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After the Army, I did what most veterans do. I went back to school. My very first semester challenged me to write about things before I was ready. I was quickly tasked with writing about someone that changed my life and I didn’t want to write. So last minute, facing a possible failing grade for not writing, this came flying out in a whirlwind. It was like some weird stream of consciousness writing exercise tangled with mixed up memories frustratingly beyond recall. I was still in therapy for post traumatic stress at the time I wrote this, so some of it I glazed over and others sensationalized with the intention of trying to convey my emotion. I took creative liberty where memory failed on some of the logistics, and the very end, as there were details I didn’t feel I was authorized to reveal at the time. This was what I wrote.
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I don’t know anyone who would disagree that children change people’s lives profoundly. Of course, having children does. Every parent would say that. Still, just having a relationship with a child can be life-changing. Just the interactions you have with children can turn into a memorable experience. My children definitely changed my life. But one child, in particular, changed my life in ways I never thought possible.
In 2003 I was part of the force that invaded Iraq. It was shortly after the invasion that I met a small toddler. I couldn’t say what day I met him. The spring days of 2003 are mostly a sleepless blur. I never even learned his name. But the unfortunate situation that led to our meeting changed my life forever.
My team was working with the British Royal Commandos. We were in a small abandoned hotel in the small town of Umm Qasr in Iraq. The hotel was about the size of a small elementary school. It was mostly concrete, and had a gate around the courtyard. Many Iraqis came to the gates looking for help. I rarely got involved. Not many people knew there were Americans there. But this day, someone knew we were there.
Our interpreter had the day off. He brought his ‘cousins’ to the gate in need of help. He asked specifically for ‘US’ help. That’s what the British Commando told us in the hotel at least. We didn’t know what to expect. We briefly talked amongst ourselves about how to handle it. I was the senior non-commissioned officer, so I went to the gate.
Before I could even see who it was at the gate, I could smell it. I will never forget that smell. The horribly strong smell of gasoline. It was so strong I could taste it. At this point, I had no idea what to expect. A short 60 feet later, I got to the gate. I could hear a commotion as the gates opened. As the gates cracked, I saw the image that haunts my memories every time I fill up my Jeep at the gas station.
Before me was an Iraqi man. He had a white man-dress on, dark hair and mustache. In his arms, he was cradling the toddler that changed my life. I thought he was dead at first. He lay lifeless in the man’s arms. He had one arm dangling down toward the ground, head rolled back limply. His eyes were open! They were rolled back so that I couldn’t see any color. His mouth was wide open. Overflowing from it was foam. It was a yellowish, thick foam running down his face. It looked like lathered up shampoo. In the seconds I took all of this in, I realized the toddler was the source of the terrible gas smell.
Immediately I started asking questions. What happened? How long ago? How had he already been treated? I was trying to determine whether this boy could be saved. I could only describe what I was going through at that time as a sort of sensory overload. It was like time slowed down for fifteen minutes. There was no detail I didn’t take in. I knew how many people were around. I could tell it was the mother who was slumped down in shambles on the ground. I could tell that no one really knew what happened to the boy. I could also tell that these people were not related to the interpreter. Even though I was taking in so much, I couldn’t rip my eyes off the toddler. The sight was horrific. His shallow, labored, uneven breathing. The occasional twitch in his neck. How his head rolled back and forth as the man was cradling and rocking him.
It felt like fifteen minutes, even though I had no idea how much time went by. As I was trying to determine what happened to the boy, the man leaned toward me, shrugging his shoulders up and pressing the toddler into my body armor. I took him gently.
A wave of intense panic struck me. Racing thoughts of my own two, similarly aged toddlers in New York flashing by raised my anxiety probably beyond what I realized. As I looked the boy over in my arms, the interpreter started to give me some useful information. The boy was drowned in diesel fuel. The story was that he ‘drank from a diesel can’ unknowingly. I knew it was a lie. A sip is an accident. A sip wouldn’t put the boy in this state. The story went in one ear and out the other as I was evaluating options. We were obligated to assist Iraqis if it involved them losing life, limb, or eyesight. So treatment legally wasn’t a problem. My team didn’t have the equipment to deal with drowning, or ‘accidental’ ingestion.
It felt like an hour before I figured out the best option. I handed the boy back to the Iraqi. I sprinted back inside to find out if the Combat Support Hospital was still set up nearby. After a second and a radio call, I showed up outside the front gate again. I had a small notepad. I scribbled frantically. I wrote a crude note. It was to the guards at the hospital. It said, ‘This boy authorized treatment for poison ingestion by approval of sergeant Smoot. Please admit ASAP.’ I gave the note to the interpreter, I told them to show this note to the guards and pray.
I never saw that toddler again, and I never needed to. The next day, I asked our interpreter. For a second, he didn’t even remember. Then gave an expression similar to ‘Oh yes, that boy’. His reaction made it obvious his answer was a lie. He told me that the boy lived and he was fine.
I don’t know anyone who wouldn’t agree that children change people’s lives profoundly. Every parent would say that having their own children changed their lives. Unfortunately, relationships with children aren’t always life-changing and memorable in positive, magic moments. Personally, having my own children wonderfully changed my life, but it was a brief heartbreaking interaction with one Iraqi child that drastically changed my life in ways I never thought possible.
***
I would never claim to stand alone in facing the dark side of humanity. Many others face the horrors of violence against the indefensible, and the profound impact that has on people. When it happens relatively early in life, as is usually the case with soldiers and law enforcement, it shapes our futures. College writing assignment aside, the underlying story made a significant impact.
For sure this day took time to process and understand, and while I don’t pretend to have all the answers, I can say that it reinforced a wide swath of beliefs and behaviors, some conflicting. For example, it shook my trust in others and emphasized a need to keep people at a distance. Yet it underscored the fragility of life and the value of sensitivity and closeness in my own personal relationships. It was a lesson, prompting impatience and action, especially on behalf of those unable to do for themselves. At the same time, it spurred me personally toward not being the protector as a soldier, but the caregiver as a fellow human being. Ultimately, I think it encouraged living in the moment and taking risks, by exemplifying how fragile and short life can be. It also contributed to my acute sensitivity to the welfare of children. Like I said, it took time to process its impact, after the memory returned to the forefront.
This was one of those events that, after the experience, quickly disappeared from memory. It’s almost as if my brain pushed it out, intentionally locking the memory away to protect me from reliving it. I didn’t recall it once. It was like it never happened, until eight months later.
After spending a year in the Middle East, our units regrouped to go home and I was with friends. We were bonding as we took turns telling our infamous military “no shit, there I was” stories. Most were hilarious fails from teammates and terrorists alike, sprinkled here and there with some of those crazy days. As I starting actively recalling my own good and bad days, this memory unlocked, like a door opening to smack me in the face. I shook off feeling stricken with a weird stunned heaviness though, because the Army has a stigma, and a certain machoism. I held this story back, I didn’t share. But neither did I forget again. It’s not easy to hold a toddler in your arms, struggling against a death sentence you can’t pardon.
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Previously published here and reprinted with the author’s permission.
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