Where Shall We Go

As  a young boy I was called by the forest. The trees bowed in the winds, the streams babbled and spoke, I never felt alone. I would have my adventures with friends, imagining myself on historic battlefields fighting for something I knew, but probably didn't fully understand as a 10-11 year old. Nonetheless I knew that I wanted to, I needed to, and one day I would go.

By 24 years of age I was doing what I had dreamed of as a boy. My first battlefield was Kabul, Afghanistan, little did we know of its significance. After a month of sporadic and random rocket attacks the city was being overrun. The Embassy I was defending did not last long, we evacuated towards the airport, HKIA. There we held out for a week, before having to leave Afghanistan behind. After our exit people were often shocked when they learned I had gone there, but they did not know of the same place I did. To me Afghanistan was chaotically beautiful, a cruel and hectic nature embodied by its landscape. Its large, jagged mountains shared by both brown dirt and green trees surrounded us like a bowl. The natural landscape, contradicted by a modern capital city, gave it a unique ambiance. The natural landscape appeared to be a view into our humble beginnings, while beside it lay our modern present. While it was hard to understand at times, I knew that we had to go. 

    Not yet 25 I had left Afghanistan and gone to Iraq, I volunteered to go. There too we faced a war, a different kind. Yet again, surrounded by beautiful landscapes and huge skies, the biggest I have ever seen. There we watched another beautiful landscape at war with its inhabitants and their modern advances. After several months we were sent to go home, back to the States. 

    A humble return, I was greeted by family and friends. All of them were shocked that I had gone to such a wild land, and returned. I was glad to have gone, happy indeed, proud forever. I would go again, in an instant if I could. Although, now there is no choice, no mission to accomplish, there is no war to fight. Without this, where shall we soldiers go?

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