I was driving to a meeting in town today.
During the short journey I listened to an item on The World Today.
Nancy Sherman was being interviewed about Robert Bales.
Robert had four deployments to the Middle East in ten years. During his deployments in Iraq, Robert had an injury to his foot, suffered a head injury and saw other soldiers wounded.
Nancy talked about the toll this experience takes.
She pointed out that “we fail to appreciate what multiple deployments in grinding ground wars for the past decade have looked like and felt like”. Her work in this area is shared in The Untold War.
In two days I have listened to Deidre Anderson talk about sport transitions and Nancy talking about the moral challenges of going to war and returning home. Notwithstanding the enormous differences between the two contexts (war and sport) I am struck by the narrative synergy about accounts of transitions.
I think we have a great deal to learn about and share in caring for people whom society sets off on journeys deemed important to the nation state … and yet ignores on return.
Photo Credit
Rainbow Valley
