Baklava Day and Boxed-Up Memories—Experiencing

seven years, we’ve known each other for thirty, since the day he walked into the room to become my basic training squad leader at the US Military Academy at West Point.

A fair question, one often asked by those who want to understand but haven’t faced such trauma.

Between watching my mud-encrusted face as I crawled under concertina wire and my struggles memorizing the requisite bugle notes throughout basic training, Christopher has seen me at my worst. He was also the brave soul in the grenade pit the frst time I pulled the pin and tossed one over the concrete barrier. After a fring range sergeant altered my gun sites, Christopher came to correct it, knowing something was wrong when the farm girl used to shooting coyotes and old metal car rims for target practice suddenly couldn’t hit her mark.

At the time of my congressional appointment from Wyoming in 1989, women had only been allowed in West Point a short time (the frst class with females graduated in 1980). I was grateful for the young women who paved the way for the opportunity to serve in military leadership.

In my only year as a cadet, the frst female leader of the corps of cadets, First Captain Kristin Baker, was blasted by cadets even while she was making the front page of the New York Times. Some upperclassmen said other cadets were more qualifed for promotion and wondered who she’d slept with to get the spot. Others didn’t like her high voice commanding the corps from the marching plain or speaking in the mess hall. While my post-graduation military intentions to serve my country were blowing up stuff as an ordnance offcer and becoming a translator, I admired Cadet Baker and dreamed of leading like she did. It was not to be.