Last Days at the FOB

"What was to be our last day at the FOB started with pregnant drops of rain sizzling through the predawn darkness. They fell in a tumbling cascade, slowly gathering strength until the air was thick with water. The first few drops of rain splattered into the dust like micro meteorites, sending tiny puffs of dust into the air from their sudden impact. For the first few minutes the air was filled with a strange elemental alchemy – the elements of water, earth, and air all defending their respective domains. Eventually the rain turned into a torrent, and the fallow dust yielded, transforming into tarry pools of mud. Just like a year ago.

The mud is the same, the high walls still grope for the sky, even the wind tastes the same as when we arrived. But I am not earth, nor stone, nor air. I am creature of blood and bone… and I have changed. I am leaving this FOB a different man then the one who arrived at these chill gates those many months ago. I’ve sipped from the poison chalice of loss. Felt my veins run with chill blood and my face streak with hot tears. And I’ve watched as the reaper’s scythe whistled through the desert air. Mortal things cannot brush shoulders with eternity without bearing the psychic scars of their meeting. And so I am changed."
365 and a Wakeup