Never Forget 11.5.09

Today marks the four year anniversary of the Fort Hood Shooting where 13 people were fatally shot and more than 30 others were wounded at the hands of a US Soldier. I will never forget that day and all the chaos and confusion that followed the news of the massacre. We were stationed at Fort Hood at the time, and my Hubs was on base. I had no idea where he was exactly or what was really going on since the news stations were reporting conflicting information. Cell phone communication was sketchy for hours as the entire Fort Hood/Killeen area went into full panic mode. I worked at a bank at the time, and a large portion of my coworkers were fellow military wives. I remember running down the hallway to the breakroom to watch the news, and I have never experienced a silence like that even though the room was packed from wall to wall. All eyes were trained on the television, and all ears were straining to hear the reports. Tears ran down our faces as we hugged eachother and tried to stay strong and calm, but in each of our minds we were wondering....where is my husband, and is he okay?

Several of my coworkers lived on base, so they were unable to go home because the base was on lockdown. A couple of them came to my house to wait, and we were glued to the television. Looking back on it now, I really wonder where some of those news stations were getting their information. There were so many different stories going around that there was no way to know what was really happening. They reported that there were multiple shooters--but there was only one. They reported that there were also shootings going on at several other locations on base, including the PX, the Commissary and the Library. These were all untrue. They reported that the shooter had escaped and was at an apartment in Killeen and they had him surrounded, which was untrue. Another news station reported that the shooter was DEAD. This, of course, was untrue as well.

I finally did hear from my husband hours later, which was a great relief. He had just returned from a 15-month tour in Iraq earlier that year, and I thought he was safe when he was on American soil. That day was a harsh wake up call that he is not safe anywhere, even surrounded by his fellow soldiers. And that, I think, is extremely sad.

Please keep the victims of this massacre and their families in your thoughts today. They have already gone through enough, and then our government decides to label this incident as "workplace violence" rather than terrorism--which makes the victims and their families ineligible to receive benefits. That fact just blows my mind, along with the fact that Hasan was still getting paid by our government while awaiting trial, but I'm not going to get into that right now. The important thing today is to reflect on those lost and tattered lives, and hope for a better tomorrow.

Never forget 11.5.09

~Fluffy Girl~