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Friday, May 15, 2009
Experiences
So I have been wanting to post a new blog for a few days, but have been uncertain as to how to go about it, as every time I proofread it I just exit the window because it seems to be gibberish. Mrs. Stausing once told me that only I shall know the truth of my penning, but when I looked at them they seemed like lies, that I could not put my feelings down on the proverbial piece of paper. I have been having quite a few mixed emotions lately, as milestones come and pass, as memories resurrect themselves then fade away again, to float to the top of my mind yet once again in the future. Some of these memories are pleasing, others not so much. I have been reflecting upon the decisions I have made in life, giving up a full ride scholarship to the University of Oklahoma to take a deployment based upon the fact that I was probably going to fail out the semester, but also based upon a feeling of loyalty, that if I said that I did not want to go (which I had the option to do due to my scholarship) that I would never be able to look myself in the mirror again without feeling disdain, seeing the disgust in my eyes at myself for being, not necessarily afraid, but hesitant to do my duty, my part in this period of history. The experiences that I have had over the past sixteen or so months will be with me for the rest of my life, the good and bad, the memories of life and death, of times of happiness and times of sadness, of the feelings of loneliness and the feeling of being surrounded by those who love you, who would lay down their lives for you. I do not claim to be well acquainted with death, but we are friends of friends, as the names of the fallen continue to get longer, there are a few on that list that I knew. When I am in the airport or at home and in uniform and someone comes up to thank me, I feel embarrassed, as if I do not deserve their thanks, as I have done nothing, that the people they really should be thanking are in a box that once had a flag draped over it. That my sacrifices pale in comparison to theirs. My sacrifices involved parting with my loved ones for a year and a half. Their sacrifices are more permanent, the scars that they left are deep, and can never be healed. I can go home and start my life again, they can't. I do not feel as if there is anything else I can say that would have any impact on this post, so for now I shall leave it at this.
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I have read and re-read this post a dozen times... and there's not anything I can say.
ReplyDeleteWonderfully written... Maybe I'll think of something else to say later. :)
"The ultimate sacrifice," in our vernacular, reflects a noble, voluntary gift of one's life to death for others--a gift which only the Narcissus's among us, without success, attempt to diminish. Others make sacrifices, similarly noble, which do not involve giving up the ghost. Perhaps, if we perceive our dead heros as having achieved rest in the afterlife, we may also see, through the looking glass, some of our living heros and their families walking an even more difficult, equally noble, but oft forgotten path: living for untold decades, incessantly persecuted by the abdominal hauntings of their experiences; missing limbs, and faces; damaged brains, or sanity; life as a quadraplegic from a 7.62 x 39 to the neck? Even Jesus told his followers that they would achieve greater things than he did--perhaps he intended, at least in part, their years of struggle in this life contrasted with the restful peace of his death, and their own. As for you, my friend, you're just as much of a hero to me, for you put on a uniform and offered yourself just as they did, and would have died had it been your lot. Heroic nobility roots itself in the gift as much as in the death, or life, of the giver. You portray sincere humility, so, you do not count yourself a hero, which is as it should be, making you even more heroic. It is my job to call you "hero," which, also, is as it should be. In any event, let us honor the sacrificial dead, without forgetting the sacrificial living.
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