Gregory G. Schulz, a Baraboo, Wisconsin native, discusses his career in the Army and Army Reserves as a medic in the 7302nd Medical Training Support Brigade, including his experiences in Honduras, Haiti, and Iraq. Schulz reflects on his reasons for enlisting in the Army Reserves at age seventeen and for joining the regular Army after basic and advanced training in administration at Fort Jackson (South Carolina). Assigned to Fort Drum (New York), he states that even though he had specialized in administration, he was assigned duty as the commander's driver. Schulz talks about six months of duty in Honduras operating a base cable television system, overcoming homesickness through recreational activities, and observing the poverty in the area. He comments on the food, being allowed off base, accommodations, learning his job, and getting a weekend off to visit a beach. Schulz mentions that he was happy to get out of administrative duties and reflects that during admin training they worked with typewriters, but at his first duty assignment they used computers. He characterizes some of the officers he worked under in Honduras and Haiti. After returning to Fort Drum, Schulz talks about spending a lot of time playing video games with a friend to get out of the barracks and avoid being snowed in. Sent to Haiti with the advance party for his unit's annual training mission, he reports the lack of civilian reaction to an air assault on the airport. He expresses frustration at not understanding why the Army was in Haiti. Schulz comments on being promoted there, his promotion ceremony, and being interviewed by U.S.A. Today. He recalls an incident when some infantrymen accidentally released mustard gas on the base and mentions he never carried protective gear. Schulz reflects on forming friendships overseas and losing contact with those friends back in the States. After returning to Fort Drum, he states he joined the Reserves in 1996, and in 1998 he became a Department of Defense civilian employee as a unit administrator for an Army Reserve dental unit in Denver (Colorado) before returning to Wisconsin. He mentions moving in with his brother and working for the 998th Quartermaster Company in Junction City before quitting due to some difficulties with the commander. While attending combat stress school, Schulz talks about being selected to go on a six-month rotation to Kuwait and the fading of his fear during two months of waiting during mobilization. He characterizes some of the friends he made, speaks of getting sick on the plane ride to Kuwait, and touches on spending a week at Camp Arifjan. Assigned to a water distribution unit, Schulz discusses being unable to find his gas mask during a rocket attack, living in Umm Qasr (Iraq), being replaced by the unit he had quit a couple years earlier, and spending the rest of his deployment at Camp Victory and Log Base Seitz (aka "Mortaritaville") in Baghdad. He comments on transporting supplies between bases in convoys, mortar attacks on Log Base Seitz, acting as his unit's medic, and working with the British at the Troop Medical Clinic. Schulz recalls a particularly hot day when he ran out of supplies dealing with so many cases of dehydration, feeling drained by the heat, and not getting air conditioners until September. He describes the psychological breakdown of one of his friends and the drama caused after the friend was sent home for mental health reasons, mysteriously promoted, and lied to the newspapers about how much action the unit had seen. Schulz speaks of his job as coordinator with local civilian workers, working with an interpreter, and meeting his wife, Jackie, in Iraq. Schulz mentions the first time he saw a bad injury after some soldiers driving a convoy passed out in the heat and crashed. He reflects on how humorous incidents kept him going, spending time with Jackie, and getting secretly married after returning to the States. Schulz mentions he and his wife are now in the same unit and talks about how hard it was when Jackie spent six months away at operating room technician school. He details the weird moments of his readjustment to civilian life, his homecoming, his plans to attend flight medic school, and his distant plans for retirement.
