Every day, without exception, I wake up trying to solve problems, trying to understand myself, trying to heal, trying to perceive something new about the world, and to dream something new about how it might be improved, how it might be led in a better direction.
And there is a cost to this: solitude. The one unquestionable benefit of being in an actual military unit is shared difficulty. Your buddies understand you, and you them, at least in important ways. Me, nobody understands me. I am a tribe of one. I walk through the world largely unseen. I do manual labor. I walk in the construction entrance, and use the construction elevator, and spend my days with people who got their GED’s. It’s better this way: I feel less misunderstood with people no one expects to do any hard thinking, than with people who theoretically could, but choose not to; who are encumbered with a variety of emotional issues even they can’t see; who are enmeshed in a political field which requires constant maintenance and tinkering.
Somewhere, though, there is a tribe of people who will get me. It may not be in this world, but we aren’t here so very long after all. I’m not feeling melancholy. It is, I think, a good thing I am allowing myself this line of thought, though. I have been alone so long I forget there are alternatives, and it’s always good to remember alternatives: it is a part of perception.
I was told many years ago by a hot Austrian “don’t think so much”. In this country especially, people who think too much are not held in much esteem, and as a general rule, those who do identify as “intellectuals” are leftists. There are not a lot of conservative intellectuals. But that may change.
At the end of the day, I am what I am. I am not going to change to suit the winds. I am not going to change to make things easier. I am going to continue to do what I perceive as my job, until time takes this job away from me and assigns it to someone else.