Twilight

Looking Back on 9/11

Looking Back
Today is Jorden’s 17th birthday…………we were looking at his baby book/scrapbook and found a paper he had written about his birthday, September 11th, 2001. I remember the day clearly….i climbed up on Jorden’s top bunk to wake him up and began singing “Happy Birthday to you…., not too far into it the sirens began going off. I guess I should explain where we lived….Ed was a Drill Instructor for the Marine Corps and was training recruits at MCRD San Diego, Boot Camp and we lived on the Marine Air Station, USMCAS Miramar. This little base houses many of the best fighter planes the world has to offer. The sirens meant nothing to me as they regularly practiced drills of Marines getting to the flight lines, however, the words over the loud speakers said, “This is not a drill, all personal report immediately to work in battle gear.” We had one of the speakers right outside our house. I quickly went downstairs and turned on the TV. I was shocked by what I was witnessing in New York. Vehicles began coming down our street informing us that our base was on lock down and nobody would be able to leave or enter the base. All of the Dad’s were dressed and loading their packs in thier vehicles and children and wives were hugging them good bye. Ed was at work. MCRD runs parallel with the San Diego airport flight lines. My stomach felt like lead as I prayed that none of the planes in the air would be crash landing into all of our Barracks of Recruits and Marines. Our skies were deafening as all of our planes began taking off and scrambling along their various missions. I explained to Vicki and Jorden why they would not be going to school. Ty was 1 and Ryan was 1 ½ months old, far too young to know anything was happening. Ed called to say they were all okay and that they just held their breaths each time a plane came in for the forced landing. He said he had recruits from New York and he would be working on finding out how their families had faired in the attack and would be home whenever the bases reopened………….Jorden wrote a paper on his birthday, I found it in his scrapbook and thought I would type it out……he had turned 10 that day….
Sept 11, 2001
On Sept 11th it was my birthday and my mom said you might be late for school and after a few minutes my mom said you’re not going to school today and I asked why and my mom said to watch the news so I did and what I found out was that some terrorists hijacked two planes and ran both of them into the world trade centers and they both collapsed. 500 firemen died and I think 26 policemen and over one thousand civilians on Sept 11th. The reason that I could not go to school was because we could not go out or in the gates and I will always remember this birthday of all the people that died.
On Sept 11 I felt sad for all the people that died and a little scared because what if they start to bomb San Diego. I even felt a little mad of what the terrorists have done and I know we are going to pay them back
When we went off base and on base there were a lot of Marines there and they had on helmets, bullet proof vests, pistols, M-16’s, and a lot of other battle gear.
At school our teacher let us watch the news of what happened and I hope that we can get these people back and catch the person that did this to us and he is wanted dead or alive.
One day at school all the schools in America did the pledge of alliegance at 11:00 to show that our country is the best country and the strongest country ever and that we will not let them do that ever again because we will stop them before they can hurt us again.
One day after school we went to a restaurant called Oliver Grove because the money that we give them they put 10% of the money to New York of what happened so that is why we went out to eat at Olive Grove.

Dinner Table Conversations

Dinner time at our house is crazy most nights, but the the few evenings we are ALL actually at the table provide great entertainment! I figured i would use this blog to randomly post thoughts, one liners, arguments, etc. on here for our family journal, so it will occasionally be updated whenever one of our fire team has something worth remembering and of course if i have time to write it! How people have time to keep thier sites updated, i will never know! Maybe when i have outgrown my desire to be outside playing this sitting at a computer will be more enticing....but for now, i will post when i have time....

Sept. 4, 2008, Okinawa, Japan
We were sitting at the dinner table tonight talking about all kinds of the normal sit around the dinner table conversations and Vicki and i are talking back & forth and Ed turns to us and says "what are you guys saying"? Ryan, while slurping his milk shake thru his straw, nonchalantly says, "you don't speak girl Dad, but Mom does". This just cracked up Ed and i.

April 6, 2008
Ty informed us tonight that he knows why Okinawa is so hot! He said it was because they burn their trash! Wow, the insites of an 8 year old never cease to amaze me!

March 17, 2008
Ryan informed us tonight that when he grows up he wants to be one of santa's elves because he just loves him so much and wants to build toys for him. I laughed and said he had plenty of time to thnk about it, but he definately had the ears for the job of an elf!

Looking Back With Giggles

Memories That Make Me Laugh & Ed Go AAARRRGGGHHH!

Ed just re enlisted for probably the last time! This one was for 5 years and should take him to the 20 year mark. The USMC would have to offer him something REALLY good for him to stay any longer in this gun club! Soo, we think this was the last one! We were laughing when we remembered the first time he re enlisted.....i went and picked him up at work and he throws this poloroid picture at me and says he is done with the Marine Corps and that he had just got out. I had a momentary blast of panic as i frantically figured out how much time we would have to get out of base houseing, where we were going to go, what we were going to do, how much in savings, all kinds of stuff in that moment and than he laughed and threw another pix at me and said he is back in the good ole USMC for 4 more years. That was the first and now we just had our last. Always a scary moment when the hand goes up and the oath is repeated....he's been kept safe and hopefully the next deployments will continue to keep him safe and that was the last time i will have that scary uncertain feeling in my stomache! We were talking about all the crazy things we have gone thru on this journey we have chosen and were just laughing at all the memories. These are two of my favorites, not Ed's favorites, but mine.....i still laugh when we remember these times and Ed still says he is going to kill me someday....there are probably endless stories to tell tucked away in my journal, but i'll share these two since they are short and always make me giggle!

The Smiley Face
One time Ed came home at lunch time. He took off his cover (hat) and was sitting at the kitchen table eating. I picked up a marker and went behind him and drew a happy face-and yes it was the classic Julia Happy Face with the big ole tongue sticking out- right there on the back of his head. As I was drawing, he of course said “you better not be writing on my head!” I giggled and said “of course not baby, the lid is on”. And then I even showed him the marker that now had a lid on it. After he finished lunch he headed back to work. He put his cover back on and my smiley face was right where I wanted it! It was just under his tan line, right there where anyone behind him would see it! Yes, mission accomplished!!! I laughed sooo hard after he drove away knowing full well he was going to kill me when he got home! Later that night when he got home from work he let me know that he hadn’t found my artwork as amusing as I had. He said he kept hearing “Cpl Kretschmer, why do you have a smiley face on your head?” I still laugh when I remember that day and he still says he is going to kill me someday for it!

Socks
Soooo, one day I thought I would decorate a pair of Ed’s white socks with some cool paints that I had. I covered them up with hearts and kisses and I love you’s and all kinds of girlie stuff. Sooo, later on down the road……..on an early morning before the sun had risen Ed is grabbing a pair of socks out of his drawer in the dark and heads off to work. Camp Pendleton is 80 miles from our house. He gets to work and quickly changes into his PT gear and is not so happy to discover the socks he grabbed were the beautiful ones I had decorated for him! Yea, he got lots of comments on his cool socks! I wonder if he was wearing a pair of the boxers I had decorated for him as well….? Another memory where I laugh and Ed goes AAARRRGGGHHH!

I'm Confused

Sooo, i'm talking to Ed yesterday in Japanese and than i ended my thoughts in Spanish and didn't realize i had even switched languages until he just shook his head and said "confused is the word for you my dear". Yes, Ed refuses to speak anything other than English, so i do randomly talk to him in those 2 languages, but i had never switched languages before.....i guess i am one confused chicki!

Shark Cage Dive

While in Hawaii i was able to do one of the things on my Wish List! A Shark Cage Dive! It was the coolest! Jorden did it with me! We took a boat out about 3 miles off the coast of Ohau's North Shore and than got in a shark cage in about 400+ feet of water! They threw bait in the water and whala, the sharks appeared! They were between 13 and 15 of them and the avergage size was about 10 to 15 feet long. Yes, i was scared, i kept wondering if there was anyway that the cage could somehow not work properly, like come off from the boat and us sink to the bottom and have to swim out and surface without the cage to the boat. I watched how it worked very closely and than just went for it! The scary part was getting into the cage, i hoped i would not fall over the side into the water or that a shark wouldn't bite my foot as I was climbing down the bars into the cage. It was a scary sensation when they let the ropes go and we floated out away from the boat and the sharks began circiling us! Once inside the cage, i quickly realized that between the waves and the sharks bumping the cage that my limbs were continually outside the bars of the cage! That freaked me out cause like i didn't want a shark chomping into my leg or arm! But with being somewhat scared but having the time of my life i did manage to get some pretty cool pictures. Jorden took some too and he loved it as much as i did!

Dive Meida Point

Meida Point is my favorite place to dive on Okinawa! It is truly a beautiful dive spot! There are always an abundance of fish to watch and follow and we usually see eels, octopus, rays, and even a shark here! The visibility is almost always fantastic! This is the place i saw my first shark out in the open water! Very scary and i almost swallowed my reg, but an amazing experiance all the same! There are also caves here to explore that are like totally fun to swim into! I also completly love that there are always a lot of people here diving! My imagination doesn't get the best of me as long as there are plenty of divers around down under and snorkelers above me! ha! To get down to the water, you have to walk a lot of stairs and it seems like more stairs when it is time to go up! Someday i am going to count these stairs! It probably really isn't that bad, but on a hot day with full sun and all that gear on, you really do sweat alot by the time you get to the water and going up the stairs, especially after a rough dive, it can be quite exhausting climing up. Ed will usually carry my weights on those days! This dive spot also has a nice chain that you can grab on to and pull yourself back to shore when the water condition has changed by the time you surface. I've been slammed into the cliffs of Meida on more than one occasion! Ed says i look like a rag doll bouncing off the rocks. Soo fun! But it is my favorite place to dive and take pictures!

Two Scoops Please?

Okay, so I am in line with some friends to order an ice cream cone. I asked if I could have a double scoop and the lady tells me no, that I can only have a single scoop. I asked, "Really?" and she said, "Just one scoop." Sooo, I asked my friends if they think this is part of that new food philosophy of the vendors taking more responsibility in keeping their clients healthy? We laughed and thought about sending up a skinny person to ask for a double scoop of ice cream so we could see if it was because I was too fat or if they just do not sell you more than one scoop. But the only tiny people around were Okinawan and didn't speak English, so I am left to wonder….. Only in Okinawa………..

Broke Down In Guam

The kids and i have flown thru Guam many times catching military hops to Travis AFB, California. We have never broken down in Guam going Stateside, but manage to breakdown almost every time coming home! So far, from only my experience, this is the worst place for your aircraft to break! We have always broken while flying the C-5's there. Unfortunately, there are no C-5 mechanical crews on Guam, so when you break, these guys have to be flown in from Kadena AFB, Okinawa. So, yes, you are going to be there a few days. Guam is also in the heart of typhoon country, so if there is something churning between Guam and Okinawa, well it will just be that much longer before the crew gets there to fix your plane. And yes, we have been stuck there when typoons have approached. The longest we have been stuck there was 5 days! NO FUN!!! It is hotter than anywhere i have ever lived, muggier than anywhere i have ever been, and the bugs make our Oki jungle crawlers look miniature size. But there are rental cars and we have toured the itty bitty island. You just go out the gate, turn left on Highway 1 and head out and around. There are several resorts with the nicest of beaches where we have hung out and killed time. It is almost like a little Hawaii, even with the ABC Stores. There used to be lockers where you could lock up your suitcases, but due to the increase in terror levels, those have been removed and so you just make new friends very quickly, share a rental car and take turns watching each others luggage. Billetting is almost always not available, but the terminal is open 24 hours and the PX and Commissarry is accross the street as well as the Movie Theatre, Gym, and swimming pool. The best time was when we were stuck there with 5 other families from our neighborhood! We had been traveling together since Hawaii. We got billetting and had almost the whole wing. It was hilarious! As always for Guam, you have to go into your room first and kill everything alive, and those bugs are no joke! Of course it is always moms travleing w the kids, so we are on our own to kill the besats! Jorden won't even go after them for me. Than you have to keep everything zipped up while in there or you will have scary things crawl outta your suitcase when you get home! It's happened to me, but only once! I learned that lesson fast! Nixon saved us one time when our plane had been broke for 5 days! Ed was talking on the phone with Nixon and asked him where he was, he said he was in Guam. Ed said my wife and kids are stuck there. He showed up the next morning at the termnal with 4 Marine C-130's for us and all the rest of the Kadena bound stragglers! It's a bummer because only the Air Force flights are listed at the terminals, they won't put up the marine flights. UUUHHGG!! But the Marines saved us that day! And it wasn't the last time they have brought me home from some distant country!

Sushi Anyone?

I came home one night and noticed that my fish were kinda not swimming right, most nose diving and surfacing....as i got closer to the tank, i put my hands on the glass and realized it was hot! My heater thing had broken and my fish were boiling! I started putting ice cubes in the tank and sent the kids off to neighbors for more ice. We weren't fast enough and all died but Elecra and Little Blue. One of my neighbors found humor in our sadness and asked us if we were having everyone over for sushi. Love my friends! They can always bring a smile to my face!

Typhoon Swimming

One typhoon Leilani and i were a little bored during lockdown. Anyways, we thought it would be fun to climb the wall around the pool at the high school. It is right accross the street from our house. We climbed it and had fun taking pictures of each other jumping off of the diving boards as we flew in the wind! It was late at night and we realized that the flash from my camera might catch some peoples attention, so we took the rest of our pictures underwater! Gotta love my friends!!! Leilani, you are sooo much fun!!! Yep, both our husbands were off island somewhere else in the world, otherwise, i don't know if we could have pulled that one off!

Flour With Your Eggs?

One morning Ed and i woke up as mischievious as ever....Ed saw Jorden and Cody asleep outside on the trampoline. He ran downstairs and brought back up a whole bunch of eggs. We opened our window and began egging Jorden and Cody in thier sleep. We told them we were giving them breakfast in bed....meanwhile one window over....Cody's mom, Kat, hears all this noise and is getting mad that there is all this comotion going on soooo early on a Saturday and looks out her window. After realizing the situation, she goes downstairs in her house and comes back up and opens her window and sweetly calls out my name....of course, i'm all smiles and giggles and hang out my window to say "Good Morning" and she hollers out..."Want some flour with your eggs?" and proceeds to throw a huge amount of flour all over me and thru my window. It was hilarious! The memories....the stories....the laughter that will never be forgotten!

Immunizations!

The Immunizations Office has never been fun to take the kids to, humorous at times but never FUN! All 4 of the kids needed shots for this upcoming school year. I think this is the first time they have all gone in to get shots together since they got their overseas shots to come over here to Okinawa. Ty and Ryan both freaked out and screamed their bloody heads off! Jorden and I had to actually pin them down so they could get their pokes and bubble, all needed the TB test. This reminded me of a very funny time when I had taken Thing One & Thing Two in for shots. They were 2 and 3 at the time. Ty was the oldest so he went first. I held him on my lap and he cried crocodile tears as he had his shots. Ryan watched this and was quite appalled that he was going to have to do the same thing. I am not exactly sure how it happened, it was so fast, but Ty and Ry exchanged some sort of communication and WOW! Ryan flew outta the room and Ty was yelling after him “Run for you life, Ryan, RUUUUUNNNN!!!” I took off after Ryan. Ty was running behind me yelling the whole time for Ryan to “Run for his life!” Now, let me tell you about where we were…..this was back when the kids could get their shots done at sick call where the active duty Marines went, so this place was packed in cammies, there were atleast 100 or more Marines getting their Small Pox shot. This was a building with winding hallways that were packed with Marines. I was the only adult there NOT in cammies! Ryan was running full speed and was dodging around cammies, between legs and I was doing my best to figure out which way he was running. It wasn’t too hard to notice the uniforms swaying from side to side dodging the missile flying thru the hallways! I said plenty of excuse me’s as I ran after Ryan and heard all the chuckling and even heard Marines cheering him on! Next thing I see Ryan in the air! A Doc was walking down the hallway and scooped him up and threw him over his shoulder and hollered out to see who Ryan belonged to. Ty was still yelling to fight and run when we caught up with the Doc. I quickly explained we had run from Immunization and so the kind Doc carried Ryan over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes while Ryan punched his tiny fists into his back and Ty yelled to keep fighting. As we rounded the corner back to Immunization, a huge roar of applause broke out for Ryan and all the hundreds of Marines packed in their gave him High 5’s and told him to be brave and that they were getting shots to and they wished they could run! Ryan bit down on his lip and Ty held his hand while I wrapped my arms around him and he had his little booster shots. He was given another thunderous round of applause as we made our way thru the sea of cammies out the door to my car.

Forest Adventure Park

Ed and i went to this really cool park that just opened here on Okinawa. It is called Forest Adventures Park. It is a European Park they brought here. I know you guys in the states have all kinds of cool things like this, but for us, this was just an amazing day! I think it is the best surprise date i have taken Ed on, aside from Catalina Island. That will always be our favorite and needs it's own blog! Anyways, this obsatacle course took us thru a jungle. We were harnessed in really good w a safety chord as well. The zip lines were 120 feet up and we raced along the tree tops! It was exhilerating being up so high and looking down on the jungle and at the same time to see the beautiful blue ocean on the side of us! It was soooo fun i didn't even notice ONE bug!!! I could hear them, you can ALWAYS hear them, but didn't notice a one of 'em! It was a very hot, humid, black flag day, but it was sooo much fun we didn't notice until we were done that we were drenched in sweat! It took us 2 1/2 hours to complete and was just simply incredible!!! The last part was the most challenging! The Tarazan Swing, or as i called it The Spider Web, was the scariest part for me and i almost got down. Just couldn't bring myself to make that drop before you were thrown out to this net you needed to grab on to! But, i did it and found it to be the most fun of all!!! wanted to do it over and over again!!! Ed and i are buying year passes so we can come all the time. It is right by where we dive at Meida. Jorden wants to bring friends here for his birthday. If you ever come visit us, this will be one of our places to take you!!!

Sometimes....

Sometimes life deals the cards just right and you are lucky enough to be in the right place at the precise moment in time and have the most amazing opportunity to share this fantastic thing called life with the bestest of people! We have had that here on Okinawa! Kat and Matt next door and Leilani and Angus across the way have been our neighbors since we moved into this little concrete house on Camp Foster on the itty bitty island of Okinawa! I still remember Kat coming over on our very first day and giving us a plate of brownies and introducing all the kids on the street. My munchkins immediately scattered with the neighborhood children that were their age and I went back inside to finish unpacking. Not having the slightest idea that Kat was going to become a friend that will always be held dear to my heart. Vicki instantly began playing with her daughter Alex and Jorden hit it off with Cody. Ty and Ryan, 2 and 3, began to play with the giant group of little boys and a few little girls their age. Later that day I came home and found a note taped to my door that the neighborhood was going to be grilling together for Labor Day and to join them for some fun. My only thought at that moment was that these people were frickin insane! It was like a few hundred degrees outside with humidity that saturated you in a heartbeat! Why would you grill when you could just throw your meat out on the pavement and watch it cook? But, needless to say, we went out in the heat and sat drenched in our sweat and the friendships were formed that would never unravel, no matter where our future duty stations would send us! That has been the last 5 years of our life on this island! Spending it with the most incredible of people. Our kids have grown up together, potty trained together and began school together. Our husbands have deployed together, gone to war together, and thru it all we have been one big family. Ohana it is! Always there for each other, thru the good and the bad. Laughing when we have wanted to cry and crying because we have laughed so hard! Securing our houses when the typhoons have approached, the Dad’s on island making sure the houses with deployed Dad’s were set and ready. Hanging out during lockdowns and playing games till we could not keep our eyes open. Santa’s visits on Christmas Eve, Thanksgivings, trick or treating, roasting marshmallows and sitting by a fire, even if it meant with umbrellas! Angus practicing his aim with his paint ball guns at our front door, bringing out the left over’s and having a buffet so nobody had to cook that night……….the list goes on of all the fun times shared! We have lived in the kind of neighborhood where you can take your trash out in the morning and 5 hours later realize you need to go inside and figure out what to make for dinner. There is always someone sitting outside and a chair waiting for you to join them. Every year we have endured the sadness of the moving trucks pulling in to pack out our dear neighbors as they head out to new horizons. Now, the last two families from our original group are leaving and I am so very grateful for the treasured memories and saddened by the thought of not seeing you each day! Kat, I couldn’t have asked for a better family to share walls with! You were my very first friend on Oki! You are the wise one and I will miss all of our chats in your front yard and watching the clouds on your trampoline to the tunes of my iPod! Tank has made us forever family! Leilani, you have been the twin I never had! Thanks for being the brave one and enduring my screams during the late night scary movies and letting me grab your arm and making you tell me when I could open my eyes! It was the best swimming laps everyday while we traded watching each other’s kids! I think we are the only ones to sneak into the pool during lockdown in a typhoon and take pictures of each other jumping off the diving boards as we flew in the wind! I can’t imagine going to the beach this summer without you and the rest of your crew! I’ll miss not seeing you plopped on my couch or vice versa hanging out on yours! Who is going to help me move my furniture around?! I know this is not good bye; it is just merely a switch in our locations. With tears running down my face and a shaky smile I bid you all farewell and know that our paths will cross again. We have truly been blessed to live among you all!!! And as the song goes…. “I will remember you……” Now, I guess I will just catch up on everything that I have put off over the last 5 years!!!