Soldiers used, forgotten

The soldier says it’s not that bad over here except when the cameras get set up for the bad guys to attack, so when reporters are seen we start to pray and get ready as they have their sources that can’t be compromised not even for a life.

And back at home my wife tries to manage a house without me, as she’s done four times before. And she can go on food stamps, but pride won’t let her, though the church helps because no one else will. But everyone has a hand out.

The elephant gives us pay raises and weapons, and the donkey calls us killers and cuts our funding, but both want us to do the same job after all. For 12 years “a military at war, a country at the mall.”

And when we are injured, we are forgotten; a number in a system, a skeleton in the closet. Senators lose your number; your units forget you existed. Two systems will treat you. One will say you are all used up; the other says it’s a scratch, so they don’t have to pay you.

It’s grand to be a soldier.

Sgt. Joseph Larsen

U.S. Army National Guard (retired)

Clarkston