Courage

Courage

When someone mentions courage to me, most of the time when someone mentions the word to me what imagery comes to mind about courage is that of the brave men and women sacrificing themselves in the military for our freedom here at home in America. To me, it takes alot of courage to do what the people of the military do by sacrificing their lives daily on the front lines with people shooting bullets or explosives towards them in battle. What they do to keep us safe is unbelievable when America is danger and the milatary of America had repeatedly done that time and time again from the American Revolution all the way through the current Iraq and Afghanistan Wars. There are many other ways to show courage too when faced with danger or something that tests how courageous we can be. For courage to show itself, someone is going to have to be mentally tough to withstand or to go through something that can and will be difficult or unknown, it also can bring out your biggest fears for you to face.

With a word like Cancer, someone might not think of courage but of death when it is mentioned. But With the subject it actually takes alot courage to fight the disease and to swallow the news when you here someone you know or you, yourself, have the dreadful disease. My father had it twice in a four year span and both times it was the same kind of cancer, Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma. For him it took alot of courage to fight through something as horrible as cancer. My family and I through this difficult time and unknown future, it took alot of courage for all of us to go through this trial because one of our biggest fears was shown through my dad's treatments and it was not knowing if he was going to be alive each day. We did not know what to expect because we did not know how he was going to respond to treatments especially the second go around because he had to go through a bone marrow transplant. So each day was a test for everyone in the family of our courage and our faith in not knowing what the future held to know that he could make it. Through my dad's couage and faith he was able to make it and beat cancer twice and be able to tell the story still to this day about how he beat something as scary as cancer.

There may not be any way to physically show how courageous someone is because it is something that is a mental toughness to things that can be difficult or unknown. When someone is faced with a diffcult or unkown situation, such as how to deal with having cancer, it will show itself in the persons composure in how they deal with that difficult situation. Everyone is different when faced with the same difficult situation but when they have someone to lean on it helps them get through it by being able to talk about what they are dealing with.

Cancer is something that people instinctivally afraid of because when they hear the word they immediately think of things like death and decay or people with tubes and IV's shoved in them looking like they have been starved to death while clinging to any last hope of living among other things. For me and my family through the experience we had with my dad having cancer, it was our courage, faith and encouragment to each other that helped everyone make it through. It was that mental toughness we had to fight the unknown and fear of what might be that made our courage shine for others to see.

When it comes to the military, it takes alot of courage just to join it because once your in the military your stuck there until your time is up whether it's the required minimum four to five years of service or serving your country for thirty or forty years. Then you have to go through all the rigourous training just to see if your fit for combat which takes alot of courage with all the harsh treatment and words you face during training to see if your the best of the best. Where courage shows up the most though with people in the military is when they are in combat. One of the best examples for courage showing its true self in battle is during World War Two, from June 6th, 1944 a.k.a D-Day to V-E (victory in Europe) day on May 7th, 1945. Those dates in particular is the amount of time that the 101st airborne of the U.S. military was in action. They had time off to get some rest so they wouldn't get worn out when they weren't in battle. But it was the 101st, particularly Easy Company of the 101st, that showed how much courage they had. Easy Company had complete trust in each other and no matter what happened to any member of the unit they fought courageously and bravely for their country throughout their time in Europe. Since their time in Europe, they have become famous for their courage and for their bond to each other to never let each other down. They have many books out about different members of the group and also a television series calle 'Band of Brother' about their experiences in the war.

It has and will always stand in the test of time among each individual. It was shown for everyone to learn from by the 300 spartans in the battle of thermopalyae or by the 101st airborne a.k.a 'the battered bastards of batsogne' in the Ardennes forrest in the winter of 1944 during World War II. It will be shown by those in any military in the future in whatever war may come next wherever it might occur. It will show up in those fighting a disease, such as cancer, and those loved ones of the one fighting a life threatening disease. It will always show up in a persone when dealing with something that is unknown, something which is difficult or something that can bring out your worst fears. Courage has affected me because it has shown me that through times of difficulty or being faced with the fear of something that is unknown, with the help of family and friends, I can become a better person because of the test that I am facing.