Two Roads Diverged in a Desert Wood

Up and down the brown, packed clay dust my fellow soldiers run, .

It is a strip of dirt road here at Camp Liberty, the teeth of the rhinos and other war machines having clawed divots into the ground you can trip over. You will run past trailer after trailer and other metallic buildings. A depressing, dusty run as your lungs fill with the fine dust. You see, around the work buildings and living trailer areas of Camp Liberty there is a 'If it Grows... it Goes" policy. I have many times seen bulldozers literally come in and bulldoze around our living and work spaces to assure nothing but the light brown dirt will comprise the space. If shrubs and other desert fauna begin to grow they are eradicated. I somehow know there is a more scenic run.. one that would prepare a soldier psychologically for the 10-12 hour day or nights work that awaited them. I ventured out to find this road. First I ran down the brown road and to my right.. far off... could it be?

YES, it was. The distinctine outline of palm trees all in a line. As I ran and picked up speed, I suddenly saw form a series of beautiful structures... grass thatched canopies over picnic tables... a beautiful lake... bullrushes lining the edge of it, and I immediately imagine little baby Moses, 5000 years earlier, his basket floating in them... bobbing, just before Pharoah's daughter finds him and a Christian legacy begins.

As I run several miles along this beautiful stretch I return to dirtland and also to a stark realization about soldier's experiences here.

There are soldiers who, under the stressors and demands placed upon them, make choices on their own behalf which are of a destructive nature... picking fights with their senior enlisted or officers, or destroying or stealing property belonging to others or the government. When we see these soldiers at the clinic, many do not see alternatives to their past poor choices, and sometimes, our guidance towards another path will go in vain. Others, however, even those who engage in the most traumatizing or stressful of occupational specialties (mortuary affairs, IED (bomb) disposal, military police) make a very profound decision. It is part of one of the classes our fitness center offers. If one can change their environment to a more positive one, do so. If this is not possible at the present time, change your perception from within the stressful environment you find yourself in. One POW in the Vietnam war would survive Psychologically after torture and starving by holding 9 inning baseball games in the sand of his cell, intricately crafting players, bases, and stadiums out of twigs and smooth stones. He couldn't change his environment, so he changed his perception. One soldier here began by cursing the Army that he was voluntarily drafted, lost $20,000 annual salary, and separated from his wife and children, while becoming so embittered he began cursing his wife from here, quarreling about the smallest things daily! When challenged to change his perception and turn it on it's head... he finally understood that he must accept his fate and make the very best of it. Not a 40 or 50% effort, but a literal give it all you got 100% effort. He chose to find ways to connect and bond with his wife even from afar. He went to amazon.com and purchased two books... one for he, and one for his wife of the same inspirational copy. They then read together or on their own and over the phone discussed perspectives and daily thoughts and dreams on their reading and most important, each other. It strengthened and revitalized their marriage. Soon they will come together in 17 days.. stronger than they ever were before. Here.. in a place where explosions are heard throughout the day and night, and choppers fly overhead constantly.. we can make the very best of a bad situation, or led the bad situation beat any last inkling of joy out of you. I choose the former. I choose not to run the dusty brown road... because another environment is available and it revitalizes my spirits... where I can imagine I am on the Island of Oahu, Hawaii perhaps.. and just around the corner from this lake is the ocean surf. (Won't happen.. but hope wins out and the day begins with a prayerful peace and serenity which carries me for hours and hours). In the words of one war-torn infantry soldier in the last two weeks of his 16 months here... "I had two choices here. Get busy living, or get busy dying. I choose living". So many people that see dying just begin to do the same to themselves since it's so familiar. The less common path is living life physically, socially, emotionally, and spiritually to it's absolute healthiest, fullest, potential. Physical vitality, socially lifting others up, emotional health and genuineness, and a daily walk with God.

It reminds me of the Robert Frost poem The Road Not Taken..

=TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.