Two weeks on a mountaintop

[Ace Pace]

I just got back from two weeks on an isolated mountaintop in the Jordan valley. One of the odder experiances I can imagine. It was an all expenses paid, no effort spared vacation in the middle of nowhere.

Some actual background, I need to spend 3 weeks of my year guarding holes in the ground. Some of them are villages near Gaza, or isolated illegal settlements in the West Bank. Others are small bases that are too small to have a proper guard contigent and "Order in" guards from other places. I spent two weeks in the latter.

Now, I did say small. Small is on the order of "Walk from one end to the other in 5 minutes," or small is "too small to even have vending machines." Small can also mean "barely has a functioning kitchen," or the oddest one, small means "the base commander is a 2nd Lt."
Think about that, the place is teeny tiny and has nothing to do in it.

A step up in the isolation is what I actually do there. Guard shit. This involves sitting 4 hours in a watch tower staring at landscape. Not worried about anything. Because if this place was actually dangerous, they wouldn't send me, who's barely qualified to hold a gun.

So between some sleep, some watch standing and some more watch standing, I had nothing to do. Nada. Zilch. You could find more interesting anonymous graveyards. A bee farm would be infinetly more interesting. Emo poetry written by angsty 16 year old girls online is more refreshing. I think you get the picture.

You go mad. Very slowly, very subtly, but you become insane. No stimulation, very little interesting conversation. Nothing to do for hours on end in the day. After a while, you stop reading. Cellphone becomes the only point of contact to the outside world. No one sends newspapers up to that hole, so you lose track of time. Days blur together. All inside 2 weeks.

I am so not going back there.

[Lindar]

*hugs Ace* you may have no choice but to go back though Honey. AM sorry it was no fun