{"id":6082,"date":"2016-12-24T12:17:17","date_gmt":"2016-12-24T12:17:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bucksurdu.com\/blog\/?p=6082"},"modified":"2016-12-24T12:17:17","modified_gmt":"2016-12-24T12:17:17","slug":"grass","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bucksurdu.com\/blog\/?p=6082","title":{"rendered":"Grass"},"content":{"rendered":"

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This meme hit my Inbox this morning. \u00a0It is a soldier in Iraq growing grass in front of his tent. \u00a0I cannot verify the accuracy of the rest of the Email that accompanied this image, but scenes like this were not uncommon. \u00a0When I left for Iraq in 2010, the folks who worked for me gave me a cookie sheet, a pair of scissors, a bag of US topsoil, and a bag of grass seed to take with me. \u00a0I was living in a shipping container that had been converted to quarters. \u00a0It was not uncommon for soldiers to grow a cookie sheet of American grass under their hooch to remind themselves of home. \u00a0It takes a tremendous amount of water for grass to survive through sand storms and blistering heat. \u00a0I don’t have any personal pictures of this, but the picture above struck a chord for me. \u00a0Pause a moment between glasses of egg nog to think of our Soldiers, Marines, Sailors, Airmen, and Coast Guardsmen far away from home this holiday season for whom a bag of American dirt is a special gift.<\/p>\n