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OGDEN -- Most people would find a 12-hour workday with no weekends off tedious, but Command Sgt. Major Chris Beyer says it's all about attitude.
"You get to choose that every day," he said Friday in a telephone interview from the U.S. Army's base in Camp Taji, a former Iraqi base and airfield, 27 miles north of central Baghdad.
"You can look at that as having a negative side or a positive," he said. "Every day I choose to have a good attitude about my situation. Regardless of what my situation is, or where I'm at, and I talk to my soldiers about that.
"It's the only thing we get to choose every day, and as long as you maintain a positive attitude, you tend not to focus on where you're at."
Beyer, 42, lives in Hooper with his wife and two teenage sons. In civilian life he's a franchise sales manager for 7-Eleven in Utah, Arizona and Las Vegas, a job he's held for 24 years.
He is "an Air Force brat" who moved to Utah as a child and stayed. He joined the reserves when he was 17 because "I've just always felt it was part of my duty to serve the country." He rose in the ranks to the highest ranking noncommissioned officer, the only E-9 in the whole battalion.
He has been serving with the 96th Special Troops Battalion in Iraq for several months (he is not allowed to say precisely how long) on his first combat tour after almost 26 years in the U.S. Army Reserve.
"We provide life support for our brigade and we have two additional companies on the postal side and the human resource side that work for us," he said.
"Days are exciting. I am privileged to work with an exciting group of individuals. We work seven days a week. Typical days are anywhere from 12 to 15 hours a day."
His days are "somewhat mixed," he said, starting at 5:30 a.m. with physical training, into the office by 7 a.m., and work until 7 p.m., or longer. His time is divided among doing office work and visiting troops in the Baghdad area, doing evaluations, promotions and handling disciplinary actions.
It is an exciting time to be serving in Iraq, he said. Historic changes are going on. The U.S. military is reducing its role and the Iraqi government is taking over.
While he is never able to get out into Baghdad and meet with the civilian population, "I do have the privilege of working on the other side of the base with my troop counterparts with the Iraq army," he said.
"It's awesome. It's a great experience to see nothing but positive from it. They're very optimistic and appear to be very appreciative of what we are offering."
He, and other soldiers, did hear about the shootings at Fort Hood, Texas, on Thursday, but beyond what anyone else listening to the news knows he said he couldn't comment on that. "My thoughts and prayers go out to the family of the 13 that were killed and the other 30 that were wounded," he said.
There are several reasons he can't get outside the military base system in Iraq, he said.
The streets of Baghdad are still dangerous and none of the troops he works with are there anyway. Plus it is just faster to travel around for his work by helicopter.
Even though he's 7,200 miles away, he is able to talk to his wife, Melissa, and his two sons on a daily basis.
"Technology has definitely allowed us to stay closer with our loved ones back home," he said. "We have soldiers that do the Skype (a free Internet telephone service) and just having phones easily accessible has made it easier to stay in touch with loved ones back home."
That can be a two-sided blessing, though. If his wife back home gets used to a call every day and suddenly he can't call, does she worry?
"I've got a pretty good understanding if I'm not able to call every day, we make it through," he said.
Still, he knows his wife has the tough job. "She is definitely the commander in chief of the household," he said. "Without her, I wouldn't be able to do what I do."
His job gives him an opportunity to see troop morale firsthand.
With U.S. forces pulling out of direct involvement in Iraq, he said, "it's exciting times. Troops are making history here as we're turning things over to the Iraqi government. We're proud to be part of this history that we're writing, that every day we're seeing."
