That AllenS posted over at TOP in the women in combat thread.
Thank you for your service sir!
(one question though....what happened to the parrot?)
Michaleen Flynn: No patty-fingers, if you please. The proprieties at all times. Hold on to your hats
AllenS wrote...
ReplyDelete"You don't realize anything, Inga. You're a fool. Not only are you a fool, but a damned fool."
Wow, just wow. AllenS - you are the man. Thank you for your service, then and now. You are an American, something that can be said about vanishingly few people these days.
I feel like Plato, watching the shadows on the wall...
ReplyDeleteIt was a good thread. Worth reading for what was said by those with real lived experience in serving with and without women present.
ReplyDeleteOn a personal note, I appreciated the "thousand yard stare" comment along with the picture (and pictures). I wasn't familiar with the term, but recognized the look, having seen a similar look come over the faces of those who've experienced early childhood trauma and abuse. It's a faraway look that comes and goes, usually in response to an unrecognized trigger. If asked "What are you thinking? or What are you feeling?, during such a time, the answer is often an emotionless "I don't know" with a slow return to the present.
Looking up the term led to this: the limp, unfocused gaze of a battle-weary soldier, but the symptom it describes may also be found among victims of other types of trauma. A characteristic of post-traumatic stress disorder,[1] the despondent stare reflects dissociation from trauma..."The look in their eyes was like the life was sucked out of them."
Yes.
With despondency identified as: deep state of gloom and disheartenment.
Loss of heart, while the body continues to function in a disconnected, flat-line form.
The parrot is still alive. In fact, there are two of them. Sandy and Homer who own them wonder what will happen to them after they pass on. Parrots live a long, long time.
ReplyDeleteAllenS, I read the thread. You were Sugar Ray Robinson and she was a club fighter.
ReplyDeleteYou know she reads this and she seethes. But, she's a fucking coward. At least her daughter got some balls..obviously from her dad.
ReplyDeleteAllen S, Thank you for your service.
ReplyDeleteAnd why that idiot seems eager for her daughter to enter into combat is utterly puzzling. I hate when people attempt to calim glory for things they didn't do, couldn't do, and will never do.
I hear that, Mr. Haz - it is easy for me to get caught up in rhetoric and forensics and taking sides and whatnot, but I try not bask in the reflected glory of my relatives who have served and continue to serve. My sister has been expressing concern about her current situation in the army, her husband just got back from a hot zone and now she will be deployed - it is stressing her mightily. But I have never been through what she and her family are going through, so all I can do is wish her well and hope she makes it home safely.
ReplyDeleteI guess there is one relative I can relate to - my great grandfather who served as a private in Company G, 11th Mississippi Cavalry (Perrin's). He was AWOL at the end of the war. My kind of guy. Kind of the opposite of Lt. Dan's family history.
He lived long enough to see our country involved in WWI, and his widow was alive when my older brothers were toddlers - that amazes me - my brothers met the widow of a Civil War veteran.
Okay, enough of this memory lane strolling - have to go do some work out in the cold. I hate the cold and think I didn't move far enough south...
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ReplyDeleteJust went and read the thread.
ReplyDeleteKudos to Allen S and thank you, and everyone else who served then and NOW for your service. My first husband spent two tours in combat in Vietnam, volunteered before there was a draft. I've seen that thousand yard stare.
Inga...what an ignorant, self centered crunt.
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ReplyDeleteI meant joined before the lottery. I think his start date was 1960 and was then sent to combat later. He re-upped two more times.
ReplyDeleteThank you, everyone. Your words are much appreciated.
ReplyDelete