Opinion: The Veteran’s Voice

By Bob Hollingsworth
The Guardsman

What is a veteran? Well according to the online Merriam-Webster dictionary a Veteran is simply described as “a former member of the armed forces.” That doesn’t really give a detailed description. According to my personal imaginative dictionary, which you will find me quoting from very frequently, a veteran is much more. A veteran is someone who committed himself or herself to a service of sacrifice for a limited or extended duration of his or her life to preserve the freedoms of those that may not be willing or may not be able to preserve those freedoms for themselves.

Many people may see benefits to being a veteran, like free school. I am glad to say free school is a benefit that I here at City College appreciate greatly. Others may see the benefit of having a handicap placard and free parking. There are also the other benefits of unemployment insurance for up to two years, disability compensation, and not to mention the experience of a lifetime. All these and many more benefits are great but what about the sacrifices made to earn those benefits? How free really was our school?

How do the long hours standing in formation learning discipline, rifle training, overworked hours that drain body, mind, and soul, and not to mention trudging the desert and foreign lands just to meet new, exciting, and exotic people who wanted to hurt us for our beliefs in preserving freedom give us benefits?

The free parking? Most of us would probably trade our free parking for a new pair of legs or hands. Unemployment insurance? With the skills we have we should not have to be unemployed. We could walk into a McDonald’s or a Donald Trump Company and own that business with our knowledge. Yet, here we are.

Many veterans suffer from mental and physical conditions beyond the understanding of many. Take the time to learn and read about the symptoms of your hero veterans and understand them. You might discover a quality of humility and servitude you may not have seen before.

Veterans also have the “hero complex”. My therapist tells me it is not a complex but rather and genuine quality. We have been trained to help those in need and we do a great job of helping each other. The problem comes sometimes when we attempt to reach out to help a fellow class mate in need and our motivations are questioned. So if a veteran offers his or her help, just take the help and go about your day or kindly decline the help in a way that is non-judgemental. Some of us have trouble with guilt and depression and helping someone in need is a way we make sense of our past.

I’m not complaining and neither would I want to seem ungrateful. Don’t forget the ones who are no longer with us, who sacrificed all for your freedoms. Remember to thank the ones who made it back and are sitting next to you in class. The next time a veteran introduces himself or herself remember to say, “Thank you for your sacrifice.”