Word: schermerhorns
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...more durable. The news of Saddam's capture on this day is a jolt of euphoria for the Tomb Raiders, but it does little to alter their cool assessment of the perils ahead. "This country is still up for grabs, as far as these people are concerned," says Schermerhorn. "It's still going to be crazy around here...
...from disparate backgrounds, the platoon's members provide a portrait of the military's diversity as well as insight into the motivations--and fears--of America's fighting forces. Its soldiers include Sergeant Marquette Whiteside, 24, an African-American gunner who pines for his 6year-old daughter; Specialist Sky Schermerhorn, 29, an idealist now gnawed by doubt about what he is fighting for; and Buxton, 32, a brainy Gulf War I veteran who since being deployed has taught himself Arabic and missed the birth of a son. Specialist Bernard Talimeliyor, 24, a native of the U.S. protectorate of Yap, Micronesia...
...toilet is driving Sky Schermerhorn crazy. It's bad enough that the bathroom at the base is shared by 10 G.I.s with varying standards of hygiene plus half a dozen Iraqis assigned to train with the platoon. What gets Schermerhorn is that no one else seems to mind that every 15 minutes the toilet stops up or floods, and when it does, no one else tends to it. Schermerhorn is the platoon's most garrulous soldier, a pudgy specialist with downcast eyes who joined the Army at 27 out of a desire to "protect freedom and democracy." Inside...
...Schermerhorn speaks, Kamont and Winston recline on the secondhand couches that adorn the platoon's common area. They stare at a television hooked up to a portable DVD player that serves up a steady stream of war movies, sci fi, horror and porn. In front of the TV is a coffee table littered with picked-over ready-to-eat meals, Tootsie Rolls and water bottles filled with tobacco juice. Heat comes from three portable radiators. The platoon's house--the hooch, as the G.I.s call it--lies within the perimeter of the Azimiya palace compound, built by Saddam...
After inspecting the bathroom, Schermerhorn writes his name on a tile wall in the common area that serves as a reservation sheet for the platoon's single Internet terminal. Most members of the platoon communicate daily with family members through email. The soldiers recently bought a webcam and connected it to the house laptop. The Tomb Raiders' hooch can be eerily antisocial, largely because today's G.I. can spend so much time in front of TV and computer screens. Schermerhorn spends the next hour instant messaging his girlfriend of three months, Nicole, a German he met while based in Giessen...