Or:  Kick Me!  I’m a Dog!

That shiny idealism I’ve been sporting since my arrival here has developed an ugly tarnish.  I thought a project I inherited from my predecessor had been reviewed and approved by The Powers That Be here in Bagram, to include my organization and all the other stakeholder organizations.  The way it was presented to me, everybody knew the plan and was on board.  What could possibly go wrong?

Standing on the snow in the cold, bright sunlight of a Bagram morning recently, I was surprised to suddenly find myself on the receiving end of an aggressive and accusatory dressing-down by a certain military service member.  To protect his anonymity, I’ll call him “Major Wedgie”.  Major Wedgie verbally tore me apart in front of Everybody’s Big Boss – let’s call him “The General” – and his entourage and my chain of command for failing to know what he knew about the project, which was entirely different than what I had been briefed and thought I knew.  I had no satisfactory answers for Major Wedgie, who seemed to get a real charge out of shredding me in front of The General.

As a fun bonus, when The General asked who is “the dog who gets kicked” over this project going forward, the  non-response from my chain of command prompted me to raise my hand and say, “Me, sir.”  Brilliant.  (Another New Year’s Resolution: never miss an opportunity to keep your mouth shut, dumbass!)

Back at the office, I’m trying to reconcile what I heard from Major Wedgie and my organization during The General’s project site tour with what I was briefed on this project when I first arrived at BAF.  It’s not like everything was super wonderful on this project before Major Wedgie came along:  I was becoming ever more irritated by the people who declined to participate in the planning stages of the project (and tried to make me feel bad or stupid or small for even considering such a waste of their time) and then were complaining about how the project was executed incorrectly because it wasn’t properly coordinated with all the stakeholders during planning.  Seriously?  Show up or shut up, people.  (New Realization:  I’ve been the dog who gets kicked all along!)

The day after the ugly scene in front of The General, Major Wedgie himself came to the Garrison to discuss the project design with my boss.  The Environmental Chief/Official Dog Who Gets Kicked Over This Specific Project was not invited to participate in this discussion and didn’t even know about it until it was over.  Hmmmm.  Perhaps here is a clue as to why I am not informed about what everybody else seems to know.

I’ve experienced several low points, annoyances, insults, and disappointments over the last couple of weeks, so I’m not really the poster child for job satisfaction right now.  In fact, I don’t much like myself these days with how useless I feel in this position, which is making me grumpy and snappish.  Plus I’m questioning everything I thought I knew to do here, which is exhausting.  I’m feeling the tug of a downward spiral.  Not good.

Despite these frustrations and the sting of embarrassment at being made a fool of in front of my chain of command, I am going to redouble my efforts to move forward and not let myself get depressed.  Like many other deployers I’ve talked to, I’m at just about the right number of weeks into my service here for a standard-issue existential crisis:  Why am I here?  Can I do any good?  When is the next plane to America?  I am told this is normal and will wear off, but I’m having trouble seeing the light at the end of this particular tunnel.

Must.  Push.  On.

So go ahead and kick me, General.  And you also, Major Wedgie.  If making a public spectacle out of humiliating a relatively new civilian (who has been working hard in good faith while you’ve withheld relevant project information) is your way of demonstrating military leadership, it’s pretty clear who’s a dog in this situation.  You can bite me, too.

MM