It gets into your blood, it becomes your essence.
Sgt Allen of Contact Right...Taking Fire a combat wounded vet tells his story and lets us know what it means to him
"A story: A man fires a rifle for many years; And he goes to war. And afterward he turns the rifle in at the armory; And he believes he's finished with the rifle. But no matter what else he might do with his hands, love a woman, build a house, change his son's diaper; His hands still remember the rifle."
I remember being in college, working in the library, reading that quote. I remember looking down at my feet half expecting to see the same boots that I wore to in 1999. I remember how difficult the transition had been for me to come home again, to go back to college, to sit in a classroom for four hours without moving, to work a normal job. I remember making checklists for the day, minute details that were no longer essential where documented. That way of life had woven its way in. I was a eighteen.
Now I am twenty-five. I have been there, and I have done that. I hold my head high. I have done my job, and I have done the job so someone else would not have to. I have taken the hits so someone else's son or daughter will never have to. I look at pictures of myself and I try to think about what was on my mind then. Did I know this would all happen? What could I have done to change the outcome? What thing could I have done at that very moment to have done more? Doesn't matter. Better luck next time. Bring it around and try again. Every lesson, good or bad, weaving its way into my character. Guided by my father's sage advice that, "if you aren't doing
something wrong, then you aren't anything." Moving forward in life, refusing to acknowledge what others say can't be done, doing what scares me most, and leaving the impossible behind me. That is me. That is what war has woven into me. Courage is being scared but doing it anyway. And I'll be damned if I ever run. After all you only die once. Read the rest...
To this day, I can look at a person on the street and tell right away, they were a soldier, a brother from a forgotten time, a fellow sheepdog as Bill Whittle would call them and yet it isn't a forgotten time it is who we are. We carry ourselves differently than others because we know that while others debated and lived off the fat of the country, we gave them the peace that made it all possible.
It isn’t some egotistical thing, that we are big brutes looking for a fight or some cocky feeling that we can take you in a fight, although we probably could. It’s something different it is some deeper part of your soul that comes to life when you know your days are literally numbered. There is no tomorrow, only today, there is no future only the mission; the mission to make one’s country the safest possible.
In a few short hours it will be the one year anniversary of Sgt Mike Stokely’s death. He was a fellow soldier, a sheepdog, a man that served while others debated. Do you remember the rifle, are you a sheepdog if so, one day I’m sure I’ll pass you on the street, and we will both know at that moment that we are looking at a fellow brother, and we will both know what it means to remember the rifle, that we did our duty and we did it right, and we should never be ashamed of being who we are for we make it possible for America to survive.
No comments:
Post a Comment