Photo By Marc Loi | Staff Sgt. Krystle M. Wright of Fort Worth, Texas, the non-commissioned officer of the...... read more read more
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FORWARD OPERATING BASE SPIN BOLDAK, Afghanistan – “I love being in the Army, I love being around soldiers. I love helping them out,” said Staff Sgt. Krystle M. Wright as she reflected upon the reasons that brought her from the University of Texas to the Army, and compelled her to stay even after having left family and friends five different times to deploy in her short nine-year career, and eventually here as the non-commissioned officer in charge of the Orderly Room for the 509th Forward Support Company, 504th Battlefield Surveillance Brigade, from Fort Hood, Texas.
Though the fluctuations in her voice indicate she is proud of her job, and the wide grin that breaks out when she talks about mentoring soldiers even more so, Wright isn’t shy about the reason she joined the Army. She didn’t join because she felt a need to after the attacks on New York City and Washington, D.C., in 2001. She didn’t join because she felt a greater calling tugging at her heart. She didn’t join because she felt her country threatened and responded by marching toward the sound of the cannons. For the Fort Worth, Texas, native, the reason she became a soldier was simple economics.
“I was in college at the University of Texas and things weren’t so well. The Army was there and offered me money to go to school,” Wright said, her voice at a leveled pace, without a hint of apology for her decision.
But Wright hasn’t a single reason for which to be apologetic. Since trading in textbooks for her the little green note book so well known to non-commissioned officers and soldiers, Wright has deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan five separate times, including the trip into the unknown into 2003, when she became one of the first soldiers to cross the border between Kuwait and Iraq.
“It was nerve-racking,” she said. “I didn’t know where I was going to go or what I was going to see. Once we crossed the border, everyone was on pins and needles. Everyone was nervous.”
So nervous, in fact, that one soldier began firing into the unknown, thinking that someone there had been firing back at them. As it turned out, Wright said, it was only nerve playing with the imaginations of young soldiers.
“They were shooting at nothing,” she said. “We were with a [military police] unit, so we were all gunned up.”
Later that night, having safely crossed the border, Wright – 20 years old at the time, did something most her classmates back at UT would never imagine doing – she traded in comforters and twin beds for a spot on the ground in a war zone.
“We set up camps, and set up a perimeter and we slept anywhere we could find a spot,” she said. For many soldiers, Wright included, this meant sleeping on top of trucks and in the dirt. But neither did she mind the conditions, Wright said – she’d signed up for this, nor was she nervous anymore.
“We were a very tight unit, everyone knew the person next to us had our back, so we were very comfortable around each other,” she said. “It makes it easier.”
It is that camaraderie – that sense of belonging to something, as well as the responsibilities, that Wright lived for – and one of the reasons she stayed.
“I don’t want to come in and just sit down and get paid,” she said. “I think it’s a great accomplishment to say I did something, and this is what I earned for it.”
But a sense of accomplishment and the paychecks aren’t the only reasons Wright said made her stay. There is a lot to the Army than people know, and some of the reasons Wright feels an affinity for being a soldier aren’t necessarily outlined in those 30-second Army commercials. Like her family when she first joined the Army – to whom she did not reveal her plans on becoming a soldier until everything had been finalized, her civilian counterparts don’t seem to understand the military or its culture, she said.
“All they know is what they see on TV or movies,” she said. “Once they get a better understanding of it, it makes them feel better about the military.”
Some of the things unseen include the mentoring and leading of soldiers, which Wright said is one of the most paramount duties in the Army, as it allows her not only to develop soldiers into future leaders, but also allows her to grow into a better leader.
“It guides me and it guides the soldiers on how to be a better leader,” she said. “It’s very important.”
Another reason she loves the Army, Wright said, was being able to take care of soldiers – not necessarily her own, but those who come to her needing help.
Last month, for example, Wright helped a soldier get paperwork finished to be laterally-promoted from specialist to corporal, and through the ordeal, the satisfaction Wright got was not from the paychecks or the friendship she made, but knowing that she’s helped out a soldier.
“To me, it’s a great feeling. It gives me a sense of accomplishment and that I’ve done something to help someone,” she said.
That feeling, along with the stability of being in the Army, is one of the reasons she also compelled both her brother and sister to join. The first one in her family to have ever joined the military, Wright said she didn’t know much of it, or how it actually worked, but once her family saw the life she led, and her stability, having the rest of the family also trade in civilian clothes for the uniform was a no-brainer.
“They weren’t too happy when I joined,” she said, remembering the first time she’d broken the news that she’d be joining the Army in the midst of a war. “But now, they’re real proud of me.”
Wright’s family, however, isn’t the only one proud of her. A good way to measure leaders’ ability and competence is how their soldiers view them, and those working for her are just as proud.
One of Wright’s soldiers, Spc. Morgan L. Rains, an administrative clerk, also isn’t shy about speaking her mind, even if it’s about her leader – something she attributes to having learned from Wright.
“She’s been a really good NCO to me,” said Rains, of Great Falls, Mont. “I was all about getting out, but she was one of the reasons I [re-enlisted.]”
It is that good leadership, Rains said, that not only inspires her to stay in the Army, but also come to work each day looking forward to doing her job, even if it’s in the middle of a war zone.
“When you have good leadership, you just want to come to work – you want to do your job and are proud of your job,” Rains said. “She’s made me stronger and given me a voice.”
Rains’ testimonial of her leader, perhaps, is one of the reasons Wright also stayed in. Having learned from good leaders prior to becoming a leader on her own, Wright said she feels a need to also discharge the duties of a leader to the best of her ability.
“I want to be the best leader that I can,” she said. “I want to be someone soldiers can look up to and say that’s who they want to be.”
Perhaps, through Rains’ experiences and her desires to be a better soldier and eventual leader, Wright’s already done that.
| Date Taken: | 08.31.2011 |
| Date Posted: | 08.31.2011 01:52 |
| Story ID: | 76203 |
| Location: | SPIN BOLDAK, AF |
| Web Views: | 223 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
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