Born on the Fourth of July

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In the military, it’s all about hurry up and wait.

For Richard Pasquini and his family, as of today, the wait is finally over.

The 27-year-old is scheduled to return from Afghanistan where he’s been working for more than six months as a technical sergeant on the Air Force’s Critical Care Air Transport team as a respiratory therapist.

Outside the house he grew up in at 10th and Jackson streets, red, white and blue decorations are already waiting to welcome him home. He’s just in time for Independence Day and, hopefully, with a little change in color scheme, the birth of his daughter, Aliya Nina Pasquini.

Earlier this week, the women in Richard Pasquini’s life — wife Heather, mother Lisa Godfrey, grandmother Chickie DiMartino and sister Nina Pasquini — recollected what life has been like in the 189 days since they’d last seen him.

"It just felt like it was going to be forever," his wife of six years, who is due to deliver their second child tomorrow, said.

The couple found out in November, shortly after Pasquini was given a deployment date, she was pregnant. Although they’ve been through it before — their son, Giovanni, is 4 — there were still plenty of hard times in facing much of those nine months alone.

"When I crunched the numbers, I panicked when I realized how close I would be cutting [my return] to her due date," Pasquini said via e-mail from Afghanistan. "Unfortunately, by that time, there was no going back. It was terrible being away from her. We had some tough days while I was gone, but so far everything has worked out OK. I wished so many times that I could have just held her on some of the bad days, but all we had were phone calls."

Now, the days of e-communication are behind Pasquini and his loved ones.

"I have been getting more and more excited because I know that in a few more days I will be home again," he said via e-mail. "I just can’t wait to see my wife and son again."

Those stateside share the anticipation and are excited about the unique timing.

"It’s a weird coincidence, but I think everything has a way of working out," Pasquini’s sister said of the hat trick of her brother’s homecoming, niece’s arrival and America’s birthday. "It’s kind of nice the way Richie served our country and now he’s going to have a baby born on the Fourth."

If the women’s beaming wasn’t obvious enough, the resounding "Yes!" when asked if they are excited for his arrival was a sure sign he’s been missed.

"We are anxiously and happily awaiting his return," his father, Joseph, said on behalf of himself and wife, Carm. "He has made his whole family proud and is a shining example of what the word ‘hero’ truly means to us. But to him, he is just doing his job."

Pasquini is no stranger to trauma. He’s worked at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) for five years as a respiratory therapist and started studying at Temple University to become a doctor before his deployment. At CHOP — where he’ll likely return — just as now, he was onboard aircrafts with victims, working to stabilize their breathing and respiratory systems.

In Afghanistan, though, the conditions can be much more grave.

"Here, it’s a completely different population," he said in a phone interview from Afghanistan Monday. "I’ll see guys whose limbs were lost in an explosion or a patient with 70 percent of their body burned. This gets old. You get tired of seeing people your age fight the same fight and end up like this."

Similarly hard, the family said, was hearing about the situation in Afghanistan and Pasquini’s daily routine.

"The stuff that he’s seen he’ll never erase from his mind, that’s hard," DiMartino said.

Pasquini’s group transported those in medical need from small bases around the country to their base in Bagram, Afghanistan, or to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. Patients could be soldiers from any branch of the military or country, even Afghan soldiers.

"Last month was the first [time] that he cried when this guy got killed and he was the same age [as Pasquini]," his wife, 28, said. "When he started crying, I started crying because he’s never been like that since he’s been there. He just gets to the point where …"

"He’s seen too much," DiMartino finished.

So it has been since the beginning of civilization.

Patrick Devine, 44, president of the Veterans of Modern Warfare, a nonprofit that provides social and health services to its members, said although the types of warfare used have changed, there will always be risk.

"The levels of danger can’t even be compared because they’re so different," the resident of the 800 block of Kimball Street, who served in the Army in the Gulf War as well as Iraq and Afghanistan in the 1990s, said. "Some people would say low-intensity conflict [such as in Afghanistan] is more dangerous because you don’t know where or who your enemies are, but both are dangerous."

In wars of the past, just as now, Godfrey said, it’s important to show gratitude so the troops can keep going.

"When they hear negative things it really knocks their morale down. It’s really important for them to know that the people back here are supporting them," Pasquini’s mother said. "Even if you don’t agree with the war, these men and women are out there and they’re putting their lives on the line and they need to have the support of the public here."

Still, Pasquini looks at his time in Afghanistan — where he’s serving as an Air Force reservist — and his job at CHOP with the same attitude.

"I don’t know what God intended me to do on this earth. If my skills as a respiratory therapist help fellow troops, it’s worth it," he said. "I just feel like it’s my part."

According to those who know him best, that selfless attitude has always been a part of him.

"The night before he left … I said to him, ‘Are you afraid to go?’ And he said to me, ‘I’m not afraid to be there, I’m afraid that I won’t be able to do my job well enough and I won’t be able to save lives,’" Pasquini’s sister said. "And that, to me, just says the type of person that he is."

Even the list of things he requested while gone was modest. His wife sent over items like coffee, Gatorade, books and soap. The two communicated by phone at least twice a week and many e-mails were exchanged.

"For me, the separation was hard, I was lonely pretty often at first, but I managed to get myself into a routine of going to the gym six days per week and getting involved in weekly poker tournaments on the compound. I tried to keep my mind busy as much as possible when we weren’t flying," Pasquini said in the e-mail.

His wife — whom he met when they were both working on Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland in 2002 — has been trying to do the same. She was a nurse at Kendrick Hospital in the Northeast, where the couple and their son make their home, up until June 14. Now, she’s been spending a lot of time at her mother-in-law’s house, keeping her fingers crossed their daughter doesn’t come before tomorrow.

"I’m really not," she said of being nervous, "I just keep telling him she’ll wait."

Upon his return today from his first foreign deployment, Pasquini said getting sushi is high on his list. His family noted he’s missed his grandmother’s eggplant Parmesan, chicken cutlets and crabs.

Coming home with him, too, will be a new outlook.

"In South Philly, you can walk down the street and pass three or four stores with anything you could want to eat or drink. You don’t have to walk a couple hundred yards to the bathroom and shower," he said via phone. "It’s the little things in life you take for granted. But on the bigger side, being away from my wife and son for six months has been difficult.

"I can’t wait to be at home and just spend time with them, even if it’s just laying around on the couch."

Contact Staff Writer Caitlin Meals at cmeals@southphillyreview.com or ext. 117.