Too Good Not to Share

It came to our attention that a photo of Gwen from her deployment has made the official "Army Times Photos of the Year" list for 2007.

This piece of news, besides being the funniest thing I've heard in a while, is yet another powerful indication that Gwendolyn - aka Major Brophy (although she's still just Captain Brophy in the photo) - isn't just strong; she's Army Strong (Tm).

I'm not sure how much I would pay to see Gwendolyn be featured in one of those highly dramatic Army Strong TV commercials, but anyone reading this can rest assured that it would be quite a lot.

It appears it was taken by a professional photographer who visited Ramadi in early 2007. Gwen remembers him being around, but only vaguely.

Here is one link (follow link to 2007 "Army Pictures of the Year"). And here is another. Don't say I never gave you anything.

In all seriousness, it's a pretty cool photo. It's certainly easy to see her deployment beleaguerement, and I like to interpret her expression as a greater symbol of the emotions and feelings of many soldiers who have spent a long time overseas, far from home, in difficult places, working ridiculous hours, for questionable reasons, and seeing repetitively some of the worst things humanity does to itself.

6 comments:

Adman said...

Congratulations(???)

That picture is... interesting. I really can't read her expression. Is she worried? Sad? Scared? Panicked? Picking her nose?

Anonymous said...

I'm not picking my nose, that's for sure.

While I don't remember that day in particular, nor do I remember having my photo taken, I'm pretty sure that I was thinking how very, very tired I was of seeing young men (and rarely, women) blown up for no good reason.

Gwen

Adman said...

Before seeing the picture, I was sure it was going to be this one:

http://mamastringbean.typepad.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/102106ramadisurgical050_1.jpg

THAT is an incredible picture.

Anonymous said...

The expression on your face spoke volumes to me!

eryn_roston@yahoo.com said...

The picture of Gwen is pretty crazy. But the LAST picture of Sgt. Ryan Baum is simply heart breaking.

...

-E

Adman said...

Ugh, heartbreaking is right.