the .: fyr :. light

Sights, sounds … from a day on post:

• BOOOOM! – explosions on the ranges. Sometimes, even being far away from the ranges, the sounds of mortar fire carry anyway. It can be a little unnerving to hear that, hear the house shake in response and feel the trembling beneath your feet. For the first few weeks that I lived on an army post (Fort Knox) I would jump 50 feet in the air. Nowadays, I just listen to make sure nothing in the house is going to fall and break and then back to what I was doing.
• Wee-ooo-eee-ooo – sirens. I have to say that here on Fort Hood there are far more instances of sirens wailing on a daily basis than there were at Fort Knox. It’s become common place to hear them for me here. At first I would get up to look and see if I could see what was happening that would require emergency services, but now it’s “ho hum”. Sad. Fort Knox never had this much action.
• ACUs – everywhere! First, for my non-army readers, let me explain the acronym “ACU”. This is what the uniform is referred to as. ACU is an acronym for “army combat uniform”. Now, imagine having just about everybody around you dressed in ACUs … that’s what it’s like. Every 5th person is in civilian clothes and half of those are sporting soldier haircuts so you know they are military too.
• Bugle calls! – you all know what taps by bugle sounds like? We get that every night at 11pm. Now, imagine hearing that bugle between 7 and 10 times a day. Soldiers get bugle calls: to wake them up, to tell them it’s time for PT, to tell them it’s time to report to work in 10 minutes, to tell them work is starting now, to tell them lunch hour has started, to tell them lunch hour is about to end, to tell them lunch hour has ended, the workday is about to end, the workday has ended, that “Day is done, gone the sun / From the lakes, from the hills, from the run / All is well, safely rest; / God is nigh.“. Some people hate it … I like it; even when I have to stand at attention at 1700 for end-of-day call (if I am outside, of course).
• Yellow ribbons – plastered on cars windows, bumpers, doors, houses … everywhere. That yellow ribbon is a staple and is usually accompanied by the Army strong sticker. Sometimes, it feels annoying…
• Huge building numbers – every building on post has it’s own unique number and it is usually posted prominently on a black plaque with large white numbers. On Fort Knox, when we would order pizza, all we needed to give them was our building number – didn’t even need the road name. That was a new one on me.
• Street signs aplenty – the USofA are big on street signs since they enforce their road code with an iron fist. However, you will find that most military installations tend to overdo it so that NO one has an excuse for breaking the law. This is even more noticeable in a school or residential zone. I think on our road alone, here, there are 5 speed limit signs.

There … pretty much a day in my life.

Anybody else want to share their sights and sounds?

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