Diminishing Light
Saturday, 21 Aug 2004This past month has been a good one. I finally got to go down and visit some of my family in Italy; the first time in over 3 years! We met on the island of Sardegna, during their August holidays, at the home of my cousin's parents. The place is situated just uphill from the beach, on the west coast of the island. The Tuesday morning I left was an early start, getting up at 3AM, and leaving for the airport around 4AM. The flight left out at 7, and it was pretty busy that early in the morning for such a small airport. (RyanAir tends to bring in lots of customers, regardless of the time, because of their great airfare.) Anyway, the flight over was nice, less than two hours, and I got in a bit earlier than scheduled. My cousin Maurizio was nowhere to be found. So I called him on the cell phone, and, after excited greetings, I asked where he was. He said he was at the airport... I told him I kind of figured THAT, but WHERE? LOL He was at his car and on his way over to meet me. He'd shaved off his beard since the last time I saw him, and in full fashion for a summer's holiday at the beach: loose collared shirt, shorts and sandles. I was way overdressed with my long slacks, shirt and layered collared shirt, and shoes. Couldn't wait to get to the house to get changed. :-) On the ride to the house, we talked and got caught up on stuff, and had plenty of time since we were stuck behind 3 slow-moving, caravaning RVs on a road too small and windy to pass (except by insane moped riders). Finally getting to the house, the tempurature was already on the rise, and some of my other cousins came out to say Hi. I was thankful that Maurizio spoke English, because it wasn't until I got to the house that I realized my Italian wasn't as good as I had remembered it being. Luckily, his son Christof also speaks English, but I tried to always talk in Italian, even if I couldn't alway understand it coming back at me. Christof's grandmother offered me a cappuccino, and I went to get changed into something more appropriate. Soon the sun was high in the air, and it was nearing 100*, so Christof suggested we go "have a bath" (go swimming) at the beach. And this started was would be 4 days of excellent nothingness routine of: wake in the morning, have an esspresso, eat a bit of fruit/buscuits for breakfast, go to the beach, come back for lunch (which, by the way were great, as Maurizio had taken up some culinary skills and made home made pasta noodles and sause each day!), let the food settle by taking an hour or three nap, get up and head back to the beach, return in time for a late evening supper, play a game or just talk until it was dark, then go to sleep. Not sure how this type of activity did it, but those four days went by WAY too fast! Before I knew it, I asked Maurizio what day it was, and he said it was Thursday (the day before I went home, the next morning)! Doah!! The next morning wasn't as early a start, but still 6AM when you're used to 9 or 10 is early. This time, the whole fam rode (with the exception of grandma and grandpa) - Maurizio, Daniela and Christof took me to the airport and planned to visit the co-located city of Alghero afterwards. So we chit-chatted on the way over and after arriving, checking in and whatnot, we went over for some coffee, perused the shops, and took a final group photo to mark the occasion. After saying our "Ciao"s, they headed off, and I turned for the security line to get ready for my flight home, all relaxed and sunburned/tanned, and ready for the weekend back in Germany. :-)
The day before this trip, our commander called a sudden "Safety Call", where the squadron gathered in the conference room to hear information on safety, and probably drinking and driving. He started off with a reminder that there were more DUIs this past weekend and then turned it over to the Chief to deliver his speech on the subject. He started talking about "having a Wingman" and whatnot, then called me out and said "Sergeant Rea, were you a good Wingman this weekend?" "Sure was Chief!", I responded. "What did you do?" he inquired. "Well, I ensured I had my cell phone on, in case my Wingman needed me and would have responded immediately if called", I pulled this out of my ass pretty quickly, and must admit, it was a good cover! LOL He then asked me to come up and share my insights on DUIs and Wingman concepts, so I, now confused, made my way up to the front. Before the Chief began rambling, the commander interrupted and said "I think I want to deviate from this for a moment, because I noticed something's not right with Sergeant Rea's uniform..." This is when I found out, the out-of-cycle promotion test I took the previous month was good! He gave me my line number [3815.5] for my next rank, Master Sergeant! Should be able to put it on in the March timeframe, if the numbers cooperate! This is a big step, going from NCO to Senior NCO status, and taking on more managerial work rather than just work, which I'm going to miss. I enjoy working, but I think managing is going to be a good experience as well. We'll see what the Air Force has in store for me with that.
That said, I'm not certain I'll still be going to Korea, those folks reassure me that the assignment won't cancel because of that. But I'm checking on it anyway, as there are several Master Sergeant billets for the same timeframe as the Technical Sergeant ones. Who knows, might end up in either Qatar or the UK. But, if I do still go to Korea, with Master Sergeant, I'll be eligible to bring my Jeep and will get a 2-dorm room out there. So either way, no complaints! :-)