Humbled

8 Apr 08

There was an award ceremony before I left Iraq. It was pretty strange. There was a group of doctors – 8 of us in all – who all came to Iraq together. We were all scheduled to leave on the same day, so the commander gathered us all below the American flag and surrounded us with the entire hospital staff. The Army Commendation Medal was presented to all of us for the outstanding work we did in the combat theater of operations.

Well, all of us except me.

No one said anything right away. There were all kinds of rumors. “Why didn’t Dr. Chako get an award?” “Did he kill someone?” “Did he piss off the commander?”

Actually, the Deputy Commander told me to tell everyone that I didn’t get an award because I was sleeping around, but they just couldn’t figure out with whom. I told people it was because I punched out the chaplain during a poker game.

The real reason I didn’t get an award is because my award took a little longer to process. You see, it needed to be approved by a three-star general prior to being signed by the Secretary of the Army.