This morning there was an article about how a young man had to adjust to things after he returned from his service in a War Zone. I'll bet this was a pretty common thing for most of us no matter what war we served in. For example:
I had a real problem with all the lights outside at night when I first returned home from Vietnam. There was a light on a pole right outside our trailer in San Diego and it bothered me to no end.
I was uneasy for a long while because I was on alert for people that didn't want to do me any good. Getting shot at does that to you.
After a year of fighting an enemy, it was way too easy to get my juices flowing and to not just walk away from confrontations. There was a lot of us that changed the motto live and let live to live and let die.
I gave up hunting because carrying a gun and searching for prey was just way too much like combat.
I am thankful that I had a wife to come home to and it was reassuring to talk to her alone about where we wanted to go with our lives. I think I lifted and shifted my focus by going back to school and by touching the base of our common goals.
As an officer, I was a lot more likely to be the person giving orders so getting up, going to school and to work was just a part of life and I didn't fight it.
It is strange that being a forward observer, I had a map and always knew where we were and where we were going. I have to fight the urge to tell the wife to get the map out and pay attention to where we are going. I have a feeling that if I go somewhere once I can almost always get back there or home. Living in a State that has most roads going one of the primary directions doesn't hurt. I hate cloudy days where I don't have the sun to orient myself. I love the little compass in the Crown Vic.
I will be the first person to admit that I am not as tolerant of people that say stupid things. Not just wrong things, but things so stupid that I cannot believe they really believe what they said. I can appreciate opposing opinions, but not people that can't appreciate any part of something others say. Stupid shouted at me is just almost more than I can stand. Yes, I do stay away from the Westborough Baptist Church crowd.
For some reason, rules, laws and order seem to be things I like. I would much rather live in a strict society than one without laws or people enforcing those laws.
Being in another country (or many of them) gives me an attitude that things will have to get a lot worse here before we get nearly as bad as some of the places I have lived.
I think that because the Military put us in places with a lot of diverse people, I have a love of meeting new people. I have the feeling that I could talk with a CEO or a common laborer.
It has taken me a lot of years to stop having dreams about combat and now I just have them about the other 30 years in the military.
MUD
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