Shawnclay’s Weblog

I was born on October 12, 1979 in Stroud Oklahoma.  From the day I was born until the day I moved out at age eighteen I live a very stable and sheltered life.  I come from an evangelical Christian, very conservative family.  My family values hard work, education, Sooner football and devotion to God and country.  In high school I participated in multiple sport and extracurricular activities.  My favorite was football.  I think football instilled a devotion to a cause larger than myself.  It helped me develop some mental toughness that I have used in my life as a soldier.  I attended my first year of college at Evangel University in Springfield MO.  I received a very small scholarship for football and stayed there only one season.  In the summer between my first and second year of college, I got married to Sheli and we move to Tahlequah Ok.  I went to college there for a couple of years while trying to support my new family.  It turned out more difficult than I had anticipated. After a few semesters I made the decision to change my major from Biology to Paramedic Technology. After one semester of that I liked so much and my grades rose tremendously that I decided that this is what I wanted to do. So I made the decision in July of 2001 to join the army as a medic.  In 2001 before we were attacked it was possible to be a soldier and continue a college education while having a rewarding career or so they said on TV. On September 11, 2001 the day that has defined my generation and changed my life forever; I no longer was a college student looking for experience and a little extra cash. I was a soldier in the greatest army in history on the verge of war.  After completing my basic training at Ft. Benning   I went to Ft. Sam Houston for medical training.  I was accelerated through the training due to my college experience.  I was moved forward two months. Little did I know that it was going to allow me to get a deployment in Kuwait before the beginning of the war with Iraq.  The six months I spent in Kuwait gave me some invaluable experience.  However, what I learned did not prepare me for the war. 

I was totally ignorant of what the war was going to be.  I had a Hollywood version of war in my head.  Yes, some movies do accurately portray aspects of combat but one could never get the full emotional experience of actually being there.  During the first few minutes of the ground war on March 19, 2003 I was staged in my ambulance waiting to cross the Iraqi border.  When I felt someone run into the back of my vehicle, I was extremely angry.  I got out of my truck ran to the back and no one was there.  Very confused I climbed back into my truck.  Just then over the radio I hear “for those who don’t know that was a medium range ballistic missile that landed within a kilometer”.  I had no idea that a blast could be so large to rock my truck like that. Minutes later we crossed the border and the race was on to Baghdad.  During those 21 days to the capital I had a few close calls and I consider myself extremely lucky to be alive. I will share some of those with you in the future.