They say that a way you can tell that you're growing is that you think about the same things but you think about them in a dramatically different way. Let me be clear from the outset-- I have never been a fighter. I don't believe that war should be a legitimate answer or even a method to settle differences in a civilized world. However, I do understand how it has a place in the society that we live in today because, well, quite frankly, we don't live in a fully civilized society yet (despite what we might think).
Being an election year and everyone up in arms and taking sides, it's easy to get swept up in the madness I think, and easier still to take a stand on polarizing issues such as defense spending, the war in the middle east and the troop withdrawal strategy. The truth is though that behind all of these intangible concepts and political grandstanding, there's real people, and these real people are often forgotten. I don't believe in war, but I believe in the great people that fight them, and recently, I was reminded that real people-- sons, boyfriends, brothers, daughters, mothers, wives and husbands--are the people that are really out there. Whatever their reason for joining, you have to say thanks to them because they are doing something that they genuinely believe is for the better of our society, and at great expense to themselves.
It was a Thursday-- I was flying home from Atlanta, and was seated next to a young man I'll call Chris for the purposes of this story. He was about the same age as me, tall and crazy amounts of excited to go home. In the 2 hour flight between Atlanta and Chicago, we talked about a lot of things from the very superficial (weather, airplanes) to the very deep. I was surprised about the commonalities that we had.
He didn't believe that killing people was the answer, and he definitely wasn't a gun-toting fanatic. He was coming home from basic training for the national guard, and he wanted to use the military as a tool to get a good education, get a good job and provide a good home for him and his girlfriend (soon-to-be-fiancee) and settle down somewhere in the midwest. He and I both liked the outdoors. As a veteran outdoorsy guy (hiking, horse-riding, ranch hand guy) he was excited to hear my excitedly talking about my re-introduction to the outdoors through backpacking. I listened as he described how, as a terminally bored student, he finally found something that he liked to learn about. We talked about how we liked to work in team environments. We talked about families and we talked about our plans for the future. I tried to explain what a consultant was/did, and he explained what a HALO operative was/did (High Altitude Low Oxygen infiltration technique). He told me how he thought about his family every day, and he was scared his little brothers wouldn't remember him after being gone so long. I assured him they remembered him for the little things-- how he ate his cereal or his favorite TV show. I told him about how I was nervous about starting a new business-school-filled phase of my life, and he assured me that new things "will never stop comin'-- but you'll know what you're doing is right if it feels like you're comin' home".
I'm grateful to have met him because in a world where I often don't have direct human connection (computer, cellphone, teleconference), he reminded me of the joy and the happiness that comes from the appreciation of little things. He explained to me that these are the things that he joined the military for. He gave me back some perspective that I think I had lost sight of because I have been so self-absorbed in all the things in my life recently. So, to all the men and women out there-- thanks for being soldiers, but more importantly, thanks for giving up so much for the little things.
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