Night Vision

As I knelt there waiting for Alfa team to signal us forward I broke noise and light discipline to snap this pic of Specialist N____ through my NODs. This was just a brief exercise in tactical squad movement at night with, obviously, the advantage of night optics. The funny thing is that your depth perception is altered when looking through them and even though they reveal small obstacles and movement with great clarity your vision is so tunneled that its more like looking into a crystal ball containing your immediate future.

What I like to do, if there's enough natural light (a clear starry night) is just let my NODs hang from my neck and allow my eyes to adjust to the night. Maybe its because I grew up playing in the woods, getting lost and finding my way back, trying to sneak up on my sisters and their friends as they played in their little scrub oak forts, but I seem to be able to move with far more awareness unencumbered by the device. Now, granted, they are useful when you need to pull security and pay attention to hand and arm signals from leaders and such, but as far as simply moving unnoticed through the forest at night, I'd put my money and my heart on my own two orbs. Plus, its pretty damn comical to watch everybody else staring at their feet and moving as if they were on thin ice in the middle of a lake.