Yesterday a veteran came to school to talk about his experience in the war. On July 4, this eighteen year old soldier was hit in the head by a bullet and a grenade blew off one of his legs and the other one around his waist, and left one of his hands hanging by flesh to his hands. He said that when he woke up he felt worthless. He said that he lay paralyzed for eight months. Then he began to work hard to recover from the wounds, until he was able to walk again. He said that the feeling of being able to walk is so intense, but it someone who has not suffered such a tragedy cannot realize how it feels because we were so young when we started walking for the first time.

One of the things that changed me from his talk was his respect he commanded. He said that no matter what our feeling is on the war we should still support the soldiers that go to war. He suggest that when we see veterans that we can say, “I do not support the war, but I still want to say thank you.” He said that there was so much apathy and contention against the war that he would have to lie about how he lost his leg. He would tell stories about how he got into a motorcycle accident and people would be concerned and ask a lot of questions. However, when he told about his injuries in war people would close off and not pay attention to him. This was an important lesson for me to learn from the speaker.