Lost

A very good friend of mine is joining the Army Reserves. This is not a big thing really except that he retired from the Navy Reserves after 24 years and 3 tours in the Mid East. He was there in 1990 for Desert Storm. He went back in 2003 and 2005 for the Iraq war.

I was hanging out with him at Comic-con after he got back from Iraq in 2005. He was having a hard time with the adjustment back into"real life." I was pointing out something I thought was cool. He said he had a hard time getting excited about anything. This stunned me. I didn't know what to do with that or know what to say.

The experience in Iraq was so heightened that the normal world doesn't compare. When I saw The Hurt Locker I knew exactly what it was describing. When I hung out with him at Comic-con this year he said pretty much the same thing he said 5 years ago. He said he missed the war. Things over there made sense. Since I have never had that type of experience, I don't have any frame of reference.

I think he's kind of lost. So am I in my own way. He has a wife and kids. I have yet to figure that normal stuff out. But he feels the need to go back to something that made sense to him. His wife understands. But his kids are too young to know what is going on.

So my response to this news is; I feel lost too.