First, let me explain: I don't camp, and when I did, flush toilets were

always within an easy midnight walk. I subscribe to Bon Appetit and

Cook's Illustrated and would never open a can of Chef Boyardee. I don't

go outside without a shower and makeup. I have no military experience.

Yet, I spent the last two months in the Middle East with the Seabees

of Port Hueneme-based Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 4; most of

the time in Iraq during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

We were in Baghdad before the city fell. Bullets flew over our

heads. A land mine blew up a minibus next to our camp.

I ate prepackaged meals sealed in plastic called MREs for six weeks.

I lived in the dirt and went two weeks at a time without showering.

Often, I didn't have so much as a bucket to pee in.

Since February, I've been telling the stories of the battalion's

Seabees, remarkable men and women whose resiliency, commitment and

kindness will stay with me always.

This is my story.

Quick preparations

I got the assignment to go to war on a fluke. I'd been at the

Ventura County Star for only four months when the reporter originally

slated to be embedded with the battalion bowed out. There wasn't enough

time for The Star to send me to the Department of Defense journalist

training, so I had to wing it.

The battalion's chaplain, Lt. Brandon Harding, showed me how to put

on a gas mask and a chemical protection suit, and walked me through the

"gas chamber" to make sure my equipment worked. He explained that, if

war began, there was a chance the Seabees would get near the front

lines, but most likely they would stay in camp, taking small day trips

to repair bridges and roads. He didn't think I needed to bring a

tent.

I told my best friend I would most likely be in Kuwait during the

war: "I just hope I get into Iraq afterward to cover some of the

humanitarian efforts."

Colleagues asked over and over: "Are you scared?" I said, "No."

Although the possibility of chemical weapons haunted me, my biggest

fear was boring stories.

I got desert boots, two desert camouflage uniforms, a sleeping bag,

a couple of sea bags, a computer, a satellite phone and three months

worth of Clinique skin care products. I was ready to go.

The journey begins

We were scheduled to board a bus early in the morning on Saturday,

March 1. The bus would take us to March Air Force Base near Riverside,

where we would catch a chartered military flight to Kuwait. So I

canceled my trip to Washington state to see my son's first solo horn

recital that weekend.

I hadn't yet heard the Navy mantra, "Hurry up and wait."

It was three days before we actually boarded the plane. When we did,

many Seabees assumed I was a poorly trained reservist. I not only wore

makeup, but my tool-belt-looking thing was crooked, and my

shoulder-length hair was untethered. Getting onto the bus, Seabees

grabbed Meals, Ready-to-Eat for dinner, but I had no idea how to even

open the thick brown plastic pouch. When we boarded the plane, I left

it behind unopened.

Once aboard, the pilot asked: "Please put your weapons on the floor

facing the outside of the plane." Many Seabees were already snoring

when he made the announcement. After years in the military, they had

perfected the art of falling asleep whenever given the chance. I, on

the other hand, had never slept sitting up and spent the 33-hour plane

ride completely awake.

At the first stop, Chief Deborah Faye Young worked to get me into

regulation. With the loving kindness of a mother, she explained my hair

should be back and above my collar. She showed me how to tuck my pants

into my boots so sand fleas wouldn't bite my ankles. She bent down to

hide my shoelaces in my boots so there were no untidy loose ends.

When we arrived in Kuwait, instead of being allowed to continue on

with the Seabees, I was pulled out of formation and taken to the

Department of Defense media center at the Kuwaiti Hilton to apply for

formal clearances along with the other 500-some embeds. I was at least

heartened that the public affairs officer had a hard time finding me

among the enlisted.

At the Hilton, Marines gave the journalists chemical weapons

protection training. They also gave us the syringes we would slam into

someone's thigh if they were affected by chemical weapons and on the

ground doing the "funky chicken." Several journalists decided to go

home.

Learning experiences

A few days later, I was among 150 embeds, only about a half-dozen of

whom were women, waiting for the buses that would take us to our units.

TV reporters did standups. "Like never before, the media is going to

war," said one, pointing a handheld camera at himself. Cameramen took

pictures of rolling bus wheels each time the buses moved to a different

parking lot. Journalists interviewed each other. It was swelteringly

hot. Kuwaiti hot. I had been in the sun several hours, so I ran back

into the hotel for a bottle of water.

But the store wouldn't take a $20 bill. I was flushed, faint and

frustrated. A man in line behind me offered to buy the $6 bottle of

water.

"You'd do the same for me," he said, telling me he was Michael Kelly

of the Atlantic Monthly. After I thanked him, we talked about our

embeds, wished each other good luck, good stories and safe

journeys.

At the camp, I was put in the female officers' tent with a

half-dozen other women. We slept on bunk beds, but the Seabees called

them "racks." It was just one word out of a whole new vocabulary I

learned in the first few days. The Port-a-Potties were "heads." The

kitchen was a "galley." The tents, "berths."

But other than sandstorms and a false alarm over a possible gas

attack, my first few weeks were lessons in the military rhythm and

rhyme and reason. I've always lived life by my own timetable, but

suddenly people were telling me where to go, and when to do it and to

take off my "cover" (hat) when I was in the galley.

My stories were the stories of Seabees. They were simple, quiet

stories that I privately called "Fluff from the Front." Getting them to

my editors was my biggest frustration. I would sit in my tent and type

out my story on my laptop computer. Then, I would set up my satellite

phone, get a connection and try to send it by e-mail to my editors. My

first few stories wouldn't send at all, ending up at The Star via

military e-mail.

The computer and phone weren't connecting, said Petty Officer 1st

Class Tom Wooten, the battalion's resident computer whiz. He sat in the

sand with it until the connections began to occur. Still, the satellite

was overloaded and I couldn't get through. I developed a habit of

getting up at 2 a.m. and sending my stories then.

I made other adjustments. I stopped wearing my contact lenses: The

grit of the desert seemed to get under the thin plastic. I gave up

makeup. I bathed in moisturizer, but still watched the tips of my

fingers crack and bleed.

One day, the chaplain asked to speak to me.

"It looks like we will be moving up just behind the front lines," he

said. "You can go if you want, but you don't have to."

I asked where he would be. He said with this forward group that was

part of Task Force Mike. He needed to be there to comfort anyone who

was hurt or dying. I said I would go also.

The war begins

At 2:30 a.m. a few days later, a male voice shouted at the tent

door. "Senior Chief Lavoie, Senior Chief Lavoie." Michelle "Shelly"

Lavoie was the only woman chief in Task Force Mike. Knowing this might

mean we were convoying out, I headed for the showers. By 4 a.m., I was

fresh and clean and packed, although I was exhausted from a hacking

cough that had afflicted about half the women in the tent.

But we didn't leave. Like the trip to Kuwait, there were several

false starts.

Then on March 19 we were given an hour to get all our things on the

trucks.

"Hurry up and wait," Seabees laughed or fumed. I realized, as

frustrating as it was, I was no longer in control of the simplest

aspect of my life: my time.

The convoy arrived at a blank spot in the desert near the border as

the sky was taking on the rosy glow of morning. We passed scattered

Marines rousing from the sleeping holes they'd dug in the sand. There

were explosions somewhere in the distance.

"Training," most people concluded, setting up their tiny two-man

tents and sleeping through the heat of the day. There were five

embedded journalists on the convoy. One, Nick Oza, a Knight Ridder

photographer, had a short-wave radio. He was the one who told Lavoie

the war had started.

By dusk, most Seabees still did not know President Bush had

announced the start of the war. That night, I was eating an MRE at the

front of my tent when I saw two bright lights streak across the sky

toward our camp.

I pointed and asked, "Should we be worried?"

Screams erupted all around me: "INCOMING! INCOMING!"

I ran for the bunker behind the combat operations center, but I have

no night vision. I couldn't see it. I ran for another bunker, but got

lost in the blackness and the shouting.

"INCOMING! INCOMING!"

Chaplain Harding called out: "Dani, this way."

I followed his voice to a big hole in the ground, tumbling 4 feet

into the soft dirt, wondering how I would get out again. There were

four or five others in the bunker. After we scrambled to get our

chemical protection gear on we watched in amazement as the missiles

sailed over our heads. More followed. It was like Fourth of July

without the picnic or the celebration.

It was a cool evening, so the first few hours in the chemical

protection gear were comfortable. Over the next few weeks, though, I

came to hate the charcoal-lined jungle camouflage pants and jacket.

Worn with the gas mask, boots and gloves, it is supposed to protect the

military men and woman from chemicals like mustard gas that could harm

their skin.

But no chemicals in meant no air out. Everyone wore it all day, then

slept in it all night, for about a month. We sweated profusely. I

developed heat rashes that itched like a thousand ants chewing on my

back. Usually I wore a flak jacket and Kevlar helmet as well. It was 20

extra pounds of protection to drag around. After a few hours in it all,

my back ached so badly it was hard to sleep. Many Seabees complained

about the same problem, yet others wore it like gym clothes and still

sprinted around our makeshift camp.

That night, I wore my boots to bed. I began using my flak jacket for

my pillow and my helmet to hold my glasses. I went to sleep with my

hand on my gas mask.

Tomorrow, Part 2: Covering the Seabees in Iraq