Convoy live fire training

This past week, we had convoy live fire training. This training turned out to be very exilerating for me. We went out in a convoy of seven vehicles, I was in the fourth vehicle, an LMTV. There was several obsticles for us to encounter. We ran into direct fire and then an ambush with an IED and direct fire concurrently. All this training was under supervision and safety control. We did our first run thru with blanks and then did live fire. We actually had to dismount and remount throughout the whole event. We were to react just as if we were really being ambush and hit. It was great training. My enthusiasm may show you that as a kid, I played a lot of cowboys and indians. (Never got to be the deputy though, but I can pretend that while on CQ duty--a whole other story.) To make this training even better, it was raining and a cold front started moving in on us. Boy did it turn cold quickly, expecially with the rain. We had our wet weather gear on, but everyone was still dreanched. We were in full battle rattle and so wet from the rain that I looked like a drowned rat dressed for war. I had mud from the top of my kevlar to the bottom of my boots. (Boy was this going to be hard to clean).
Anyway, I was very happy to know that in the end, I was complimented by the officers for the way I handle myself and put my soldiers first. I was so excited by this, that I went home to tell my boys. They told me they were very proud of me. To have my boys tell me that, meant more to me than any compliment an officer could give me. Another great day in the Army.