What would you die for...
An interesting conversation developed yesterday between myself and one of my favorite classmates, Robin. She is usually a very ebullient person who is excited to share what I at least find to be unusually interesting information from the web. (This is during idle chatter in lab time mind you...) Anyway, yesterday she was very quiet and looked almost as if she had been crying. I asked if she was ok and she deferred that she "just wasn't feeling too well". I couldn't help but think that it was something emotional rather than physical that was bothering her.
Regardless, she consented to talk with me and quietly offered up some deep and ponderous questions. I was not expecting to hear all of the answers that I spoke. The first question was about what I felt about the place where I lived; San Ramon. Funny, but this has been a deep matter for me to consider over the past 35 years that I have lived here and in just the past two weeks I've been contemplating the question more deeply than I have in awhile. "If you don't like it there, why don't you move away?" is the gist of what people end up saying to me when I complain that I have no friends in this city and that I hate the artificial, soccer-mom/business-park culture that people move here to take part in. I usually answer that I am "god's prisoner here, serving my time for past crimes." Or in simpler terms, that I am karmically bound to this place, and that until I endure my karmic obligation to this place I will not be free to live in a
~Santa Cruz or Berkeley~.
Robin's next question was unexpected though and I still don't understand the connection. I for a moment thought that maybe she was interviewing me, anthropologically as a researcher does an informant, except I don't know that she is actually studying anthropology. Anyway, she asked, "What does it mean to you to be an American?" She spoke more with her tear burgeoning eyes than she did with her voice, so I paused and looked deep inside myself for the answer. I diatribed for a little bit, just to get my thoughts flowing, but then said, "Well, what do you want to know? Whether I'd die for my country?" She said "no", but I continued. "Being "American" means that I have the life I have today, and yes, to defend this life I woulddie for my country.
One of my other favorite classmates, Rick, then chimed in. "I'm sorry to butt in but I couldn't help being impressed by what you just said. In my philosophy class we just had a discussion about this. There were two military men in the class; one of which, a Marine who said he too would die for his country. The other from the Air Force said that he would not die for his country. So what makes the difference? For me it is more of a question of respect for the spirit of life than it is of allegiance to a nation. Hmm, or is it...
So what would you die for? Your country? A loved one? Would you put yourself in harms way to protect or save a stranger? Or an innocent animal? How far would you go??
Regardless, she consented to talk with me and quietly offered up some deep and ponderous questions. I was not expecting to hear all of the answers that I spoke. The first question was about what I felt about the place where I lived; San Ramon. Funny, but this has been a deep matter for me to consider over the past 35 years that I have lived here and in just the past two weeks I've been contemplating the question more deeply than I have in awhile. "If you don't like it there, why don't you move away?" is the gist of what people end up saying to me when I complain that I have no friends in this city and that I hate the artificial, soccer-mom/business-park culture that people move here to take part in. I usually answer that I am "god's prisoner here, serving my time for past crimes." Or in simpler terms, that I am karmically bound to this place, and that until I endure my karmic obligation to this place I will not be free to live in a
~Santa Cruz or Berkeley~.
Robin's next question was unexpected though and I still don't understand the connection. I for a moment thought that maybe she was interviewing me, anthropologically as a researcher does an informant, except I don't know that she is actually studying anthropology. Anyway, she asked, "What does it mean to you to be an American?" She spoke more with her tear burgeoning eyes than she did with her voice, so I paused and looked deep inside myself for the answer. I diatribed for a little bit, just to get my thoughts flowing, but then said, "Well, what do you want to know? Whether I'd die for my country?" She said "no", but I continued. "Being "American" means that I have the life I have today, and yes, to defend this life I woulddie for my country.
One of my other favorite classmates, Rick, then chimed in. "I'm sorry to butt in but I couldn't help being impressed by what you just said. In my philosophy class we just had a discussion about this. There were two military men in the class; one of which, a Marine who said he too would die for his country. The other from the Air Force said that he would not die for his country. So what makes the difference? For me it is more of a question of respect for the spirit of life than it is of allegiance to a nation. Hmm, or is it...
So what would you die for? Your country? A loved one? Would you put yourself in harms way to protect or save a stranger? Or an innocent animal? How far would you go??
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