I recently caught up with a girl I used to hang out with around a decade ago. One of the nicest things about my relationship with this girl was the fact that she was a single mother of two lovely kids who despite the mother’s bitterness to the world (she had been going through a tough battle with her ex-husband for child support) were somehow loving and innocent. I was particularly fond of her younger boy and one of the saddest things about not having this girl in my life was not having the boy around.
Although the
mother and I didn’t exactly have the easiest of relationships, I kept my heart
open to her because I figured that anyone who managed to produce nice kids had
to have something going for her. So, when we managed to bump into each other in
cyberspace, a virtual meeting ended up becoming a real meeting. It goes to say
that I did ask about her boy and then she said that he had gotten out of
national service. At that point, things turned a little awkward because I think
my disappointment must have showed.
I mean, I wasn’t
a fan of national service. I guess you could say that had I not had to spend
two and a half years in the army, I would not have. However, when I look back
at the time, I spent int the army, I would argue that it was probably one of my
most important formative experiences. School and University in England were fun
and very special experiences which I got back in touch with in my most recent
trip to the UK.
The army, was,
however, the most important formative experience in that it was the first time
I really met people who were different from me. It was the place where I had to
learn that life wasn’t so much about what you know but about how you use it and
the reality of life is that its not who or what you know but how you use it.
By far and away
the most important thing that I got out of the army were some of the best
friends that I could ever had. These are the guys who were there for me in some
pretty messed up times and because of that, we became what William Shakespeare’s
Henry V calls the “Band of Brothers.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-yZNMWFqvM
It’s hard to explain
the bonds of friendship to anyone who hasn’t had the experience that the
military provides. Its like this, you know who your true friends are when the
chips are down and unlike say, colleagues that you share an office space, the
friendship and bond is not based on self-interest rather than on what’s in it
for me.
The concept of “we
few; we happy few” wasn’t just a concept for Shakespeare. The concept exist in
a universal time line was shown in the 1994 movie Renaissance Man.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzIyExlEcyk
Being part of a band of brothers is something that stays with you. It’s a form of protection to have people who will look out for you when things are down. It’s also a form of growth when you have people who want you to succeed.
Its like this,
when I heard that the boy didn’t go through the army, I felt sad for him. Sure,
he’s not going to go through some of the awful things I went through in those
two and a half years but he’s not going to have those two years to develop the
type of friendships that I managed to. These were the friendships that made my
life so much richer.
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