Half my heart is in Iraq:
Students with deployed parents write their lives

by Abe Louise Young

KILLEEN, TX—Lamiah and Anthony wake up and get ready for high school with one thing on their minds. Are Mom and Dad safe? They go to sleep praying for the same. This brother and sister team gets through the school day in the shadow of absence: both of their parents are soldiers deployed (in Iraq and Korea) with the U.S. military.

The war is everywhere in Killeen: mattress billboards say, "Give your veteran a good night's sleep!" But its presence is felt in with particular poignancy in public schools like Killeen High. KHS stands in the shadow of Fort Hood, the nation's largest military base, and roughly half of the 1800 students have parents who are active military employees. When the bell rings at 4:00, khaki fatigues and combat boots flood the hallways and parking lot as parents in uniform come to pick up their kids. But parents who are not there for the daily events or big moments like prom or graduation have an equally powerful biggest impact on student success.

As one might expect, the student body is enormously disciplined. The waxed hallways shine, and white walls are unmarked by graffiti. Yet a burden of unexpressed emotion is carried throughout the school day. The subject of the war is curiously off-limits in conversation—it may be agreed that it is too volatile, and too heartbreaking a topic to handle on school grounds. Yet this February, students with deployed parents met to do creative writing, find an outlet to explore their emotions, and gain support from one another by expressing them publicly.

Assistant Principal Helen Miller dreamed up a Writing Week as a way to give all students a creative space before the grueling stress of standardized TAKS tests (Texas Aptitude and Skills Survey)—and to help them feel good about their writing. Coming from a military family herself, Miller recognized the strain that students with deployed parents are under. She arranged a private group meeting for creative writing sessions for these teens.

The week was met with enthusiasm, and the classes were overfull with kids who'd signed up to do creative writing and learn about the routes to publication. So many young dreamers smoldering with things to say....it was inspiring, to put it mildly. Yet none touched me like the workshop with students whose parents are deployed. A few expressed that they'd never talked about their sadness before. The feeling of connection was so powerful that we decided to squeeze another two hours in to the week, and meet to write for a second time. The students asked if they could meet every week to do this.

They wrote about using email and cell phones to talk to parents every few weeks; about holding framed photos to their chests as they fall asleep; about missing the smell of a parent's cologne, or of barbeque and taco dishes cooking.

Girdy writes,

Sometimes I hear her talking to me, saying
Don't worry, be strong.
And know that she's smiling down on me
And making sure we're safe.
We are a big family, though it seems like we're
A little puppy who's lost its mom.