PTSD Patrol: What is in your dash?

It is the middle that matters

PTSD Patrol
Kathie Costos
February 17, 2019

When you look at your dash, there are a lot of things it can tell you. In the center, you see how far you've traveled and how fast you are going at this very moment.

THE DASH by Linda Ellis is one of those poems that is usually delivered when it is too late for the person being remembered to benefit from. It is not so much for the person being buried, but for those gathered to be able to think about their own lives.

This is part of that poem.

"He noted that first came the date of birth and spoke of the following date with tears, but he said what mattered most of all was the dash between those years."

While we have no control over when we arrive into this world, we do have control over what we do between the dates used to acknowledge we were here at all.

"For that dash represents all the time they spent alive on earth and now only those who loved them know what that little line is worth."

Question; What is your line worth? Can you see it all or is it mostly a blur with symbols you cannot really understand?

This veteran served in Vietnam. We know he was born in 1940 and died in 2008. 

What else happened in between the space of those dates is known only to those who knew him. There were a lot of veterans mixed in with civilians, and for the most part, that is the way they spend their lives as well. Mixed in with people who saw them all the time and never had a clue what they did serving this country.

So what is in your dash? What is missing from it? What can you add to it? The other thing is, if you are thinking about giving up, do you want to be remembered for the way you died? Or do you want to be remembered for what you did in your life?