Sisters woman awaits "orders" to help

(Clockwise from bottom): Jonathan Ayar, Charles Trego, Ryan Trego, Krystal Ayar, Jesse Ayar, Judy Trego. Photo provided Cordless phone poised in midair, Judy Trego answers the door with, "Excuse me, we have war things going on."

It was not a flash of breaking news from the war front in Iraq -- but it was a huge flash of news for the Trego family.

Daughter Krystal Ayar, an E-4 Administrative Specialist in the 98th Area Support Group in Wuerzburg, Germany, was calling home; she was calling her mother.

Judy paced the floor and words drifted over in fragments: passports, flights, base shutdowns, Turkey. Judy's manner registered concern and at times even fear.

Krystal was explaining that Judy needed to come to Germany. Her two-year-old grandson Jonathan was caught in the center of strategic military commands. Specialist Ayar was likely to be leaving for Turkey; Wuerzburg would close down -- nowhere to run with a baby.

Ayar and her son were living just outside the base gates where terrorist threats to blowup housing were very real, very close. Now with each urgent call, the war was invading the Trego home in Sisters. No longer was it continents away, a world gone mad but confined to the evening news and remote-controlled.

As so often happens, the immediate status of military planning can flip in a heartbeat. After days of waiting for the go signal and making careful provisions for her family at both ends of the globe, Trego's daughter's orders were called off. For now.

"It's the insidious uncertainty," she said.

"The military gets 72 hours notice. I have 48. My bags are packed. I am on constant alert. Things can change in a minute."

This is no small juggling act for the Community Action Team of Sisters (CATS) Program Manager and Sisters City Councilor. Some days it is a matter of going through the motions.

"It's the mother thing, too," she said. "I want to fly over and grab them, both of them, and get them out of there. And I'm powerless to fix it."

Ayar's husband, Jesse, is in the army also, stationed four hours from her and son Jonathan. He is serving as a military policeman.

The Tregos' 18-year-old son, Ryan, is leaving next month for firefighter training.

Trego tried to look at the situation philosophically.

"There are bullies everywhere," she mused.

"But as long as there is a bully on the block, we need to stand together, even if it means sacrificing our feelings so that people who are oppressed have an opportunity to taste freedom.

This is all close to home," she said.