Musings on life in general

[aadler]

 
A little over ten years ago, in one of the classes that served as a precursor for my Master’s curriculum, I took a life-stress survey. This was simply a check-off of all the identified stress events I had experienced in the preceding year, with varying point values for the different events, and multiple scores for those events I had undergone more than once during that year. According to the scale, a total score of 100 was about normal, 200 would indicate sufficient stress to be worth some serious concern, and 300 was the point at which you could expect to see the stress-level beginning to affect your physical health.

My score? 1,014.

Granted, that was a rough year, but it wasn’t the worst point of my life, either. My wife had filed for divorce after I returned to college on her recommendation, and I was hell-bent on finishing the program I had set myself. I can remember that, two out of three summers, I worked three jobs while maintaining half-time classes; two out of three summers, I drove to the nearest metropolitan center three times a week to sell my plasma for extra cash; obviously, then, during one of those summers I was doing both. For three years straight, I got a full night’s sleep only twice a week; the rest of the time, I slept in two- to five-hour blocks as they came available.

(Incidentally, I made a single B in my Master’s courses. The rest, straight A all the way. I was driven.)

This is not me bemoaning how hard my life has been. No, I look back on that period of furious, relentless determination as one of my major growth experiences. It was a long, sustained push, requiring imagination as well as grit, adaptability as well as perseverance, discipline undergirding commitment. I would be a different person — and have a radically different life — if I hadn’t taken on that task and made it work.

Iraq was nothing after that. My biggest problem on coming home was losing the weight I had gained while living in “Mortarita-ville”. I had operated in three separate field teams and done my platoon sergeant’s job while he was on leave, and the whole tour was like a vacation with pay.

While I was going through those three years, the only thing I could focus on was that I would not fail. I couldn’t have known, then, that the eventual success would matter less to me than what I had to find within myself in order to achieve it.

That’s life. You can always count on there being a surprise twist.

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[aadler]

It would have been impossible, determination or not, if the construction of my brain hadn’t given me two specific advantages:

First, I can pick up almost anything by reading it. Reading it once. I had to spend more time than that going over specific technical information, but I could grasp all the basic themes — and most of the subsidiary ones — the first time through. That’s a blessing, not a virtue; without it, I simply wouldn’t have had the time to study properly.

Second, I could sleep anytime the time was available. I know people who’ve worked hard all their lives, but their sleep cycle is so delicate that if they don’t go to bed at the right time, or something wakes them unexpectedly, they can’t sleep properly. Me, I could come in at 10:00 PM from my first job, sleep till 11:35 PM, get up and dress and make it to my second job by midnight. That allowed me to keep going when, without it, I would have collapsed within a month.

See what I mean by a combat tour being easy by comparison? I’ve been really lucky in my life.