Veterans are returned travellers

At some point in your life, you stop and ask yourself whether you are unique. The answer is always, "Of course!" Of course, as a whole you are--no one has the exact combination of stuff (eye color, laugh, family history, interests, personal history, etc.), right? You are unique from the combination of thousands of biological and personal events. You get to wondering though--are you unique from anything that you have done?

Well, I am not so sure that I have done anything truly unique and novel to humankind. I am not even sure that anything unique has ever happened to me. But so many sad events happened to me last year that I felt unique. I felt alone, experiencing things far outside the normal run of life.

Even now, my perspective regained, I still feel like I am part of a smaller club of humanity now than I was before. My experience-peer circle has shrunk dramatically. And now I begin to wonder why I ever wanted to be unique. Knowing you are different is one thing: suspecting you are a rare combination is loneliness itself.

But sometimes (and I for one can testify to this), bad years start with planes crashing into trees a hundred yards from your office. You can't duck it and you can't ignore it. When you walk out the other side of your bad year, back into the world, your only punishment and only reward is a normal life. Veteran's can attest to this: life is sometimes Penelope, and life is sometimes the Odyssey. You can tell Penelope about the Odyssey, but it won't make you happy. You are much better off just kissing her, and laughing at the wind in the trees.

God, the wind in the crabapple blossoms was lovely today. Am I unique? Of course. But who cares? Only I saw the wind I saw today.