy there with soldiers. This was my last day in the Army, I was signed out, hasta la vista homies! I had said bye to my unit, 21st CSH, by to Cpt. Shilley, bye to Sgt. Will and all the homies…by the (Ret.) CSM Sandra Townsend who had helped me in my time of need. And Col. Brooks was last on my list.
He and I had grown together since I got back from Iraq. I was referred to him when we went through redeployment SRP in the Sports Dome in 2007. He was the Pain Management Specialist and the Traumatic Brain Injury OIC over the SRP.
I walked the halls of the office that day then made it halfway to the Sports Dome, didn’t want to bother him, shed a tear cause my life as I knew it was over…I was officially discharged and he is the one who had taken care of me physically and mentally for almost 2 years. I was in his office once to twice a week. He had sent me off to referrels for other issues, but it all back channeled through to him. He was ground zero of my treatment. I would pop in to say hi if I was next door with another provider. Ms. Georgia always kept me in the loop. We had cell phones, emails, texts…Whatever medical question I had for him, he answered…It was March 2009, and our tine was up. One last goodbye…
So when I see his office as the scene of a massacre today. It’s just not a good day.
I didn’t know what was going on. I was in a study session with my statistics professor and I kept getting texts. They were confusing texts about, “are you at fort hood? “Are you alright?”. I was like what the hell….
I pulled up to the house and my Uncle Eric called me and asked if I was okay. Still I was confused, he said the shooting at Fort Hood. I said I was at school I didn’t know anything about it…
I got into the house and turned on CNN and just fell to the ground. The first thing they had on the screen was a Google Earth Map showing the area of this massecre, only Google hadden’t updated it, the SRP buiding were’nt there, it was an old map, so they just kept pointing to “this area has buidings between the Howze Theatre and the Sports Dome.”
Well ya, of course they are. They’re small buildings for SRP and TBI. Those buildings were my second unit basically for my last year.
I text my old squad leader Sgt. Will to make sure him and his family are okay. He gave me the “We good, just on lock”. His family was good. Called my friend Cheryl make sure her and her husband Vince were okay, they were good. Text back Sgt. Will see if he wanted me to get him a pizza 
But what angered me today is the text I received telling me “Don’t you wish you weren’t in the Army anymore?”
You don’t understand. You’ll never get it. his afternoon I wanted to be in that hot sweaty no food no water dingy crappy everyone talking debating making up stuff getting called down to get calmed up again 7 hours of lock down. WHY? Because they did it together.
Because true camaraderie is knowing the people who are there and will always be there for you. And once you spend a year away from your family and the Army IS your family in Iraq, we bring back our family memories with us. We share those. It’s hard to explain to loved ones because they just don’t get it. But more than anything I wanted to be at 21st CSH today with my family. The only family I have. The only family thats ribs me but loves me.
Everyone I have mentioned was there when I went through my mental break. When I wasn’t okay. When I was struggling with divorce (those that knew When I was sending letters out to Congressman. When I was going through past my ETS and bein shittit on. Y’all were there.
When I never though I was gonna get out, when I kept getting screwed and screwed…And all those people told me to hang in there. It’s gonna get better. It’s gonna get better.
I’m out of the Army and going to school. A good school. And it’s supposed to be better. But I’m alone. This isn’t home. I don’t know what home is anymore. But I’m lost. God knows why. I Don’t. I’m failing school. I don’t have any real friends. I’m trying my best to make them. It’s hard. I came back effed up in the head. I’m only quippy because I don’t have anything else. But quippy and witty aren’t gonna get me shit.
I HAVENT LOST MY MIND BUT MY MIND ISNT THE SAME. I’m getting help but help doesn’t get here fast enough sometimes. Help requires appointments. Help requires a friends shoulder to cry on. My doggies shoulders are small!
I hurt so bad right now. THAT WAS OUR SAFEHOUSE. GODDAMMIT HE TOOK OUR SAFEHOUSE.
Pray with me,
Donnie D.
Especially after last night. No way was I supposed to have a dream that was a “real” dream that actually is emotional and convoluted when I woke up. That wasn’t the plan. How many dreams come and go without a second though?
Quick recap of my Rockstar Donnie status the last few days…Lets just say it’s been Rockstar…
I got a surprise of flowers at work one day from an (un)secret admirer. The next day I received a box of Rocky Mountain Chocolate Company chocolates, well 2 boxes from the same (un)secret admirer. I went to lunch and dinner with a my hot friend (name redacted). In the same day I was inspired by the Tupac song “If I Die Tonite” which turned into my first Army related tattoo which honors my time spent in the Army, and my deployments to Iraq, and Alex doesn’t normally do military tattoos (so many are cliche and lame), but for me, who he says has done his best piece ever in 24 years of work on me (The Black Parade on my ribs), which is quite humbling, he thought my tribute idea was amazing. So between lunch and chocolates, I stamped the side of my leg with a stone Iraq draped in my dogtags with the dates of my deployments, this of course being the day before Alex starts my sleeve which is gonna be just as long and intricate as my ribs…Rockstar. Alex rocked it too. Then I went to a Japanese place and had some sake and called it a nite. A good nite, and a great day.
Why did those words inspire me? I don’t know, they just did. My best friend and I used to roll around Medford Oregon his white Nissan Sentra and blast the hell out of this song. We were in a small town, we all wanted to become something bigger than we were, and 2Pac represented that bigger. He had thoughts and visions of what his life would be like, and at the time, dealing with my own abuse issues privately, Mother issues, the suicide of an Uncle, once again I turned to music. The quote comes around the 1:37 mark in this video. It’s an amazing video though, it really is. We were never thugs, we didn’t tote guns, we smokes a lil hippie lettuce, but we felt the “I wanna be bigger than something”, at least I did. But at that time I wasn’t sure if that bigger would ever happen. It felt that if I die tonite, I haven’t contributed what I have to offer. It scared me. I wanted my bigger before I die. It spoke. There was so much underneath which is hard to explain. I feel so misunderstood. That’s all I can think of how to explain it in 4 words. But after playing Army for 7 years and spending time in a war zone with Army buddies next to me for a year at a time, and the feeling of camaraderie is a hard subject to explain to those who haven’t experienced it. It changed me. It changed me. It changed me.
Flash forward to yesterday, I had another rockstarish fun day. We started my real sleeve. Art work by Ronald Kurniawan designed for the booklet of the Fall Out Boy album Folie A Deux. Yes, another music related tattoo. Alex is combining this art into my right arm sleeve.
Which as always, with all of my body art, I pay tribute to albums that have affected my life in certain ways. It’s my ways, and not all people agree or understand, but that’s okay. And with a song on the album called “What a Catch, Donnie”, it’s an album that speak to me! Maybe one day I’ll explain all my tattoos in detail….But for now, this song and the rest of the album is the newest inspiration. And I think I keep most of my tattoos undouchable sans the tic tac toe tramp stamp which is still the coolest guy tramp stamp ever….but that’s a long story! Anyways, acoustic “What a Catch, Donnie”
And the Official Music Video is amazingly moving, I just can’t embed it, but you can find it here…http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fme-kzS3DuILike
I said on my Twittter yesterday, I stole a quote from my friend Gina G. who wrote, “Nothing good ever happened by doing the right thing” I love it. She prolly doesn’t remember writing it on her MySpace page over 4 years ago, but I think about it all the time….More on that later, I think, I don’t keep to much of my life private, but that quote has been a true statement the last week or so for me. As open as I am I am that closed and it takes something special to bring out the inner Donnie. I am What a Catch 
Anyways, here is the version Alex has started on. Just outline, color in the next session, this is his interpretation of the art.
Now this is prolly 4 hours into what will end up being 20 hours, but Alex is amazing, and this and yesterdays ink all was involved in this dream somehow. All of the reasons for my ink are personal, a personal attack on society and breaking barriers of peoples thoughts….Anyways, all of that at will me colorful and be an amazing right sleeve.
It was an awesome session, I had super hot friend (Name redacted) Who came and supported me and had awesome conversation with Alex and I. Post tatttoo we walked downtown and ended up in my favorite bar, Lavaca St. Bar, my “home” bar and enjoyed some drinks. I also ran into a new super hot friend (name redacted) who I also had a short but good conversation with. (I still can’t figure out how a pudgy bald guy has super hot friends. I don”t think I have an ugly friend guy or girl. Which must means I’m actually the ugly friend we all feel sorry for balding and being pudgy but we keep him around cause he makes us laugh friend friend?) The night ended at my favorite restaurant Trulucks which as many of you know, is an expensive but worth every penny I’ve ever made type restaurant.
The night ended, I went home, I caught up on my DVR’s, Royal Pains and West Wing. Now I am a full fledges West Wing whore. I should have been in bed, I had been drinking all night, it was 2am, and I needed sleep. But it was the West Wing, I had to catch up. t’s one of my “happy places”
So at 3am I took my Ambien becasue I wanted sleep for hours and hours.
6:42, I woke up in sweats and in tears, I had been balling in my sleep. No I don’t know the whole dream, but I know the end.
Me and Leo McGarry (The West Wing Chief of Staff) walked into a house type buiding, the staff had left and my Army unit was waiting for us down the hill while we secured the building.
When we went through the house, in the very back was a small enclosed room with the door wide open. This was strange, this was a secure buidling. Wha had happened? We checked it out and went to lock the door. The door, of this “secure building” latched on to a small refrigerator. A red one. The small kind that retail stores keep in the back room. That kind of fridge. Connected to the fridge were huge “H” Cylinder oxygen tanks and there were wires all over them. It was strange. And for som reason, all we wanted to do was make formation with the 1st Sergeant. So we struggled to get it latched and when we did, it set of a series of small wires sparking and loud “H” cylinders starting to leak and fill the room with oxygen (which is flammable) and a small fire started at the fridge, and when I ran to the door to get out, it was locked. All we had was a small window with a room increasingly getting hot and impending explosion in my head.
The flight or fight instinct people always talk about…My initial reaction was flight. I had no fight in me. I told Leo, “Leo were dead, there’s no way out, the door won’t open. These are gonna explode, oh Leo why?” “Why us” This isn’t supposed to happen.
Leo was stuck in the wiring and couldn’t get out and I didn’t know what to do. I was crying, and for most of you who know me, I cry when I’m angry. I was so angry, this was not supposed to be happening, Leo was a good guy, I was a good guy, this isn’t how good guys go. It’s just not.
The fight kicked in, I vividly smelled the wiring on fire and felt he heat. I was sweating from my arms it was so hot, I was so angry. This ws not gonna happen. I felt like I had go get out of there Leo told me to get out of there. He had the “I lived a great life Donnie, get out of here, save yourself” speech and I just lost it, no way I said. Bullshit.
This is really dumb cause it’s a dream, Leo McGarry is a fictional character who was played by John Spencer who unexpectedly passed away during the last season, and dreaming about dead people is weird enough….Then top it off with a fictional character who I’m apparently attached to as a mentor and father figure…Holy Crap!
But the bond I felt I had, like he was my mentor, my best friend, and I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t. How could I. It felt like he was a father figure…The fight kicked in..There was a window and I broke it with my hands like the movies and bloddied the hell out of myself, it felt real, I felt the shards of glass in my arms and hands, loooked back at Leo and I knew I only had a little time before the whole place blew up. This wasn’t fair. It just wasn’t fair. I loooked back one more time and climbed therough the small window ripping my clothes and bloodying myself. Once again, it felt real real pain, real tears, real emotion….I got out and I ran down the hill to the formation that my Army unit was holding…I just started screamimg…”Top (1st Sergeant, another father figure, my “Top” is Top Walker, my old Army 1st Sergeant…)
And I yelled and screamed, and of course, because dreams that suck are never easy, there was this barbed wire and razor wire fence, but a small fence with about 3 strands of concertina wire…My funny thought in the middle of all my tears was, “Sweet, this is Awesome,, American effin Gladiators, this is NOT the time!”….When I dove, literally dove into the concertina and got cut by the razor wire I felt it, it cut the hell out of my arms and legs… Horrible pain but my adrenaline was so amped at that moment I didn’t care about anything but my friend.
I kept screaming to top “Leo, Top it’s Leo, we gotta get Leo”.
We looked up the hill and the fire and the smoke was engulfing the place. Yet unlike me, Leo was calm, you couldn’t hear a peep, it was as if he had accepted this fate where as I wasn’t ready. It wasn’t acceptable to me. Top and I ran up the hill and of course the razor concertina wire was gone. “Figured” I said.
As we got closer I could hear the whistle of the oxygen tanks and sparks and the smell, the smell was vivd. I was still in tears, I wasn’t gonna lose Leo, I wasn’t going to…I DON’T LOSE. I WIN DAMMIT.
I jumped back through the window which still had the little shards of glass on the bottom of the window sill…I didn’t care how much pain I was in, at this point I was so emotional and I didn’t want to lose a friend, nothing was gonna stop me.
I felt like I had suddenly accepted Leo’s idea of fate. If we didn’t make it out, we wouldn’t make it out together, I wasn’t gonna let a friend die alone without a loved one by his side.
When I got into the musty smokey room, I saw Leo still caught up in wires..
I had grabbed Top’s gerber (not baby food crazy civilian people!) and I started to cut at the wires.
I was still in tears. Leo was ridiculously angry and cussin at me asking me why I came back. Why I put myself in this situation…It was like slow motion. His stoic look and my look of hysteria. With all of the fire and smoke and wires sparking, he was stoic. The look in his eyes fucked me up. It was a calmness I don’t think I could have in that situation.
I told him because it’s what he taught me to do. That’s why I came back. I couldn’t live not doing whatever I have in my power to help those close to me. That friendship and love is worth dying for when the person reciprocates the same feelings for you, I feel it’s a natural feeling, it has to be. There’s no one I wouldn’t help that I’m even quasi close to. I think it’s an moral and ethic thing that our parents instill in us. And my mother was a great teacher.
You can’t do this alone I said. We’re going together.
The tanks and wires felt like seconds away from exploding and my heart had never beat so fast. I was so scared and Leo was so calm. I can’t get over it, looking back at this stupid dream I’m writing about, I’m envious of the calmness of imminent death.
When I got him loose we were able to crawl through the window. Leo was covered in soot and electrical burns and I was a sweaty teary eyed mess and Top was their to catch us.
And we ran, we ran so fast. When the place blew up a few seconds later, it was Tango and Cash like explosion.
I fell to the ground in tears. Just balling. Leo knelt beside me and put his arm around me. We were a bloody mess. Top knelt in front of me…
Leo said “Son, You’ve made it, don’t worry, you’ve made it”
But it wasn’t about the total destruction and close to life ending scenario, it was a life thing. You’ve made it in this life. And my heart was pounding so hard, and the tears were streaming, and I said “But I wouldn’t have made it without you, how have I made it?” “I’m nothing compared to you, you were calm, I’m a mess”
And he said, “Stop comparing yourself to me, we need more of you”
And I lost it. I didn’t understand anything of what just happened. Nothing. I asked what he meant by that. “Why Leo?”
And at 6:42 I woke up crying, sweating, heart pounding…and wondering to myself…”WTF just happened?”
Because it’s something I wonder all the time. I don’t know if I’m a good person. I don’t know what I think about God. I don’t know where direction my moral compass is. I’ve turned up my intensity and sarcasm lately which means that something is going gone.
When it seems like I have everything, why does it feel like I have nothing. I have an amazing life, yet my dream made me feel like I’m missing something, like something is passing me by and I’m blind to it. What am I missing. I’m intuitive dammit. My timimg is impeccable. So how can I miss whatever it is I’m missing?
I don’t know. But that’s my story of the morning. 2000 words…I’m going to take a shower and get my ass back to Facebook and Twitter. If you read this and you’re confused, join the club. But thank you for reading.
Stay up and Stay True,
Donnie
P.S. I never did mention how ell the Blogathon went. $342 raised for RAINN. Thank you so much everybody. And I still go back and read the 24 hours of madness that Elizabeth and myself went through, and it really is fun. So thank you to all who support me and RAINN. Thank you.
(Click the links to read the back story and you’ll understand. Enjoy.)
The after party is here. I truly apologize for the slow upload, but I think it will be worth the wait. I’ve hit the 43 hour mark, and I think I may have just struck gold! One extra Blogathon Awards (The awards I felt should have been given out!) should have been “The last blogger still up blogging!” We were saying goodbyes to each other 3 hours ago!
If you were here for the Blogathon, then you know that post #38 at 3am brought down the house. You can read it here with the picture I took of myself along with the lyrics I found fitting for the mood I think we all were in.
http://voicethesilence.com/2009/07/26/38-the-blood-shot-eyes-song/
and it set off a comment frenzy for those of us who were just dragging ass and it helped me get by the last few hours. It was a nice little pick me up.
I didn’t mean for it to happen, but it snowballed quick and then Blogathon dropped a front page pick me up directing people to the post! :http://www.blogathon.org/?p=1494 and then asked for a video…
…and after 40 hours, I would have prolly done anything for them. (“Drink this rancid milk”….”OKAY!”) So without further ado…..
BLOODSHOT EYES: THE VIDEO
Please go to http://www.blogathon.org/login.php?action=pledging&blogid=169 to make a pledge.Blogathon is officially over, they are letting us sleep, but they are accepting pledges up until 9am Tuesday! Support my humiliation by sponsoring me for RAINN!
It has been so hard to not jump the gun this last 1/2 hour. But I’m going to wait til 8 on the button…Waiting…Waiting…
Okay, so lets do some math. 49 posts from me, 21 from Elizabeth and 1 from Jeuke. Uh..(Math, Math, Math) 71 total posts! That’s like 150% of minimum posts allowed! WE KICK ASS!
For me, my pity party story was waking up at 2pmCST Friday (it’s now 8am on Sunday) to get some stuff done and head to work, having my car snapped in half (figuratively) at 6pm 1/2 mile from work. Do you know how many places are open at 6pm for such a tragic event in the life of Donnie. None but the tow truck guy.
This was also when I figured out I had effed up my thought process with the Blogathon and thought that I’d be able to start blogging at 4amCST and get 4 hours in, pass the torch, get some zzzzz’s then come back. Until I realized I was in bizzarro world time zone and in fact it was 8amCST when it started. What I thought would be my bed time.
So I whined. To myself. For once I didn’t whine about this to other people. I was wicked pissed about my car, but shit happens, it’s either under warranty or insurance covers it, I couldn’t get a rental til 9am, so no reason to worry over that. Just a reason to be frustrated.
But I’m also in the middle of my 29 of 30 days working, with the Blogothon in the middle of a 4 nights in a row stretch at the busy hospital. (My timing isn’t always the bestest!)
So I said suck it up, you’ll find a ride home (I did), get a rental at 9am, blog from the iPhone if I had to and still get in bed by noon. 4 hours sleep! That’s all I needed. THAT’S ALL I NEEDED.
And after my 12 hour shift, I got my ride home. I made arrangements for a ride to the rental, and then it was 8am and I was blogging.
The first few blogs I was on the phone taking care of car stuff, and Honda informed me my car would be ready by 1pm. (efff. That was sleepy time)
Then I thought, hey, maybe I can rock some power naps. Until I realized that it takes just as long to think of a 150 word post as it does to write it.
And not that I wasn’t counting on Elizabeth. In the days leading up she kept her correspondence up and like I said before, I feel like a good judge of character, but I was still quasi skeptical. I was scared. At the time, I was trusting someone I don’t know with my sleep! Holy poop! The blogathon wording on the disclaimer page was…rigid, to put it kindly. Every 1/2 hour or else be dropped from the list.
I rock a tight schedule when I work nights. Up at 4pm. Out the door by 5pm. At work at 545pm. Off at 630am. In the door at 658am. feed the dogs. Watch the West Wing from 7am-9am, take a shower during the first and second commercial breaks, go to bed at 9am. Rinse and repeat.
So any appt. that screws up my routine when I’m working nights makes me…grouchy? Throw in a snapped car, a commitment, relying on ride, relying on a person I don’t know to not let my sponsors, a Saturday with no West Wing reruns. BIZARRRRRRO WORLD hit the fan!
So my car was ready at 1 and I knew I was screwed. And I just accepted it. And I thought I’d nap for a few hours, and then Elizabeth got on. Which was supposed to be my que to nap. Oops.
And she rocked it. And she got my adrenaline going.
It was crazy. I was trying to churn stuff out and then I’d see a post from her like “wow”, this girl has it. And I totally could have let her go on, but all of the sudden, I felt like me and her were doing something others weren’t. It literally was a tag team blog, and we weren’t really on the same page but we were.
It was like Alex and Josh working on my Broccoli and Cauliflower tattoos at the same time. 2 artists, 2 vegetables, but different styles.
It was cool.
At that point, like at 11am, I knew I was about to pull a 41 hour day. There was no turning back.
And if you would have asked me how excited I was at 6am knowing was supposed to be writing in 2 hours, waiting for my ride home, clueless about my car or my day, I would have lied if I said I was excited for Blogathon. I was dreading it. No energy. No Fire. Nada. I was mentally spent.
After a few posts though I hit the groove, and then this numbering thing became fun, and then the writing was coming to me and then it became a challenge.
Along with the challenge was picking up my car and running errands while trying to write and post from the phone. In know Elizabeth was having the same challenge with her schedule. It was a range of mediums that really tested me more than I thought.
I was rocking, then the taxi came at 1pm to get me to the Honda dealership and I was basically mobile for 2 hours of posts, which at the time I wasn’t happy with, but looking at them now and seeing that I basically turned into it into an Uber Tweet and that I was stopping in the middle of parking lots to make sure I had the post ready to send on time. (Did I mention I was using the stopwatch on my iPhone to make sure I was close to finished writing so I had enough time to post!) make them look even cooler now.
This was literally a marathon.
What was kinda ironic is that when I was posting just random thoughts, Elizabeth was posting these thought provoking posts and then it turned vice versa just randomly here and there. Good times.
Posting at work was a little more challenging since my patients are on a specific treatment schedule, but they all played nice, no random calls from nurses for stuff, no codes, so a smooth night at work helped, but it also added to the versatile ways I had been posting all day and night. I know, and this isn’t a slight to people with the day off, but I would have much rather had the day that I had with the chaos and “Donnie Car Crisis” going on than sitting at home all day. It made it challenging. It made me think.
Like the 52 hour day in Jordan, the 36 hour day in Jordan, the 36 hour day at Abu Ghraib and the 36 hour day at Georgetown Hospital, all uber long days bring unforgettable memories, but none as rewarding as this.
The topper had to come at 3am. When after 1am, I think most bloggers were pooped, I know I was, and out og nowhere I decided to take a picture and I had ridiculously Blood Shot Eyes, which rhymed with Hungry Eyes, and I wrote a parody song…#38 to be exact, and I got a shout out on the Blogathon home page! (http://www.blogathon.org/?p=1494) That was AWESOME! Gotta say, my best work happens when I’m incoherent! They asked me to drop the video, I did when I got home, it’s gonna take a little while to upload, so we’ll call it the after party video!
Anyways, I can’t thank Elizabeth and Jeuke enough for contributing. I can’t thank the Blogathon for keeping us entertained and finding creative ways to keep us up, thanks to Li for keeping an “eye” on me, the people who have pledged already (and to the people who still have time to pledge thank you, and to everyone who stopped by to check us out, thank you so much. A special thanks to Chelsea and the staff at RAINN. We wouldn’t be here without you.
1328 words, now that’s a Donnie blog!
The video will take longer than expected so it will be for the after party, because we ALL want to stay up for 2 more hours and see unintentional intentional comedy right?
Super fast post cause it’s time for the finale!
The video is for Blood Shot Eyes is made. I am tryinmg upload it to YouTube as fast as I can. No I don’t have a webcam. It’s not looking good but I’m exploring options. It was one take and boom. So we’ll see what happens. Update next 1/2 hour.
I gotta make it from South ATX to NW in 20 minutes AND write. Ddnt we do this like 18 hours ago?
I’m pretty sure we did. I totally gave report and jetted. (I just hit the rewind button and broke out jetted)
And I left my dome light on all night, after all the snapped car yesterday, my heart sank, nut the Genericivic is back to tip top strength!
UT Tower and Downtown Austin look amazing right before sunrise.
Another post from Mopac and 35th St.
And you have enough foresight to know what’s comin in a half hour so don’t even try!
I was on cloud 9. I was in a hurry. My bad. Totally my bad. If you don’t know. Let’s not dwell on it. I jumped the gun. It happens. Poop.
Donnie D.
Spainbey J
Elizabeth Kaylene
