Why I can be closer to the guys I went to War with for 18 months than people I have known for years.....

I've been thinking about it a lot the last week or so and I think I can sort of explain it. Its kind of like being in a fraternity or a sorority. You live with them, eat with them, share a room with them but its more.....you work with them and its not flipping burgers or selling t-shirts.......its getting shot at daily and having people try to blow you up 3 or 4 times a week. Its agonizing while listening to a fire fight on the radio, wishing you were there because Joes you know are in the shit. Its knowing that if you get hurt, they WILL come for you....try to save you....or at the very least, they will bring you home. Knowing this.....not thinking it, not saying it like a platitude but doing it. You don't think you trust these guys with your life, you don't say you trust them with your life....you just DO.

Now....I have friends back here. We eat dinner together from time to time. We hang out....watch movies, play games.....you know....'normal' stuff. Some of them are more like family to me than my blood family. Are any of them as close to me as the guy I was borderline hating in my platoon? No....and its not due to any failings on their part.....its the difference between absolute certainty tested again and again under fire and an absence of that same certainty based on daily life back here in the 'real world'.

I was at a Scottish games this weekend. At the closing Massed Bands they played Amazing Grace for almost 5 minutes. My thoughts drifted to those I served with who fell and those who have fallen since and I was wiping away tears for Brothers I have never met. Had they played Taps I think I would have wept openly.

And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember'd;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.
Henry V by William Shakespeare