I sit here, my mind thumping, the room spinning, and all of the lights way to bright. I wish I were older, more willing to understand what was going on around me. More capable of doing so. I haven't quite grown up all the way and for the first time in my life, feel upset about it. The ideas in my head are not revolutionary but once were. My stomach churns over and over and I get more disgusted, more sickened by the minute. My mind tries it's best to rap it's fingers around the feeble truths that I have known, and they slip away.
This week, the Army pushed me to my limits. It's done it before and I'm quite surprised at my ability to overcome each of it's tests. I'm sometimes too smart for my own good. What I think about on a day to day only infuriates my soul, and makes me question what I stand for, and if I truly stand for it. Or if I'm like every other American who only believes in noble causes, yet doesn't choose to be noble about them.
I was bright eyed and bushy-tailed at this start of this, and am now soured, used up and sick of everything. There isn't too many reasons that I should stay, other than the obvious legal implications constricting me to the very freedoms that I serve to protect. I wish I could believe that facade as much as I used to, or as much as you the general public do now. Thanking this soldier for this, and that soldier for that. The saddest part is how genuine it is, how legitimate the expressions on your face are, how humbling your handshakes can be. It breaks my heart, makes me break down and cry at night. Threatens my very soul. I search terribly hard for a reason to stay, to not be sipping on Pina Colada's in Costa Rica. It wasn't apparent to me until today.
The words were so powerful that I felt my heart beating. Not just in my chest, but in every singular portion of my body. You probably would feel the same way too, but not have all the reference for it. The words were so powerful that I can't even remember how they came out, or in what order they were delivered. All I know is what they meant. "... in my 13 years I've only been thanked once. After taking a guy over there three times, his mother tells me: I knew he would be safe, I knew he was with you and he would come home safe- thank you. And to me, that's what it's all about. That's enough..." how remarkably compelling a statement.
The conversation went on and I realized a few things during it. I don't know if I'll ever be the person to create revolutionary ideas, or even have the depth of thought to be deep enough to really effect or touch people. But I think I have the courage, the audacity to display the message of those that do. To help others to see points to be made, things to feel. I have the power, the ability to tell the story, the American story. In the hopes, the desires to bring us out of our slumps, to return a sense of respect for one another, to help us all understand that until we can feel for one another, until we can love one another, we will only continue down the path of our own destruction. This crusty old veteran shouldn't be here. He should be in the sticks of Louisiana raising his family and being the dad the Army will never let him be. Maybe it's his age, his experience that allows him to see so much, to know so much, to be so much. Rare is it to find, and he only helped strengthen the point in my head, good quality people in the Army anymore. It's turned into such a bullshit political high school prom show that it on a day to day not only makes me sick to my stomach, but embarrasses the hell out of me.
The Constitution of these United States is collecting dust, and either needs to be restored through the people of this democracy, or see a new one written, and to abide by. Our founding fathers, they were not the politicians you see of today. They were men of action, men of courage. Men of honor. The conversation goes deeper and deeper, and my curiosity of why we are here fires questions like smoke out of a freshly started car on a winters day. The information he tells me is that which I'm most fond of hearing about: history. I find history extremely capturing of my own spirit, especially that of our fore-fathers. Those who chose to make the hardest decisions in order to achieve something only dreamt about.
I try and rap my head around what I need to say. The task is daunting, it always will be though, and I have to take the consideration of my own trepidations in moving forward. Of course there will be sacrifice of my time, something that I already give enough of. This time though, it will be for a cause, for an education of both myself and of others. My book sits, it's pages empty, begging me, pleading for me to write upon them. I think of all I need to say, want to say, want to write and it's all clear and concise in the head, and spits through in a flash, but complete. I sit at the computer, and it's too fast in my head, I can't slow it down, can't figure out what to say, how to say it. How to convey enough power, enough sentiment through the words. I think of action instead of words and the idea of revolution or at least renovation consumes me. I think about making brass knuckles with the word freedom written across them and making my mark on the Biebers of the world, want to make them understand what is at stake. Liberty! Liberty! Liberty! We have it, and we are willing to give it up, surrender it. We no longer wish to do what is right, do what we must to preserve our way of life. The saddest part is that our way of life is what's destroying it. We don't realize that people just won't like us, that people won't give us the respect that we all too often give them.
I stop my rant as mid sentence as I can. Focus. Our fore-fathers, the one's who made true sacrifices, our presidents, our public servants of yesteryear; they did things for the good of people. Not for themselves. But for the mothers of those kids who made it home safe. They didn't do it for the pay, for the greed, for the fame. When was the last great president? When was the last great congressman or senator? Probably before America got a taste of money, of capitalism, of socialism. I do a job, a public service, in which I pay myself for (yes, I paid myself one month worth of salary in Federal taxes), and I make just above poverty line worth of money. I never did this for me. I never offered my life up for you, for the defense of this nation for anyone person. I did it for this country, for everyone, for life, liberty and happiness. Sure that's cliche, but fuck you for thinking so! That's what separates us from other countries. Just as for the past 200 plus years, the willingness to sacrifice plenty for it has preserved it, as well as set us apart from any other nation. We don't have public servants at the top of this nation. Far from it. We no longer have the correct understanding of war. We no longer want to do what is necessary to preserve what we have, and essentially, due to our greed, our compassion to make up for every mistake, our need to bridge the gap between majority and minority, we will lose it all.
I think to the American citizen who has no care, no true concern to become a part of what America was founded upon: a country for the people, by the people. We sit back and are getting taken advantage of. Lied to non-stop by greedy politicians who have found an opportune time to make a profit, to gain in the now and squander the future. Not just the future of us, but the future of our kids, and our kids kids. They will never understand the freedoms that we possessed, because they will not have the opportunity to. We will have squandered, will have surrendered it by then. We live for today, and have plundered our futures with the impulse that brings convenience to ourselves and daily life. WE (meaning not the 1% of those who serve the public or the 30% who vote) must take that personal responsibility back, that personal charge to preserve our democracy, our liberty, our freedom!
Ike was right, it starts with the military, but can also end with the military. Think about how much power the military has in shaping our country. The media doesn't help the situation, not showing your sons and husbands dying. They don't bring to light how terrible a war is, and how swiftly we must end them. General MacArthur said it best: "War's very object is victory, not prolonged indecision. In war there is no substitute for victory." MacArthur said it, and Eisenhower warned us. We have become a nation uninformed, unaccountable for our own government, for our own military. We sit there, and watch our soap operas and jersey shore while the greedy politicians who have hidden so well in their sheep skins have blind folded us, used the blood of your loved ones, your brothers, your sons & daughters, husbands and wives, to make money in the here and now. Warmongers, not for democracy, not for a noble cause or to bring justice or even vengeance upon enemies of our sovereign state, but for money, and personal and political gain. Yes we, need a military, yes we need them to be powerful. We need them to be swift with victory, in order to scare our enemies into never attacking, and always fearing their immediate destruction with their unwarranted provocation.
The questions we need to start asking ourselves, to realize ourselves, is if the greater threat to our country is the foreign one, or the domestic one? Do we need to revolutionize our government? Do we need to take back the power that we have so easily and blindly given up? I don't know where this country will end up. I don't know if keeping within the ideas of our forefathers is the best thing for it, or an entire overhaul of our nation is best. I know few things, but I do know this: We must care. We must stand for something. And most importantly we must be willing to fall for it.
I need to get this right. If there's one thing that I should do right in my life, it's this. Convey this to you, spark the patriotism that we've lost. Recapture the essence of America. Help to reveal the corruptness, the disrepair of our military, of our government. Open eyes of those who care to do nothing to protect the freedoms they have. Be the sheep dog I have to be. The sheep dog you need.
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