About 500 U.S. soldiers in Iraq brought an American tradition to the Middle East on March 31, when they held a Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure in conjunction with the 5-kilometer run being held in San Antonio, Texas.
Sgt. Amber Orton of Emporia, who is stationed in Balad, Iraq, took part in the run. She talked about that and her life in Iraq during a telephone interview on Friday afternoon from the base, about 40 miles north of Baghdad.
“It was something I wanted to do for my mom. She had colon cancer,” said Orton, who went to Iraq in September last year with the Army Reserve’s 450th Transportation Battalion out of Manhattan.
Her mother, Wanda Orton, was diagnosed with cancer on her 40th birthday anniversary. Now, years later, she is a survivor.
Orton remembers her mother having surgery in September of that year and undergoing extensive chemotherapy and radiation treatments during her hospitalization. The family got Wanda Orton back home in time for Christmas, and the younger Orton said that until she grew up, she did not realize all that her mother had endured.
“She put up a heck of a fight and, luckily, I still have her with me,” Amber Orton said. “She’s kind of my inspiration for a whole lot, because she went through a lot of things. ... She’s my hero.”
In a phone call home prior to the event, Orton let her mother know that she planned to run in her honor.
“She had that ‘mother moment,’ ” Orton said, mentioning Wanda’s reaction to the news when she told her, “It’s something I want to do for you.”
“I was thinking about her and all the hard things she went through,” Orton said.
Orton grew up in Emporia and graduated from Emporia High School. She enlisted at the age of 17 in the Army Reserves, doing regular drilling during her last year of high school.
“The Army does have really good training and they do have good school benefits, so at the time that was what I was kind of leaning toward,” Orton said.
She was a student at Kansas State University in Manhattan when her unit was activated.
“Obviously, no one can predict exactly when a war is going to start,” Orton said.
She had served a seven-month tour of duty earlier in Afghanistan, before tours were extended, and came to Iraq last fall. In February 2006, she had married Christopher Rea, who also is in her Reserve unit.
“I actually have kind of a unique situation,” she said. “My husband’s deployed over here, too.”
Rea is stationed about 40 miles north of Balad at Speicher Base near Tikrit.
“They tried as hard as they could to work our leaves to get us home on our anniversary but we were actually flying back to Iraq on our anniversary,” Orton said. They saw each other during a flight stopover in Atlanta.
When they return to the States, Orton plans to transfer from K-State to Emporia State University to finish her degree. In the meantime, she is scheduled to stay in Iraq until August, when she will celebrate her 24th birthday anniversary by coming home.
The Balad base is more protected than some in Iraq, with watch towers, cement “T-walls” to protect the buildings, and roofs reinforced to withstand impact.
“Inside the base here, we’re pretty well-protected,” she said. “There’s cement bunkers all over the place.”
Because it is considered a military post, it offers more amenities than many locations. Soldiers and their roommates live in trailers and they have access to a movie theater.
“We’re like ‘the’ place to be,” Orton said with a laugh. “(Her mother) loves it that I’m here and that I work in an office.”
Orton is transportation management coordinator at Balad.
“We watch all the convoys that go out on the road,” she said. “We basically track all movements that go out in the theater.”
The military and civilian contract-workers took time out from their duties to do the cancer run.
“It was something that everyone was eligible to do — Air Force, Army, didn’t matter your branch,” she said.
Many of them wore official run T-shirts that had been shipped in from San Antonio. Due to some shipping delays, she said, it was difficult to distribute the shirts to everyone in advance.
The event wasn’t timed, but Orton had been training and, though “there are some fast people here,” Orton said, she was happy with her finish in the middle of the pack. And she was especially pleased that she was able to honor her mother in the process.
“I had to get my strength from her, you know,” Orton said.
ladybug (anonymous) says...
Great job Amber! We miss you here at home, come home soon! Your friends and family miss and love you!!!!
April 9, 2007 at 6:14 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )