Reeking Havoc
The Desert Cowboys you may be thinking are the last people on Earth to be Reeking Havoc over here in Iraq. Well for the most part you are right, but that isn’t the case all the time. For seven months now we have been minding our P’s and Q’s, so it only seems natural for some release to happen. With no days off or no time to relax you need to make time for yourself.
How do we Reek Havoc?
- Playing jokes on one another
- Playing jokes on the rest of the Battalion
- Having our Friday BBQ’s
- Creating new logo’s for one another that make fun of each other
- Staying happy and upbeat
Playing jokes on one another is probably the best thing that we do around here besides working. It doesn’t seem to matter who the one joking and who is the one is receiving it, it is a great tension breaker. Day in and day out we try to keep ourselves from slipping away into the abyss of depression and anxiety. Keeping a smile on ones face means more now than when we first hit ground prior to earning our first war patch.
Playing jokes on the rest of the Battalion is great too because it shows them that we have not fallen to the wayside like so many have already on this deployment. We have seen people loose it over here and snap. This could mean the end of a military career! I am not willing to let this happen to myself or anyone of our soldiers. We will keep picking on the Battalion as long as we are with them, just like Cowboys did on each other in Tombstone 1880.
Our Friday BBQ’s started on the
National Day of the Cowboy, with a BBQ to celebrate the event. Now we have decided to make it an every Friday event. We saw each other smile; we saw each other back behind our old motor pool in Oklahoma and remembered what it was like to stop and take some time out for ourselves, eating Cowboy Candy and Beef Briskets, in our Cowboy Hats. So for now we will continue to push on with our daily lives and look forward to our Cowboy BBQ every Friday. Many people who are deployed with us do not understand the American Cowboy or the American Pride that we hold as a true American Symbol for what we are over here for. Some may think that we are just Rednecks who want some attention. That may be true on some days, but most of the time we are here knowing that America as a whole is watching and waiting for something to happen. Is it tomorrow that our President will say we can go home or will he come back and say we are extended next? We do not know ‘nor does the rest of our family or friends. We wait and wonder what it takes to make it thru this deployment.
When we create new Cowboy Logo’s we create smiles; Cowboy Art as some call it. Some also say we are the First Rednecks on the Internet, but I remember that is already a song by Cletus T. Judd, no relation. We create banners / logos / Cowboy Graphics for each other because of several reasons.
- It is fun and entertaining.
- It shows what we are about and each is unique.
It doesn’t seem to matter that some are Black Cowboys and others are White Cowboys, it doesn’t even matter that some of them are not Black or White but Hispanic. We make fun of each other and we stand by one another.
It has been said that we are
Cowboy Junkies. This is true. We are Cowboy Junkies and we will not be satisfied until we make it back home and don on our Civilian Clothes and walk into Wal-Mart with our families. Cowboy Legends of the past are hard to compare to our modern day Cowboys, this is a fact. I cannot sit here and tell you we have old western shoot outs like the OK Corral. I am not Wyatt Earp or Doc Holiday; we have not exchanged gun fire over here one time. Now we have had our security forces fired upon and they return fire, but as far as the Desert Cowboys go we have not yet had that happen.
Cowboy Morals hold us back from Reeking too much Havoc this is true. But waiting to return home to Dixie Land is the best feeling ever, knowing that we do not have too much longer to wait. Our Oklahoma Cowboys will return home and enjoy there old age with the rest of America, Pure Country boys and girls, collecting Used Saddles, Western Belt Buckles, Vintage Spurs, and Winchester Rifles, just like any Typical Cowboy. Rodeo Cowboys, Rodeo Clowns, Redneck Woman, and all Cowboys in there Ten Gallon Hats / Rednecks with there Southern Pride who will be waiting for us to arrive back to our welcome home ceremony will be a welcomed site. I for one can’t wait to Ride the Fence once I return back to the Arizona Desert in my Duster. Others cannot wait until they hit the Honky Tonk Bars in there Modern Cowboy Apparel again.
Who knows maybe one day we can go down in Cowboy Lore as one of the Famous Cowboy Legends in Cowboy History in the Cowboy Museum.
Until next time America keep looking over your shoulder because we may cause Havoc for you too. LOL. (We did just that by not posting this page but creating it for over two months)
Desert Cowboys © 2006
