Totality

"I am the Lord's poor servant; to Him alone, the living God, I have offered all in sacrifice; I have

St. Lucy, after her eyes got gouged out during her martyrdom.

nothing else to give; I offer Him myself." Antiphon for the Canticle of Zechariah from the Divine Office for the feast of St. Lucy.

This morning during my Holy Hour the antiphon above really stuck in my mind. It is fitting for Saint Lucy, since she is both virgin and martyr. She truly did give everything to God, both during her life and at the end of her life. By including this antiphon in Morning Prayer, the Church obviously means me to pray it, but the truth is I cannot honestly apply it to myself. In truth, I doubt anyone ever could strictly apply it to themselves, except for Jesus and the Blessed Mother. No one else can claim truly to have given everything to God. Even the greatest saints have held something back at one time or another. All are conscious of their sinfulness.

If this is true even of the greatest saints, how much more so of myself? I cannot even give him a full hour totally. Even thinking about this during my Holy Hour I noted the trend I have to be extremely distracted for about the first 50 minutes. It is generally only the last ten minutes or so that I really feel like I engage in on any affective level. The first 45-50 minutes are just me trying not to be distracted as I work through the Liturgy of the Hours. I cannot even claim ever to have given Him an undivided hour. Can I really claim to have "offered all in sacrifice?"

In thinking about this another similar experience came to mind. I have been doing a lot of kickboxing lately, working the heavy bag a couple of hours every week. I am right handed but I box left handed because I got into that habit when I first started out. My left hand would not learn to jab very well, so I just jabbed with my right and used my left for power punches. I also liked having that surprise power shot with the right, and I liked messing with right handed sparring partners who aren't used to fighting a southpaw.

In my sessions on the heavy bag I have been having trouble getting my left cross up to scratch. It doesn't have the speed or power that I want at first, it is slow and stiff. It takes about four or five rounds on the bag to get it snapping the way I want it to, and only then does the real practice begin.

I sometimes wonder if my distracted prayer isn't a bit like that. I only really get into the last bit because it takes me the first 45 minutes just to get warmed up. With the boxing the cause is fairly straightforward. A punch flies properly when it is loose. It starts from the feet, legs and hips and translates out from there to the end of the fist, but in order to do that the power must be generated in the large muscles of the lower body and transferred smoothly through the muscles and joints of the lower body. It isn't hard to teach those muscles all to fire. That takes about five minutes to learn. What takes much longer, years and years in fact, is teaching the other muscles not to fire. When I throw that punch, my body wants to tense up and push harder, thinking that will make my strike more powerful; but that simply does not work. Instead, muscles end up fighting each other, competing instead of cooperating. Instead of transferring smoothly back and forth between different groups at different points in the movement, all groups want to be controlling all parts of the punch. I have the strength. I can deadlift 400Lbs quite easily and do multiple sets with it. That is more than enough power to hit as hard as I want, if only I would stop getting in my own way.

This, ironically, is why small, lean fighters often hit with more force than large, muscular ones. They have less muscle to get tangled up with itself, and it is easier to train them to work in cooperation. This is the secret behind Bruce Lee's incredible"one-inch" punch that was reported to be able to knock a sumo-wrestler off his feet (note the guy in the picture is not a sumo-wrestler.)

To apply this to my prayer life, what the antiphon is talking about is a similar kind of totality, where every single part of me, body, mind, emotions, will are all engaged in just one thing. As with boxing, I am beginning to think that perhaps it is less a matter of training myself to do and more a matter of learning not to interfere. The simple decision of the will is there. I get up in the morning. I go to the chapel. I kneel down. I make the decision to pray, which is a response to the call of God to pray. That call is the power. That generates all the power needed to crash through any barrier or overcome any enemy, if only I wouldn't get in the way. But my mind refuses to be still. It wants to think, because when you are a mind that is all you know how to do. My body wants to move, because that is what a body does. My emotions want to feel things, because that is their only experience of life. My will wants to choose things, without knowing that all that is required is not to un-choose.

The truth is that the prayer is not any of these things. All of these things may enter into the prayer at any point, for a specific purpose and then they must be prepared to give their all in that moment, but they are not the prayer. The prayer is that single, downward rushing desire of God to come to me and dwell in me and make His home with me.

The rest is just me learning not to get in the way.

Getting Old

When I am deployed I always have time to work out. Whereas in the states I always have more important things to do, and physical fitness is relegated to whenever I can make the time, on deployment there are long periods of time where there is literally nothing to do except work out. Then of course there are the deployments where there is no time at all, but that is a different story.

So thursday morning I did a solid sprint workout, trying to get my run time back down to the sub 6:30 mile range. I was feeling pretty good, but I had deadlifted the night before. Not necessarily the wisest thing ever, to jump straight into two-a-days and to sprint the morning after a deadlift routine. Sure enough, I pulled a muscle.

Not a large muscle, like a hamstring or a quad or anything like that. No, I pulled a very small, almost inconsequential muscle in my lower abdomen, right in the flex of my hip. It doesn't hurt very bad except when I do one very specific movement, which is try to bring my left leg from behind me underneath my body to in front of me. Given that I am a biped who gets around by walking, however, I do this with an astonishing degree of regularity, i.e. every step. As long as I am just walking it is fine, because I don't let my leg go that far behind me, but even a single step of running hurts like the proverbial Dickens.

So there you have it, just one tiny little pulled muscle. No big deal, right? When I was 19 I would have taken a weekend off, come at it hard on monday and been fine. Now, at a few months shy of 29, I am having to be wise, unfortunately. I have to cut back not just the intensity of my workouts, but even the style. It is only a small muscle, a small injury, but you use that muscle for virtually every exercise that involves tensing up your core (which is pretty much every exercise worth doing). More importantly, a weakening of that muscle leads to an increased risk of hernia, which I do not need right now.

So there I was tonight, in the gym, spending an hour working just biceps, triceps and forearms. I have not done an arm workout in years. I despise isolation exercises, ones that only use a single joint, or pair of joints. I eschew the body building notion that every muscle needs to be trained independently and sculpted to the max. That is vanity and a waste of time. I don't have time for that. When I go to work out I am focused on one thing, and one thing only, and that is increasing my work capacity. Sometimes that means I practice martial arts, sometimes I practice moving my own body, sometimes I practice moving other heavy things, but I despise workouts that are focused on cosmetics. My goal is function, healthy body mechanics, and the ability to do useful things.

Unfortunately, all of those heavy, multi joint lifts or dynamic body movements or martial arts techniques involve the core, which means they stress that particular muscle, which means they retard healing, so there I was, curling.

Then, to make matters worse a buddy that I sometimes lift with came in. He is a big guy. Huge. He proceeds to start a leg series, squatting and leg pressing. I really wanted to get rid of the curl bar and the cables and all that girly stuff and throw a bar across my back, but I refrained. I did not jump into the squat workout.

It seems I have invested my pride in the kind of workout I do. Every bit as foolish as the "beach muscle" lifters that I presume to despise, I have taken pride in not being a "beach muscle" lifter. So when beach muscle lifts are all I can safely do, it irks me. It stings my pride. Therefore, it is probably good for me. I need the humility of realizing that even functional fitness is not my goal, and therefore needs to be surrendered. God had other plans, and therefore I must cease my grumbling, my superiority complexing and my feeling sorry for myself. It is an opportunity to remind myself that I am mortal, strength is fleeting, and I will grow weak and die someday. This is my first acute sports injury, at 28 years old. I am doing really well so far, but it is all down hill from here, and I need to be detached from my physical abilities, because God is going to take all of them away eventually, once they have served their purpose. Let them go. He is the only strength that matters.



His pleasure is not in the strength of the horse,
    nor his delight in the legs of the warrior;
the Lord delights in those who fear him,
    who put their hope in his unfailing love. Psalm 147:10-11

Sore Feet

Posts are going to be few and far between for a while. Right now there are three big things going on in my life. They are work, school and social life. Blogging may just fall by the wayside a bit.


Once upon a time I was out doing a long cross country ski movement with a group of army guys. We had done a similar movement the day prior, and were still feeling the effects of it. In particular, because of the new boots we were wearing, myself and one other guy had developed blisters. I had a blister the length and breadth of my thumb on the inside of my left ankle, just below the ankle bone. The other guy had a blister about an inch and a half across under the ankle bone on the inside of both ankles.

In addition to the blisters (which really weren't that serious, as blisters go), there was extensive bruising underneath the skin. Any pressure from ankle bone to heel was excruciatingly painful, and inversion of the foot was likewise painful.

As we were moving through the snow he kept falling farther and farther behind until finally I (being the medic) told the NCO in charge, "Hey, his feet are pretty torn up."

The NCOIC replied succinctly, "Faggot!" Just like that he dismissed the whole thing. Keep up. Do not be the slowest guy or else. We won't do anything to you, really. No adverse consequences, no paperwork, no punishment. We'll just ridicule you. Call you a pansy. Make jokes about your girly feet and your week genes.

At first I was irritated. I knew what the movement was doing to his feet. It wasn't damaging them permanently, but it was preventing them from healing. Any granulation tissue that had formed the night before was getting rubbed off with every step. The bandage he had put on wasn't the best and it was forming wrinkles and hot spots which might eventually turn into more blisters. Was it going to break a bone? No. Do nerve damage? Unlikely. Get infected? Probably not.

We were not out on patrol, we were just conducting a ski movement, for the express purpose of learning how to ski cross country and try out the new equipment. No one's life was in danger, there was no mission, no enemy, no legitimate reason why we had to keep going. Why do it? Why not just stop?

But we didn't stop. I rebandaged his feet at the next stop, and we kept going for hours. And he made it. He couldn't break snow, but he didn't fall behind.

Sometimes as a medic, or even as a human being, it seems pretty intuitive. If something is causing your patient pain, you stop doing that thing. But this event reminded me of the fact that my feet were hurting too, but I wasn't quitting. I didn't even want to ask. It reminded me of all the times I had wanted to stop, but would never have asked for it. There were so many times when I would have been half-insulted and half-overjoyed to have been told, "That's it, you've had enough. Sit this one out." On the one hand who are you to tell me when I have had enough? You don't know what I am capable of. On the other hand, I don't want to do this anymore. It hurts. Wouldn't it be amazing to have a legitimate excuse to stop?

But I didn't. I would not be who I am today if someone had had sympathy on me and taken me out when I wanted to be taken out. Instead they left me with two options; keep going or quit. For some reason I kept going. God only knows why. It made me into the person that I am.

When I wanted the NCOIC to let that guy off, I wanted to show him mercy, give him a way out. He wanted a way out. He didn't get one. And he got through it and became stronger.

In a way sore feet are a microcosm of my job. I deal with human sinfulness and evil. If it weren't for them I would have no job. There would be no war. God grant I see the day when there is no war and soldiers are all out of work, but on the other hand, what will we replace war with? The hell of war and the purgatory of training the readies men for war are ugly things, but they can bring out greatness. Without adversity, there is no greatness, it seems. But is there adversity without evil? How would Adam and Eve have acheived greatness?

It is an acedemic question only, because the fact is that there is evil and we have to deal with it. But on the other hand maybe there is something there. The NCOIC's ridicule didn't sit well with me, although I knew what he was doing, and he was right about it. That guy did make it, and it was better that he did. I like the virtue of courage and discipline that makes such men who they are, but I don't like the way it comes through. There should be a way to be tough and courageous without being unsympathetic. That is part of my lifelong pursuit of the Way of the Warrior; finding that way.

It finally came!

Two posts in one day? Crazy, I know, but I am geeking out right now! A Package awaited me on my doorstep this evening after work.

BWAAAAAA!!!!!! Mere cardboard cannot contain me!

There is too much awesomeness in this package for styrofoam! It cannot be contained!

Behold!

I am big! (This should be read with a Russian accent.)

I had been expecting this for some time, a 58kg Kettlebell (127.6 lbs.) It is used so there are two large dents on the top of one side. It is not actually a solid block of iron. It is a cast iron shell around a ball of lead and you can feel the lead core shift slightly when you move it.

Even though I had just come from the gym, I had to try it out!

You must intimidate Kettlebell before you swing it. Kettlebell must know who is boss! (Again, if you don't read that with a Russian accent you are doing it wrong.)

Comrade, drive with hips, and then let kettlebell float rest of way. Do not raise with shoulders.

Solid posture, straight arms, my shoulders might be pulled a little too far forward.

If my face looks like I am in pain, it's only because I am. This was my first ever attempt at cleaning the 58kg KB. Could have been worse, but the press or jerk is a long way off.

It tried to get a video, but I didn't set up the camera right so it only showed me from about the shoulders down. I'll get a video this weekend probably.

Well, that's me geeking out. We now return to your regular programing.

Memento Mori

After Mass today (courtesy of the mall monks) I drove on post to go to the gym. Everyone on post seems to have the day off today, including myself (I have no idea why, but I'm not complaining) so the gym was empty. Just me and the guy cleaning the weight room.

I haven't lifted in a while, due to training out in the mountains. Climbing is a different kind of workout, but I was still able to hit a 462Lb deadlift for one rep. My goal is to hit 500lbs again someday (without hurting myself this time) and be able to lift it for reps. I also did some hand stand pushups and some overhead squats, and then decided to call that good.

While I was changing in the locker room I heard someone moving around on the other side of the row of lockers. By the time I had finished changing I knew that 1) he was old, and 2) he had COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. My bet is emphysema because of that peculiar, regular, breathy cough.)

On my way out of the locker room I looked over to see my fellow going-to-the-gym-on-his-day-off comrade. I was right, he was old. Very old, probably in his seventies. His arms were wasted and wrinkled, I could hear every breath that came out of his mouth, and yet he was still strapping on a lifting belt.

It got me thinking.

I am 27 years old. I can run six miles in under an hour with a 45lb pack on my back, at 6,000 ft. elevation and be ready to fight when I get there. I can deadlift twice my body weight for reps. I can climb rocks, I can swim, I can fight. I have spent years training myself to this physical level, partially because it is my job, but mostly because I just enjoy being healthy and strong and able to do all those things. And no matter how hard I work, if I survive long enough I will look like that old man.

It is not a new thought, to me. I have long since been fully aware of my own mortality, and have put a great deal of thought into why I spend so much time training a body that is destined for old age (if I'm lucky) decay, disease, and the grave. I put more effort in than most guys, less than some, but in the end how much effort or what level of fitness you strive for is unimportant. What really matters is why. The reason is everything. Do you want to pick up chicks? That will work for a while, but not forever. Everything sags eventually, biceps included. Do you want to be known as the world's greatest (insert sport of choice here.) Fine. Maybe you can reach that level, maybe you cannot. What is certain is that you cannot maintain that level forever, and someday, maybe during your lifetime, maybe after it, someone will come along and break whatever record you set. My goal is to be able to serve and protect people, but even that will not last forever, on a strictly physical level. Someday I will be injured, or wounded, or killed, or I will just plain get old, and I won't be able to move, shoot and communicate like I can now. I won't even want to.

I admire that old man in the locker room with all my heart. I don't know what his reasons were, and he may well have been a horrible person, or the best man alive. All I know is that I saw discipline there. Never mind his physical weakness, his aches and pains, the disease that will inevitably kill him unless something else kills him first. Despite all of that he still straps on his weight belt and pushes himself.

When I get to that level I hope to be doing the same thing. I will no longer be able to crush the bad guys, or climb up mountains. My days of serving and protecting will inevitably end, unless...

Unless, in all of my physical training there is some spiritual sacrifice, some shaping of my soul. Even when I am lying in a hospital bed, my body wasted and broken, God willing my soul, shaped and forged through years of training, will be strong and whole. I will no longer be able to place my body between the innocent and those who would do them harm, but by God's grace I can still place my soul there. And in the very end, when I can do nothing, and have nothing left to give, may I accept even that weakness as an opportunity for God's strength.

Every young man should have the chance to see a very old man facing death. It helps keep us from wasting our time.

On the Rocks

Last week I started a Military Mountaineering course. The first week was mostly individual skills, knots, ropes, systems, etc. but on Friday we went out to the rocks in a canyon to practice placing protection and building anchors. It involved no real climbing, but lots of scrambling around some class 4 terrain. (Class 4 terrain is considered the highest non-technical terrain. After that it is classified in 5's: 5:1 being like a rather rough, broken staircase to 5:15 which is more like a wall of glass at vertical or greater.)

So I was scrambling my way up these slopes which a few weeks ago would have scared me a bit, but after a week in Oregon doing actual climbing, these slopes were just fun. I wasn't wearing any gear, hiking boots instead of climbing shoes, no ropes. I was just friction smearing my way up the rock like spiderman, running on up that thing like it was my job. We did a run through the canyon earlier in the week, and I was flying up some fairly technical terrain in nothing but shorts, t-shirt and vibram five-finger shoes. One of the guys spent his lunch hour bouldering without gear.

And suddenly, despite my fear of heights, I could understand why people climb for fun. I have only spent six or seven days on the rocks in my life, training up for this course, and although I was terrified half the time, just touching the rock again was exciting. After climbing 5:7's and 5:8's (and top roping 9's and 10's just to look like an idiot) that little 5:0 scramble was nothing. It was fun. Rock climbing has given me an awareness of my body that is unlike anything else I've ever done. I have done weightlifting, martial arts, running, swimming, hiking and kettlebelling for years, and each one has heightened my physical awareness in its own way. At the peak of that awareness, for instance when pulling off a smooth transition to the mount, or throwing in an armbar, or snatching a kettlebell with absolutely perfect form, there is a feeling of quietness within the storm of energy and movement all around. In a way it is analagous to the love I have for really, really tough mental problems. If the problem is tough enough it takes up my entire brain, so for that time when I am working on it my mind is quiet.

Rock climbing is like that. It is utterly focusing, physically and mentally. The feel of everything is enhanced. The sound of birds, the smell of the dust and wind, and especially the feel of the rock under my hands. I have always been an extremely tactile person. I love the feel of things.

Then there is the internal awareness of my body's strength, flexibility, weight, balance, movement. The physical knowledge my body has of how to shift my weight, keeping pressure on the hand or foot that has traction, while flowing steadily into the next move is amazing.

And I am not even a good climber. I am strong but I am also heavy, 215lbs most days. I am not tall so I lack the reach that might balance out the weight. But when I climb an easy route, well within my ability level and just flow up it like water, I can see why the real climbers, the guys who weigh 140 or less, keep on doing it over and over, every day. It makes you feel alive.

So although I know next week and the weeks following when I am climbing serious rocks again, back up in the 5:7's and 8's, hundreds of feet up with exposure that would make an eagle woozy, I will be terrified. I will get halfway up and the only thing I will be able to think will be, "I want to go home." I know I will have to force my mind away from pointlessly dwelling on how much I don't want to be up there, and that I will want to quit. But God willing I won't quit. On the other side I will be more alive than I am now. Even if I plummet to my death. ;-)

The glory of God is man fully alive.

Run Harder, not Smarter

Today I started a course in Mountaineering. The very first event of this course was a timed four mile ruckmarch with a 45 pound ruck, dryweight. (Dryweight means the ruck is weighed before you add water, snacks etc.)

The stepoff time was at 6:00 A.M. and the altitude is about 6400 feet above sea level. The instructor pointed out the course for us, "You're just going to start off down this hill, and follow this dirt trail until you come to a 'T' intersection. There you are going to take a left and follow the fenceline until you hit a hardball road. That will take you up the first of those two hills over there. You will go across that first ridgeline, down the saddle and back up the other ridge. Follow that hill down the spurr until you come to another hardball road. That will take you back to this dirt trail, which will bring you back around here and you'll finish up over there. There will be vans at all the intersections to point out which way to go. The course is 4 miles, you have an hour and fifteen minutes. We are giving you that extra fifteen minutes because we know some of you come from sea level, and you'll be surprised how bad the elevation will hit you. Ready? Begin."

So I started. Straight out of the gate I had a Forrest Gump moment. I just felt like running. So I took off down the first hill, planning on using the downhill to warm up and make up some time. I hit a semi 'T' shaped intersection (it really looked more like a "Y") and I took the left, and ran around a couple of small hills until I came to a wide open spot with a fence right in front of me. There was no van in sight, but the trail went to the right and followed the fenceline, so I headed that way at a pretty blistering trot.

It was a pleasent running trail, and I followed it for about a mile, walking up a pretty decent hill before I decided to turn and look to see how far behind everyone was.

There was no one in sight. I ran back around the bend and still there was no one in sight. I could see almost a mile along the trail, and there was no way I was that far ahead. Must have missed a turn somewhere, so I turned and ran back down that hill as fast as I could. When I got to the place where the trail turned right along the fence, sure enough, there was a van out in the distance along the left hand side. I found out later that the van hadn't even arrived until after a couple of guys had already passed that spot. It wasn't really a running trail to the left, just some old tire tracks, and now a whole bunch of boot prints. And way off in the distance, about a mile and a half away, I could see the main group of guys just cresting the top of the second hill.

:-(

Nothing to do but run for it.

So I ran. I followed the tire tracks until I found a road (a dirt road, not a hardball.) I passed the van with the cadre member sitting silent and stoic in the driver's seat. I walked the up slope, which was pretty stiff, ran the ridge and tried to control the fall down the other side. Walked up one more hill, and then after that it was just straight running. No road, no trail, not even bootprints any more, just me running for all I am worth along the top of this ridgeline and down the spur on the otherside of the hill. I could see the next van off in the distance with one tiny figure just barely arriving. I pushed it out and caught up with him, and hit a hardball road (a real hardball road this time.) A bunch of regular army guys was running up behind me in shorts and t-shirts and I raced them for about a quarter of a mile (stupid move. Burned too much energy.)

I hit the trail again and ran until I hit the last little uphill stretch into the compound. The latter half of the main group was barely 200 meters ahead of me now. When I broke over the hill they were just walking away from the finish line. I stretched out into a nice, easy lope, down the last hill to the finish, with a final time of one hour and two minutes.

Dead last.

The moral of this story is, you don't need to know where you are going, you just need to RUN AS FAST AS YOU CAN. You're bound to end up somewhere eventually.

Desert Evening

Over the last week I was doing a training event in New Mexico. Since I was not one of the primary players being trained, I got to spend most of that time pulling security, which involves sitting in the turret of a gun truck and watching the desert for hours on end. With temperatures topping out in more than the usual number of digits, and sun that hot on me pate, I felt a lot like a piece of meat in a broiler. In a strange way, though, I enjoyed it. The desert is so huge. It is open and arid and inhospitable, and that makes it beautiful. (It wasn’t designed with white people in mind, I can tell you that.) There is something about the emptiness that encourages emptiness of soul, or at least some emptying of the soul, which is a step in the right direction.

The silence is good for me. The heat is good for me. The discomfort is good for me. SPF-50 sunscreen is also good for me. My Irish/German heritage is highly evidenced by the fact that after three weeks out here I am only a half a shade darker than I was in rainy Washington.

The last night in the desert God put on a bit of a show for us. The sky started clouding over around six, and then right about sunset it started to get cool and windy. I could see the thunder storms raging miles away around the mountains. The clouds seemed to be bigger than the mountains themselves, and underneath the clouds were great gray sheets of rain. And then, the wind changed direction, and started sweeping the storm clouds away from the mountains to the north, driving them south across the desert. The next thing I knew I was being pelted with raindrops the size of Chihuahuas, and as thick as thieves. If you can imagine a crowd of soaking wet thieving Chihuahuas freefalling on your head, you will get the idea.

The first thing to do, obviously, was save the gear. So I jumped out, ran around to the cargo area on the back and grabbed out my med bag and our three-day bags (nope, not waterproofed. I mean, this is the desert, right?) Then I ripped the tarp out from behind the radios and bungee cords from the back and quick as a flash rigged up a little cover over the turret. It was large enough to cover the whole turret, tight enough so that it didn’t flap in the gale force winds, and still allowed me to see out over the gun and rotate the turret 360 degrees or more. And there I stood, a little damp and chilly, but none the worse for wear. I turned the truck on, turned on the heater (never thought I’d use that on this trip) and listened to the drumming of the rain on a synthetic canvas roof.

Presently, the rain ceased. The cloud ceiling stayed, but it wasn’t dropping more than the occasional sprinkle. The wind was soft, now. Not just soft as in no longer ripping the hat off my head and trying to snap bungee cords. It felt not simply gentle, but soft like a woman’s hand. There was a tangible quality of softness, like velvet, or felt, or mullein leaves, brushing across my face as if that was its sole reason for existence. There is an intention in the wind, a purpose. It has meaning, and the meaning of that wind was a caress. The sun was behind the clouds, but I could see the rays of light stabbing through to the earth. “God’s Eyelashes,” I used to call them when I was younger, because to the ten-year old me they looked like the eyelashes of a half-closed eye. I don’t see the resemblance that much anymore, but I still call them that, because I haven’t thought of a better name.

As the sun sank lower and lower behind the clouds and the sky grew darker and darker, those rays of light slanted wider, and their fingers reached closer to me. Someone rolled up on the dirt bike asking if I wanted to be relieved, but I said no, I would prefer to stay and watch the sunset.

The sky at this point was almost completely clouded over. It looked, for all the world, like a gray bowl overturned on top of the earth. I imagine if you lived inside a snow globe and had really bad breath it would look much the same. There were still storms carrying on in the distance on all sides, except to the west, hanging down in gray, amorphous sheets like a curtain from the edge of the cloud bowl. On the west side, though, just where the sun was going to set, there was an opening. As the sun began to dip below the edge of the bowl it was as if the whole world was transformed right before my eyes. The underside of all the clouds nearest to the sun was shot through with red. Pinks and lavenders stretched around the edges of the bowl, almost meeting in the back, fading into the deep blue slate of the clouds. The rain storms flushed and then glowed bright rose red. From twenty to fifty miles away I could see them embraced by the light and shifting with the wind, like a slow, graceful love dance. Behind me, on the eastern side there was a pair of rainbows arching off the scrubby pastureland below the mountains to the northeast, disappearing into the clouds, and then descending in parallel curve to the ground to the southeast. Two rainbows, one inside the other, perfectly parallel with each other, forming a double arch exactly over that point on the eastern horizon where the sun would rise the next day.

The whole brilliant display lasted only three minutes, and then faded to purple, and then deep, bluish black, and for the few minutes I was trapped inside that glorious ceiling of cloud, I felt as if the whole thing was for me; I felt very small, and very young, as if the clouds were the arms of God, wrapping around me for a brief moment in a gesture of love. Not simply love, but specifically affection, the humble, earthy, human feeling of familiarity and comfortableness. Like when you are a little kid and your Dad hugs you and says, “It’ll be okay.”

That is fatherhood. The love that I do not deserve, and could not exist without.

I Really Do Give a ----

I have been doing a train-up for a mountaineering course I’m going to be going to soon. This means that I am learning to climb rocks. I have all of three days of climbing experience now, entirely on sport climbing routes (sport climbing routes have bolts drilled into the rock that you can clip into as you go, as opposed to trad routes that you have to place your own protection as you climb.)

The first day was rough. It was raining, the rock was wet, and I had never climbed before. The only thing I knew how to do was pull-ups, but no matter how strong my upper body may be (I can do more pull-ups than the average bear) it is not strong enough to haul my 215 lbs up wet rocks all day long. No matter how good you are at pull-ups, you can’t pull up on something you can’t grip. Plus, I am afraid of heights.

The second day was much better. The rock had dried off and I was learning to use my legs and body weight to hold myself on the rock. I was the first to climb a particularly demanding route, which I did on the first attempt.

The third day was better still. I crushed every route that the other guys did, muscling my way past moves that other guys just couldn’t stick. At the end of the day when everyone else wanted to quit climbing and just practice building anchors, I talked the instructor into letting me try a route he had never done before. He guessed it was a 5.10 and he told me I wasn’t going to make it. I didn’t, technically. I made it to one body length from the top before I was smoked and stuck, unable to progress any further. But I was not sketched out. I was easily able to talk through my descent plan, and conduct a retrievable rappel without leaving any gear behind.

The instructor said, “Well, I can tell we’re going to have a fun time in ----- ----- when we go down to climb there, because apparently you don’t give a f--- and you’ll try anything.”

That is a very strange assessment of me. The longer I stay in the Army, the more I realize I just don’t fit in. All the other guys assume that I just don’t care about anything because I go hard and long and don’t quit or complain when things get sketchy. They assume that I just don’t give a ----.

But that isn’t true at all. I’m not sure I understand it myself, but the one thing I am sure of is that I do, most definitely care. I don’t want to die. I love life. I love my family and my friends. I love the books I read and the faith I have been given. I love pizza and beer, comfortable chairs by the fire with a book and cup of tea, conversations with intelligent, joyful Christians. I love the sound of children laughing, I love running around the lawn with a crowd of youngsters, or sitting and feeding an infant a bottle. I love music and stories, poetry and prose, art and movies. There is so much in the world that I love. Maybe when I was a teenager I didn’t really care if I lived or died, but I haven’t been a teenager in a very long time.

I am aware, inescapably aware, that every moment of every day I spend doing dangerous things, is a moment that I risk losing all of that. I could die or be crippled for life. I could lose my eyes, or my hearing, or my legs. Most terrifying of all, I could lose my hands (I would rather lose almost anything, rather than my hands). I could spend the rest of my life a quadriplegic in a hospital bed, all because of a slip on a rock somewhere, or a stray bullet.

I care, all right. Nor am I seeking out thrills. I don’t really get any thrill or satisfaction out of the adrenaline, anymore. Adrenaline is a gift, a tool that focuses and enhances my abilities, but it is an uncomfortable feeling.

So why did I choose to climb that extra route? I can’t really explain it. Climbing is fun, on easy routes, but the hard routes just suck. There is a certain physical satisfaction in sticking that move with smooth, powerful economy of motion, but there is so much pain involved in getting there. I hate that feeling of being halfway up the rock, tired, demotivated, my forearms burning, my calves cramping and shaking, unable to go down, unsure if I have the strength to go up. It is a feeling of being trapped. When you just want to close your eyes and go to sleep, and wake up and have it all be a bad dream, but it isn’t a dream, you really are where you really are and you have no choice but to keep going, or fall, let the rope catch you (if your protection is good) and just give up.

So why did I insist on doing that extra climb? I just wanted to. What else was there to do? We were out at the site for a certain length of time. The purpose of being out there was to practice climbing, so if I’m not climbing or belaying another climber, why am I even out there? I have more useful things to do with my time. I have books to read, people to talk to, prayers to say. I think I climbed it because it would have been a waste of time not to climb.

Why am I going to keep climbing? Why am I still going to deploy and leave everything I love behind for almost a year?

Because this is what I have been given to do. The lawful authority I have freely subjected myself to by the grace of God has given me this task. Therefore this task comes from God. Somehow, in God’s economy of salvation, it is necessary for me to give up things. I don’t know how, or why, or what will come of it. I know that I would not love my family the way I do if I had not spent most of my adult life separated from them. I know I wouldn’t love hot showers so much that they almost make me weep, if I hadn’t spent so much of my life cold and dirty. I wouldn’t love pizza as much if I had never been delirious with hunger. These are symbols of some deeper metaphysical reality. Somehow, my sacrifice of life (what I look upon as my “real” life) makes that life more real, and somehow it benefits the people I love, who in turn are what makes that life my “real” life. Somehow, by becoming poorer I become richer. The armchair is more comfortable, the beer is more flavorful, the book is more meaningful.

Without tasting death, it is impossible really to live.

Another Way, Part 3

This is the last in a series of reflections on the individual warrior's approach to inter-personal violence. You can read the previous parts here, here, here, and here.

The first stage in a warrior's development is when his primary motivation is the challenge presented by the enemy. Through proper education, however, he will have other loves, and hopefully some of these other loves will supersede (without eradicating) his love for adventure. Then he can enter into the second stage, which is where he really doesn't care about the enemy at all, but primarily about what he is protecting. This is the stage described by G. K. Chesterton in the words, "The Christian soldier fights, not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him." This is sufficient to make a warrior a just warrior, though it has its possible abuses. But there is another stage yet.

My first clue that there might be another stage came from the life of Miyamoto Musashi. Musashi was the greatest swordsman in the history of Japan, and the author of "The Book of Five Rings." He fought in over sixty duels in his lifetime, killing all of his opponents, and also survived four major battles. After his last duel, in which he killed his opponent with nothing more than a wooden oar he had carved into a rough sword shape, he gave up dueling to the death. Although he fought a few more times after that, he did not kill any more, and simply demonstrated his unmatchable superiority, before letting his opponents go.

According to one legend, in the later years of his life he was meditating on a river bank in the company of his friend who was a Buddhist monk. While they were sitting there, an adder came winding his way up the riverbank towards them. The deadly serpent took no notice of the monk at all, slithering right across his lap, so at one with his surroundings was he. When he came to Musashi, however, the snake reared back, hissed, and made a wide circle around him before heading on his way. Musashi lamented that for all his power, he could not enjoy the peace and unity enjoyed by this simple monk. It is said that the monk was also able to defeat Musashi in a mental duel, using only a fan.

The idea that such a masterful warrior (who certainly could never have been accused of any semblance of gentleness) would renounce his life of bloodshed and practice the martial arts only for spiritual enlightenment was astounding to me. But I saw parallels with many other stories of famous warriors (Sir Lancelot being the most famous) who, having acheived undeniable superiority over all other warriors of their time, abandoned the martial life to pursue religious life. And it made sense. Certainly it would be the most skillful fighter who figured out first that no matter how good he was, it still did not fulfill him deep down inside.

The second clue, tying into the first one, came from reading the pacifist posts of @SirNickDon here on xanga. I began to see the deep points of contact between his pacifist vision and my Way of the Warrior. Because, of course, he is absolutely right, God does love every single person in the world, including the murderers and child-rapists. He longs for their good, and works for their healing, and it is a tragedy for them to die in their sin (fortunately I cannot judge their souls.)

So the third step in the evolution of the just warrior is to see the enemy as God sees Him, which means to love him; to pray for him as he cannot pray for himself; to respect his humanity, even though he fails to respect his own; to work for his healing with all your strength.

But this does not change the charism (if I may use the word) of the Warrior. It only throws it into terrible relief. The Warrior is not charged with punishing the evildoers of the world, but only with protecting the innocent. However, in order to protect the innocent, the guilty must be restrained and sometimes they must be restrained physically, and sometimes the only way to do that is with lethal force.

Central to the position of the committed pacifist is the belief that we are not qualified to judge which human life is more important than any other. The spontaneous sympathy we feel for an abused child and consequent disgust for the abuser is essentially an illusion. In God's eyes they are both equal.

It is here that I have to broaden the view a little bit. While it is quite certain that God loves both the abuser and the abused equally, it is also quite certain that He does not treat them identically in the long run. It is also quite certain that He calls us to treat them differently, i.e. to protect the victim and restrain the abuser. There is a tension here between the eschatological reality of the Kingdom and the physical reality of the fallen world we live in. It is somewhat analagous to the role of marriage in the Kingdom. Here on earth marriage is a gift, a glory and a calling. In heaven they neither marry nor are given in marriage, and all Christians, of whatever calling, are called upon to remember both of these truths. The balance of the Church in some ways depends upon there being two separate groups of people, each committed to living out a different aspect of the nature of human sexuality. The vast majority are called to live in married life, remembering that it is only a temporary arrangement. The few are called to live in celibacy as a foretaste of that eternal arrangement (whatever it may be) while still remembering that marriage is a holy and beautiful expression of the same gift.

In a similar way, all people are called upon to confront the reality of abuse in their lives. For many it is not dramatic physical abuse, but the challenge remains the same. In the reality of the world we live in something must be done to stop these things from happening. They must be resisted, and sometimes physically resisting them is the only way to stop them. At the same time, n the eyes of God, the abusers are just as precious as their victims, and this too must be remembered and lived out in the world. It is from this that I believe the charism of the committed pacifist arises. It is the need to bear witness to the deeper understanding, and the promised Kingdom. So I essentially see the two charisms, the Way of the Warrior and the Way of Pacifism, not as competitive but as mutually necessary and supportive.

The contribution of pacifism to the Way of the Warrior is that it deepens his love and respect for the enemy. It makes him realize that, when he has to kill some bad man to keep him from doing bad things, in truth the man was not born to be bad. He was born to be good. He was born to know, love and serve God, called to unimaginable glory and beauty. The fact that a human being was killed is a tragedy but it is not the worst tragedy. The worst tragedy is that he wasted his life, squandering countless opportunities for good in pursuit of power, pleasure, or hatred. The tragedy is that he was wounded so fundamentally that all his choices summed up led him to this end, the wreckage of all the he was capable of. The warrior's act of killing him is simply the end of a long and heartbreaking story, and in a way can be seen as a last act of respect for the man he might have been. It prevents him from doing anything worse to himself (which in and of itself is not a justification for killing, but merely an alternate way of looking at something justified on quite other grounds.)

So essentially all wars are family quarrels. When I intervene as a warrior I am restraining my brother to keep him from hurting a younger sibling. If I had to, I would kill him, but only if that were the only way, and always with the realization that I have killed my brother.

Those are the three stages I have seen so far. I don't think that is the end of the journey, however. After all, I'm only 27.

Another Way, Part 2

Sorry these are coming slowly and painfully. Truthfully it's only partially because I'm busy. Mostly I just don't feel like writing anything serious right now. I would rather read Dr. Seuss out loud to a bunch of kids. It would be a lot more fun.

The second part of the development of a warrior is when he forgets all about the enemy. Or, to put it another way, the enemy ceases to be important to him. This is not automatic. As a very young boy or teenager (the actual age can vary greatly depending on maturity and life-experience) the enemy is the primary reason for wanting to fight. A man can go his entire life as little more than a philosophical brawler if he does not move beyond this. Fortunately, the world being what it is, there are limits placed on the use of force, both in every day life and in international affairs. This means that there are consequences for actions of violence, so in order for a man to engage in them on a regular basis (and not end up in jail) he has to have a reason and a justification.*

So if he is serious about pursuing the challenge of the enemy, he has to find a path, which in our society is pretty much limited to the military and the police. (I personally have known many soldiers who claim to have told their recruiter, "I just want to shoot M----- F-----s in the face and not go to jail.") The military, while enabling and honing these traits, also puts controls on them, and most important to this topic, provides a justification. The only problem is that it is external justification, meaning it is entirely based on the authority of the superior officers and the consequences that could be visited on a violater by society.

In order for a warrior to develop personally he must develop his own internal controls on violence. That is, he must have his own personal moral code, which he is fully invested in. This is not automatic. It cannot come to our philosophical brawler who just wants to live a life of adventure. It can come only to someone who loves something else, besides adventure. (This is the reason why training in the gentler arts of life is a far more effective and useful response to boyish testosterone than repression.) The young man who loves art, or poetry, or his family, will eventually have to make a decision as to why he really wants to fight. Is it just about the adventure? Or is it to protect something else he loves even more? The two are not entirely mutually exclusive, but eventually one must predominate. A balanced character (hearkening back to his martial education as a child) will have other loves, and if he eventually chooses those loves as most important, he will have successfully made the transition into the second stage.

This second stage is marked by a complete lack of animosity, or personal interest of any kind, in the enemy. His love is simply that which he wants to protect. As he gets older and wiser, he will learn to desire, not only to protect, but also to enjoy it himself. A young man who admires family life, and wants to fight to protect the ability of others to have such a quiet family life, will eventually learn to love that life in its own right. He will not simply want to protect the good, but also to enjoy the good. (He may still choose to sacrifice that enjoyment so that others may have it, but it isn't truly a sacrifice until he has learned to appreciate it enough that he desires it himself.) This is why he doesn't hate the enemy. He just wants this good thing to be safe, that's all. He just wants the enemy to stop being a threat to his village, or his family, or his country, and he doesn't particularly care how that happens. If we convert all the enemy and they shave their heads and live as monks for the rest of their days, that suits him fine. If he shoots them all in the face, that also is an acceptable outcome. Whatever is the most effective way to protect what he loves, that is what the warrior at this stage wants.

The most dangerous abuse of this stage of development is the business like soldier. This is the soldier who is willing to take any advantage, use any technology, break any rule or kill any number of innocent civillians (not intentionally of course) to acheive victory. The American military has historically tended to this extreme. It's not personal, it's just business, and we are good at business. From the fire-bombing of Dresden and the nuking of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to the impersonal snuffing out of lives via satellite controlled drones, we want only one thing: we want to win, quickly, with the least amount of damage to our side. Which is admirable, but can easily degenerate to a lack of respect for human life, if that life is not "us".





*Note: this holds true for our society, right now, but other societies in other times have not been so restrictive. While there have always been consequences for violence, historically there has often been a lot more wiggle-room in avoiding or dealing with them.

Another Way, Part 1

There is another way for a soldier to deal with the reality of his job. Thus far I think there is only one true way for a soldier to remain a soldier and not be in danger of diminishing his own humanity. It cannot be a question of a trick of dealing with something essentially bad. It must instead be a matter of finding and embracing the truly good in a vocation, while slowly, over time, paring away any evil that has become attached to it.

This other way (so far as I can see) follows three steps, or stages. The first is to be in love with the enemy. The second is to forget the enemy. The third is to love the enemy.

This may seem like a strange way of putting it, to be “in love” with the enemy, but it is the most basic and most natural reason for being a warrior. Just like the most natural reason for climbing a mountain is sheer love of the mountain, so the beginning of a call to knighthood is the fascination of the adventure. The knight rides into the forest and challenges the dragon, not because he has any particular malice toward the dragon. In fact, it is truer to say that he is passionately in love with the dragon, because the dragon represents a challenge, an opponent worthy of his strength and skill. Something in him needs to fight a fight and he sees the dragon (or the giant, depending on the myth) the same way an artist sees a blank canvas, or a sailor sees a tall ship and a star to steer her by. This is a very natural thing. I would say it is at least a part of the natural makeup of nearly every boy, though it is stronger in some than in others. The boy born with this instinct at its strongest is generally going to be a handful. He is the boy who always wants to fight or wrestle or make wooden swords and play knight or play commando in the woods with guns. Of course every boy does these things from time to time, but for this particular boy these things are a borderline obsession, or at least the deepest theme in his play. He may drive his mother crazy by always getting into fights or getting scratched and bruised in mock battles, or constantly having sharp sticks swinging in the vicinity of his eyes. Some mothers will even try to suppress this type of play, fearing their son will grow up to be a gangster, but I believe this is a mistake. In this kind of violent play there is nothing cruel or malicious. A boy like this has no ill will towards any of his opponents, and in fact seeks the same boys out to fight again and again. In his mind the competition is a deep form of cooperation in which every boy tests and strengthens himself against every boy. He is not a bully or a thug. He may indeed have an almost ridiculous sense of fair play which would be a liability to a bully.

This instinct is what you make of it. It is simply raw material. It can be a vehicle for a boy learning to use his instincts to dominate those weaker than himself, or to protect those weaker than himself. If he grows up unbalanced by training in gentler arts he will certainly end up a loud-mouthed, rough mannered, though perhaps good hearted tough guy. The experiences and guidance he is give may be able to shape and nurture that instinct but they will never be able to suppress it safely. A fighter’s instinct can remain at this stage indefinitely, as many of the higher pagan warriors of history are examples. These higher pagan warriors are marked by a deep respect for their enemy, which probably reached its most extreme expression with the samurai. A samurai considered it a great honor to cut an enemy’s head off after he had ritually disemboweled himself, to prevent him the shame of grimacing in pain. Homer’s Illiad is full of both the heights and the depths of this instinct, and with Hector even an example of something like the second stage of the warrior’s development. Anything like an in depth analysis of that basic level instinct, both at its highest and at its lowest is far beyond the scope of this blog, but should be an essential part of the education of any warrior.

Alas, there is no comprehensive training for the modern warrior.

What I mean by Knighthood

There are some who complain about the emphasis on "chivalry" in the Church, seeing at as a mechanism for women to abuse men, and a smokescreen for men to use women. Some would even say that many men espouse knighthood as nothing more than a cover for objectification. I disagree. I would say that finding a man who espouses true old-fashioned knighthood is very rare indeed, if only for the general lack of martial ability. Martial prowess, or at least the lifelong pursuit of martial prowess, was an essential element of that knighthood (as opposed to modern knighthood which has nothing martial about it.) So a modern day knight, in order to follow the old code, ought at least to train in a martial art and be proficient with a gun. This is one of the problems with the modern shadowy "knighthood" that everyone talks about incessently, is that it is incomplete. They emphasize only the soft, gentle, velvet side of the fully masculine character of the knight. So we have men who endlessly preach the "warrior poet" ideal, who couldn't throw a decent punch to save their lives (or anyone else's life for that matter.) And even that basic ability is a far cry from the simple definition of a warrior, which is one who studies the arts of war and uses them.

So when I say that I pursue the concept of knighthood in a modern world, I mean that I literally practice the art of killing other human beings. I literally meditate on my own death and prepare for it on a daily basis. I actually pursue an elite physical fitness, coupled with martial arts training, and all the other arts of modern combat. I study and meditate on Just War doctrine, and the Theology of the Body, and various forms of pacifism and constantly refine my moral code which determines where, and when, and how I can justly kill. It has cost me a decade of my adult life to pursue this ideal, and it is still the underlying principle of everything I do. This is what I mean by knighthood; not that I have attained it, but that I pursue it every day, and most especially that it is not some vague collection of moral platitudes couples with archaic civil niceties. It requires the pursuit of real skills. When I say that I pursue knighthood, I mean that I can literally snap a man's neck with my bare hands, and I can literally rock a baby to sleep with those same hands. So if being civil and making a steady paycheck are all you've ever heard of "chivalry" then All you've ever heard is a waste of breath. Holding a door for a lady is meaningless if that is the extent of a man's chivalry. Valentine's day is bosh, if you don't have a soul of steel.

I think this is why I never really see eye to eye with many bloggers on the question of chivalry. To me it is a way of life, a virtue encompassing the pursuit of all virtues. It is a balance of extremes; the measured, committed, unswerving development of excellence in both extremes of masculinity. I pursue it for it's own sake, and for the sake of God, who calls me to it, and I don't much care whether any woman alive approves or disapproves. I accept and appreciate the support and encouragement of women who pursue their own femininity with the same dedication, but I don't give the naysayers a second thought. Truth be told, while most women approve the ideal on paper, in my experience, most are at least a little frightened by it in real life. Especially if they are not pursuing their own calling with the same determination, they are sometimes even totally put off. you see knighthood, when pursued in its entirety, makes you totally other. It makes you something that is not in any way more like a woman, but something that is unmistakeably and unflinchingly other. It doesn't take long for most women to get past the initial approval and realize that this ideal might just be more than they bargained for. It might get their man killed someday. It will certainly make him inaccessible on some level. In some ways he will always be beyond her influence. It means while she will always have his devotion and his love, she can never have all of his heart. In a word, he is "Not a Tame Lion." Loving a man like this requires a strength of femininity unlike any other for she will certainly have to die many times over in the course of their life together.

This kind of knighthood is my ideal. I take it very seriously indeed, having devoted my entire life thus far to the pursuit of that ideal. This might explain why sometimes all the angst over the place of "chivalry" in the Christian blogosphere seems like much ado about nothing to me.

Ruck

“Tramp!” goes the boot as it crushes the ground,

“Stomp!” goes the heel, and “Slap” goes the toe.

The rucksack creaks and squeaks, the ponderous sounds

Of overloaded canvas, in time with the slow,

Slow, agonizing pace of too many pounds

At least a hundred, sagging from my spine.

I feel it in my shoulders, I feel it in my feet

Slapping down and down and yet again down,

Always slapping down.

With shockwaves like a hammer on hamburger meat

Plodding on clay, on shale, on grass, weed and bush

Trudging in the dust of the field or echoing on the street.

Pain from toe to heel, pain from heel to knee and then

Shooting up in grinding vibrations to hips and lumbar spine

As every one of these weary, dogged men

Stoop and limp and plod under the weight of the ruck;

That damned unwieldy tick that we’ve strapped on again;

To carry across the land.

                                        Through the night, through the rain,

Through the draws and hills and swamps and thorn;

Pitch black sticks in the pitch black night

That stab you in the eye with careless scorn.

The “wait-a-minute” vines that claw and clutch and drag

And lie in wait for our heels, in the dark before the morn,

As we curse our way onwards in pitch black

Sans moon and stars, and wish we were never born,

Or if born, at least born normal people, not the sort

Who volunteer for this tomfoolery!

                                                      But that awful ruck!

All else is really an afterthought, my mind always returns

To that creaking, sagging, soul crushing bundle of suck

Ninety pounds of gear on my back: ammo, water, food

Clothes, med bag, and explosives just for luck;

Then, to top it off a 25lb necklace! The iron pig,

Swinging in front of me by its sling.

80 clinking rounds in the feed tray, to start with,

“Carry as much ammo as you can bring.”

And then a bandoleer of 120 more, because hey, you never know!

Muzzle and bipod stick out like a broken wing,

Catching the brush and shifting, sliding canvas on my collar,

After a few hours that will start to sting.

But someone has to carry it, right?

                                                     It’s really just the weight.

I carry it, not on my spine, but on my soul like a brick.

My spirits sink as hour after painful hour drags on,

And from twenty-two to zero-two we’ve moved barely a klick

And left half our mojo behind, somewhere in the draw.

The wait-a-minute vines got it. The bush was just too thick.

We hit the tracks and make up some time,

Urging speed from battered limbs and trying our best

Not to twist our ankles between the ties,

Or in the gravel. Pushing on. Only a minute for a rest.

Behind schedule. Forget security, out on the road,

And run. We need to make link-up, so haul butt

With dogged, shuffling, comical steps under the load,

For half a mile of open blacktop,

Ready to dive into the brush if a glimmer showed.

Of headlight, but nothing comes. Civilized people

Are all asleep right now. We run

Praying there’s a ride at the end of this one.

But no.

             Alas, only an angry, nervous face,

And a stream, and a quick, “Follow us.”

Then lights running off into the darkness.

“Awww. Sad face.” Someone says, but no more fuss.

These guys are running light, and they know the way,

And they’re fresh. We barely have breath to cuss

And we have a guy with a sprained ankle.

Little things like that, you know, they add up.

Who’d have thought?

                                  The lights go on, and on, and on

Up the ravine. We fall behind, get separated.

Link back up, move out again, fall behind

And half our element moves on without us.

If it weren’t for the injured guy I wouldn’t mind.

I swear I’d still smoke half of them even now.

But this guy can barely limp, and I can’t find

The slightest glimmer of light ahead, just black.

“Crossload his gear.” Everyone gets something.

They wait for us, we link up again, move back out.

Farther and farther, up and down, on and on.

This is not much fun, I think, with a slight pout.

No one can see my face, so I’ll pout if I like,

I just want to be rid, once and for all, of this

Terrible,

Hideous,

Malignant,

Sneering

Hateful

Ruck!

But here we are.

Forming a perimeter, facing out, catching a breath

A quick meeting in the center and the word comes out,

“We’re stopping here tonight. Rucksack flop.”

Tonight, indeed? All two hours of it before it’s light?

But at least we can stop,

Face inward,

Crouch down,

And let the ruck do the work:

Sag,

Sway,

Pull,

Fall over backwards

And rest on the ground, leaning against that beast

Like a lazyboy recliner, as all the stress

And tension drift away and are released.

Every muscle and sinew are totally relaxed,

And light and warmth and pure endorphin high

Flood every corner of my being in a rushing flow

Of pure, unbridled bliss.

A bliss which, without the rucksack, I would never know.