Eternal Soldier

Written By: F. John Surells

SPOKEN TO THE ETERNAL SOLDIER: Eternal Soldier guide me through the temporal into the eternal. Guard me and all others, lest false prophets of everyday social, economic, religious, political, philosophical, psychological and mental suppositions lead us eventually to where the master of darkness reigns absent the sunshine of everlasting vindication.
And Eternal Soldier, I see you mainly through artful and political reflections. And to me you symbolize many things, factors, and possibilities. But I feel your most important representation is that of what I term “The Man Who Admits He Doesn’t Know What May Or May Not Have Happened As A Result Of Actions Either Taken Or Not Committed.” And as time has passed, I’ve found I’ve reached a point at which I can honestly say that I’d have rather spent eight or so hours a day engaged in honest labor, and seeking an honest lifestyle, than to have angered, disappointed, and betrayed my fellow members of humanity by furthering left-wing viewpoints in a legislative body wherein some years ago certain members apparently didn’t know the difference between Mars and Earth’s moon.
SPOKEN TO THE READERS: Yes, we’ve all made choices, and often, when looking back upon them, I think we amplify the good they either facilitated or left undone, and forget to ponder what evil may have occurred had we not made them. And that’s why Eternity’s Soldier fights against all that’s hurtful and/or misunderstood. And in his struggle he exemplifies the fact that a life lived politically slightly right of center is a life lived well.
But mental insights can easily slip away from one. And then, minus the compass of right living, it’s often difficult for mortals to remain as wayfarers upon life’s symbolic roadway, i.e. the straight and narrow. And, despite whether or not one remains on the rightful highway, one often reaches a point at which one begins to believe that the importance of human personalities, traits, and tendencies is outweighed by the consequences they engender. And that’s a realization which often aids mortals to accept that differences between them are natural separations.
Yet, aren’t there also “awakenings” or junctures in time in which one realizes that, for better or worse, an era has ended? And doesn’t that realization then almost always instill a sense of small fear within one? Well, it’s at that point that I am today.
I’m assuming that everyone has his or her own interpretations of what “truly significant” events are or have been. And, I believe most mortals can surely separate such events as have had a lasting impact upon humanity from those which have had no noticeable effect. And yes, that latter group does include the most mundane daily tasks. But it’s to such routine undertakings and, more precisely, to those which are more uncommon and may have had effects upon certain (usually localized) groups, whereof the next paragraph of this discourse speaks.
It’s my opinion, given an incident or group of incidents involving matters which will surely be of little importance to the masses, that a point is eventually reached at which continued speculation about it or them constitutes nothing more than gossip. Yet, that’s not to say that any action that ever occurred in the past should ever be lied about, given a new reason to replace the one which actually facilitated it, or be used in the present to justify actions other than the one it initially sought justification for.
But whenever I think back to all I’ve seen, heard, said, and done, I find I’m simultaneously glad and sad about more than one would probably imagine. And I’ve spent a lifetime trying to understand life and time, yet still to this day know little of them except their perpetual motion. But I’ve known a lot of “good people” – at least that’s what they felt they were. And I never said much about or to them. Most of them considered themselves better mortals than I, and many of them no doubt were. But their stories and rumors didn’t change matters in the end. Oh, but maybe those verbal judgements made them feel good about themselves.
Or did they feel so good about themselves that they thought they were right to throw tomato soup at a work of Van Gogh, or mashed potatoes at a work of Monet? Well, I hope the world has learned a lesson from the incidents just alluded to. Apparently there are some “trash people” who think that dishonoring past greatness will aid them in their future futility. They can’t match the creativity of great artists, and therefore in jealousy try to demean or destroy what those artists left as gifts to mankind. And, one wonders if the art vandals have any comprehension of, or perhaps just don’t care about how the creators of great paintings often suffered mentally and physically to produce what should be everlasting impressions on canvas.
But I don’t know how much outsiders of my city “pay” for indiscretions. Certainly the world’s great works of art will now need to be more closely guarded. Yet, I also don’t know how some people are able to consider their acts of vandalism as glorious actions.
Nonetheless, most likely the answers to those questions, as well as the answers to all others, lie in the free flow of time. A free flow which no one, despite his or her political viewpoint or stupidities, will ever be able to alter.
And as time flows freely, so does the traffic on the highways into and out of my city. Our roadways are open here. And travelers travel upon them. But the residents of this city remain basically the same.
And some may wonder how an area that stresses conservatism and individuality can function with what seems to be a sense of unity. I believe rightness of character and values makes it possible. Of course we face detractors. And today, in Washington D.C., a large group of leftists (some of them radicals), led by a befuddled and aging ringleader, is attempting to confiscate the freedoms of all Americans. And the ringleader is now trying to persuade voters to vote for candidates of his party. He thinks forgiving their debts and lowering their gas prices will do the trick. In reality however, it’s only his own ego he’s concerned with, just the same as those who are throwing things at works of art. Don’t be fooled by acts of stupidity. The people committing them care about themselves only – no one, and nothing else.
And thus, it’s upon our struggle against these left-wing crackpots that the unification of this city is founded. And personally, I’ve come to adopt a fictional hero as my representation of the constant struggle against liberal, social, and commune isms. I call him The Eternal Soldier.
But, in a manner of speaking, I’ve just relearned something I’ve always known! Only a Divine Being knows how many stories, along with their corresponding hopes and fears, lie within mankind’s reach of human time. And only eternity’s judges know of the specialness or commonplaceness of those stories. Yet, each mortal has been, or still is an actor upon his or her respective stage of performance; in a manner similar to which each grain of sand is but a second in the desert of passing time.