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April 17, 2013 - Afghanistan deployment empathy existential Marine perspective
(http://thoughtrepair.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/img_5996.gif) Me writing, en-route to Afghanistan, Nov. 2009 I want you to try to imagine something. You’re the son of two deaf parents, an aspiring teenage novelist struggling to make the leap to college, so you join the Marines. Why the Marines? To get a taste of something raw, for good writing material. You go to boot camp, learn some language (Arabic and Pashto), dig into the Marine warrior culture, and deploy to Afghanistan. You’re me, three years ago. By then of course, I had somehow changed my mind and wanted to be a psychologist.
Now that I’ve won your readership in the second paragraph, I’d actually like you to spend a little time re-reading the first one. If you’re like most people, there’s a part (or three) in there that you disconnected from, that re-translated what I wrote to “one of those guys.” Resist the re-translation and automatic categorization.
I’m not patronizing you, I’m highlighting a natural phenomenon in how we efficiently understand each other, and my belief in our ability to actually understand each other.
Anytime we process new information, including that of other people, we use a host of assumptions which facilitate our comprehension. It’s easier to put new information into what we already know about the world. Anytime something comes along that doesn’t comfortably fit with what we already know we change our understanding in order to accommodate the new information.
You can call the latter technique being open-minded, but it’s a bit more than that. If you don’t have deaf parents for instance, it wouldn’t be enough to imagine the sound turned off for your caregivers, in order to say you get it. But here’s the crucial juncture: To know you can’t completely relate doesn’t mean you shouldn’t attempt to. Your brain is a richer ball of neurons if you try to imagine yourself in my shoes.
If you haven’t put your feet on the yellow footsteps of Marine boot-camp, I’ll buy you a Reese’s peanut butter cup (my favorite) for at least imagining the fear of disappointing an angry drill instructor.
Start with this: we’re all made of the same stuff, and we have the same general laws of existence. Hurt hurts, elation is great, etc. That’s the basic material needed to be in my shoes. You might say, “but why did you choose to do that, or how did you, why didn’t you, I would’ve–” those are all great opportunities to instead ask how you would’ve come to make the same choices I did. By insisting we’re made of the same stuff and that I can possibly be you and vice versa, we keep the people around us as real as we imagine ourselves are. And I promise: 50 people will instantly friend-request you on Facebook.
A little over three years ago now, I returned from Afghanistan. My deployment was the culmination of four years of stateside training and work, and for a Marine Sergeant it was a rite-of-passage I had eagerly anticipated. Spoiler alert: I come back without any special medals and gratefully in one piece.
But It’s not that simple. My goal at the outset was to bring friends and family with me as I redefined myself during this significant time. I was committed to creating wearable shoes for everyone, but by my return I no longer was certain of who I was.
My hope is this writing will be an exercise in a different kind of thought repair. The muddy one of living others’ lives. But on a superficial level at least, here are my writings from Afghanistan. I’m re-posting them with pictures from the deployment.
Please enjoy. I was serious about rewarding you with Reese’s.
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