‘Experiences I Tried to Forget’ Comcast Technician and Team Makes a Short Film by and for Veterans through the Patton Film Project. Watch the film at youtu.be/Z_zyanWvw2k
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t was my manager who first told me about the Patton Veterans Film Project. He emailed me and suggested I would be a good candidate to participate in the three-day crash-course in filmmaking, which is specifically designed for veterans and offered by my employer, Comcast, and the Patton Veterans Project. I had no experience making films, but I went in with an open mind, hoping I could tell my story and show my struggles with PTSD from my multiple deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq and the challenges of transitioning out of the military. When I had first gotten hired as a technician at Comcast, I was only six months out of a combat tour in Afghanistan, which I had spent doing route clearance on Highway 1, the main route connecting Kabul with the rest of the country. I did well during my eight years in the Army and three combat tours. I ended up going to Iraq shortly after arriving at my first duty station. I was young — just 21 — and didn’t let a lot bother me. Later, I was transferred to Fort Drum, N.Y., and 30 days after that, I was in Afghanistan. Shortly after we got back, I met the woman who would become my wife, and we soon got married. With all the sudden changes in my life, I started to feel the effects of PTSD and anxiety creeping in. 6
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I discovered that when you get married, you stop thinking about your own needs. I didn’t have a care in the world on my prior deployments. When I was single, I didn’t have to worry about who was taking care of my wife while I was away or the feeling of, “Wow, I’m going to be separated from my life partner for a whole year.” I decided after that deployment that I was going to get out, and no one was going to keep me away from my family or what I want to accomplish in life. When I got back home to Oregon, I started working for Comcast. I knew my military background was one of the driving factors that helped me get hired. It was clear that the company was proud of the veterans already on their teams. The hiring managers told me about VetNet, a resource group for employees who served in the military, and how much Comcast appreciates and loves to thank veterans. About a year into the job, I had a really bad day. Experiences I had tried to forget started to come back up like a bottle of soda that has been sitting in the sun too long. That was when I saw the dedication of my Comcast team to make sure we all succeed and win together. I was sitting in my van in a Burger King parking lot, frozen in place. I
managed to call my supervisor and let him know I needed to go home and that I couldn’t talk about it. He respected my wishes and asked no questions: just gave me the rest of the day off. But I ended up telling him what was going on and that I was going to get some help. He told me to take as much time as I needed and reassured me that my health and well-being always come first. That understanding really meant a lot. This article was supposed to be about what I got out of the Patton Veterans Film Project, but I felt like you needed the backstory for it to make sense. When I first arrived at the filmmaking workshop, I noticed that I was the only guy in the room on the student/veteran side of things. I briefly considered leaving, but as it turns out, a couple of people showed up late, and I became more comfortable with the plan for the weekend of moviemaking. I went into the workshop with a lot of unknowns about what we were going to do. I can be shy or standoffish, but by the end of our movie, I was helping our group and putting in my own two cents to make sure that my story was heard and didn’t get lost in the mix with the three other veterans who were working on it. The Patton Veterans Film Project is
