The Invisible Tribe
ok, i wrote a post similar to this, not that long ago, but i’ve been doing a lot of digging into military culture, military brat culture, the way military childhood affected me and others in preparation for what I hope will one day be some sort of book. but that’s not what i want to talk about now.
in the course of poking around on the internet, i found a forum where brats were talking about what it meant to grow up military. one comment in particular totally nailed down how i’ve been feeling lately:
“I think the experience of finally “settling down” sometimes feels like “settling”, a betrayal of that particular survival instinct that never accepts stasis as a reality … Time displacement lurks in the corners of our souls, and the present tense of our lives is really a rehersal for some mysterious future tense. We have to learn to relax and let our present be our present tense, if that is possible.”
The first line is especially profound for me - one of my greatest fears in life is to wake up one day, five or ten years down the road, and realize i’ve “settled” for a life i didn’t want for myself. so to counteract this, i do crazy things like start planning another move after i’ve only been in a city for six months, or switch jobs every year or so, or try to travel one week out of every month, or go live in asia for 2 1/2 months.
I also have an impossible time letting the present be the present. for as long as i can remember, i’ve been planning the next stage of my life - which goes back to being afraid of “settling.” When i was in high school, i planned for college (applied early and got accepted my junior year, actually), when i was in college i rushed through to get married (finished in 2 1/2 years), after i got married, i started racing through cities, jobs, endeavors, ideas.
for example i’ve always enjoyed writing, but i’ve never felt like i’ve found a specific “passion” on which to hinge my propensity for words. At first it was TV reporting, then it was TV producing, then it was cable TV. Throw in a mix of newspaper writing, PR, even some social minded endeavours and you get a good snap shot of the past few years.
i’m not sure i know how exactly, but i’m pretty confident that my inability to settle has something to do with my propensity to always be searching - whether that be for my passion, a job, a new place to live.
one of the posts on this forum was written by a guy who’s compiling info for a book of his own on what he says is the “sad legacy” of brats. on this point, i have to disagree. It’s true that i can explain a lot of my flaws and shortcomings by looking to how i was raised. (but isn’t that true of any introspective 20-something?) But i also have my upbringing to thank for some of the things i’m most proud of about myself, for some of my greatest relationships - most importantly the one with my family, and some of the most amazing experiences a person could want.