Random Lines A World Away

   Let me preempt this blog by saying, I hate forcing things.  If I don’t feel like writing about something I won’t write about it.  Forced writing is a disservice to the writer and the reader, in that it creates a precarious situation.  The writer puts forth a message in which he may or may not be whole-heartedly into, while the reader is subject to this unmotivated passage.  That said, tonight I had some strong words come to mind after talking to a friend in my unit.  I had a rough day and nothing seemed to be going right, due to a few decisions made by people I refuse to throw under the bus.  My attitude was descending steadily as the day got worse and worse.  By the time my mission for the day was came to a close, I was straight up brooding.  Descending into the sewers of self-pity, is a journey I make every once in awhile. 

   One of the guys from my squad walked past and asked me what was wrong.  I guess he was used to the ”usual” Kolczak, trying to improve everyone else’s mood in rock opera fashion (the guys like when I unashamedly whip out some Queen).  I spilled my guts and gave him a rundown on the events that had taken place that day.  After ranting and raving for a good ten minutes I stopped for a breath.  He smiled at me, winked, and said, simply, ”Everything is temporary.”  The statement was so profound that, for an instant, I didn’t recognize the beauty of what he had said.  But, when I walked away from the conversation, I realized the wonderful simplistic truth of the statement.  You see, I have already been through a lot to even get to this point.  Temperatures in the hundreds at a little hell-hole some call Camp Swift, countless hours of mind-numbing power points in over-crowded class rooms, training that didn’t even make it into my present mission, a twenty hour plane ride that for all I knew would bring me into close brushes with death, and the pains of being away from all of my favorite things in life.  But all of these pains have come and gone.  Now I sit here on the other side of the world having made it through all of the trials and tribulations.  I don’t know what the future holds, but I do know without these temporary pains I wouldn’t be as strong as I am today.  Life’s path doesn’t always take us through a merrygold-studded wonderland.  Sometimes we crawl on our hands and knees through broken glass just to realize God’s plan.  There are many times when we wish for a “fast forward my life,” remote.  But, what we don’t realize is how much we are growing in the tough moments.  The good experiences in life are what make memories, but how we handle the bad experiences is what makes us who we are.  While I was busy digging a ditch of self-pity, I was too busy to realize the obstacles I had already cleared were much greater than the present issue.  To end, I’d like to leave with a quote from Booker T. Washington.  Mr. Washington poignantly stated, “Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome.”