He had been counting down the days for months. His bags were
packed. But five days before he was supposed to board the plane for
his Hollister home, Sgt. Rene Arbizu’s stay in Iraq was extended
for at least another three months.
He had been counting down the days for months. His bags were packed. But five days before he was supposed to board the plane for his Hollister home, Sgt. Rene Arbizu’s stay in Iraq was extended for at least another three months.
Now, promises of returning are as deceptive as a desert mirage.
“I told my wife that next time they tell me we’re leaving, I’m not going to say anything to her, because I can’t promise that I’ll actually be home,” he wrote in an e-mail interview.
Arbizu, 25, missed celebrating his first wedding anniversary with Jenny, his wife of almost two years, and he doesn’t expect to be home for their second anniversary in July. They were married seven months before he was sent to Iraq last March and, as a married couple, have spent more time apart than together.
“My friends and I laugh about it, but I have been living here with them longer than I lived with my wife before I left,” he said.
Although being apart is difficult, he said it has brought the two closer together.
Rene and Jenny, 27, met on a blind date that was set up by a mutual friend. Rene already was in the Army Reserves with the 341st Military Police Company out of San Jose, having joined straight out of high school. They became engaged while Rene was deployed on a volunteer mission to the Balkans for eight months to support operations in Kosovo and Bosnia in 2001.
“She stuck by me through that deployment, so I had no worries about this one when I left home,” he said.
But they’ve been apart a lot longer than they ever could have expected.
After the 9/11 attacks, they guessed he would soon be deployed again. At the time, Rene, a community service officer with the Gilroy Police Department, was one semester away from earning an administration of justice degree from San Jose State and had passed the tests to attend the police academy in hopes of signing on with the Gilroy police force.
“For a while, I was upset and started thinking maybe it wouldn’t happen,” Jenny said. “It’s kind of like the stages of finding out someone’s dying. You’re in denial, then upset, then succumb to it.”
Rene was sent to southern Iraq first to provide security for convoys on the main supply route. There, he battled the 150-degree heat and blinding sandstorms, but at least the local Iraqis were friendly.
“We never encountered any hostile fire or a single improvised explosive device,” he said.
Once their mission was complete, Rene received word he would be staying another six months. He headed north to help escort fuel tankers and trucks carrying food and other supplies for the troops between his base near Balad, two hours northeast of Baghdad, and other points such as Tallil and Kuwait.
“The seven-hour drives back and forth are a challenge in itself,” Jenny said. “He told me, ‘we finally figured out that we drive to Disneyland and back every day.’ ”
Except it was no Magic Kingdom.
People in northern Iraq were far less friendly toward coalition forces. The convoys were ambushed and fired upon by rocket propelled grenades, and improvised explosive devices detonated next to the trucks. The locals try to disable the trucks and kill the Americans so they can steal the fuel or food, he said.
“I have been lucky that my Humvee has never been too close when an IED or RPG has hit, but unfortunately they do hit somebody,” Rene said.
His work schedule was grueling. The troops were working 14-hour days for 20 to 25 days straight, which left little time for dinner, showers, phone calls and sleep.
“When all was said and done, we had just enough time to grab six hours of sleep before we hit the road again the next morning,” he said.
Back home, Jenny picked up the slack left by Rene, doing the tasks he once did, such as paying the bills and setting up her second-grade classroom alone at Glen View Elementary School last fall. He would help her organize the space, because he had a knack for it.
She sleeps most nights at her parents’ house instead of the home they shared in Hollister.
“It’s been difficult to stay there alone,” she said. “It’s hard to even watch the news anymore, because you’re seeing all of those soldiers that are being killed over there, and you’re wondering if that’s my husband.”
Rene was supposed to leave Iraq on April 20. Then came the frustrating news that his stay would be extended again for three to four months. By that time, he and his fellow soldiers had already trained their replacements and turned over all of their equipment.
He moved to a base just outside of Baghdad, where he is waiting for some work to do. His mother Rose Marie Arbizu said he’ll likely go back to escorting convoys, which fills her with terror.
“I feel like I’m holding my breath all of the time, sometimes I get this feeling in the pit of my stomach,” Rose Marie said. “Two or three times a day I’m praying.”
She keeps hoping the Army will send Rene home early. The GPD is saving a spot in the police academy for him.
“I don’t know how I’m going to get through these next three months feeling this way,” Rose Marie said. “We just keep praying, hoping that everything will be all right.”
For the newlyweds, their reunion – whenever it occurs – will probably feel like a second honeymoon. Jenny boasts to friends that she’s been married for nearly two years and hasn’t fought with her husband.
“It’s funny the petty things that you could fight over, especially in the first months of marriage and you’re trying to get used to each other,” she said. “It has brought us closer. It helps you appreciate what you have.”
Jodi Engle can be reached at 408-842-6400.
