things to appreciate while in the army - Time...

It's 8 pm on a Friday evening. Having just finished my afternoon shift I am wandering around a deserted basketball court surrounded by parked cars. On one side the windows of the dorms where I am to spend half of the night (until my early morning shift starts at 3.30 am). Right opposite, a three-meter wall that separates ours (the General Military Hospital) from the one of the National Air Force. Facing westwards I can make out the sound of cars in the not so distant avenue and the fading lights of a city that is about to start the weekend. Then I turn and look towards the east. Just a few meters outside the wall, there lies the Institute of Biomedical Research of the Academy of Athens. A brand new building made out of a mix of robust yellowish bricks and grey double windows, a proud specimen of that arrogant architecture, reserved for newly-founded research institutes and post-modern bank mansions. Down here I am left with my solitary walk, trying to stretch a bit before my early night sleep, bound to be interrupted at 3 am. Up there, young (and perhaps some not so young) scientists are probably adding the final (and for some not so final) touches to today's experiments. And the fact that their lights are all lit at this time of day doesn't surprise me at all.

Less than a year ago, I was one of them, spending Friday evenings in the cosiness of my milky-lit office, trying to put stuff in order so as for my week not to appear completely lost. Less than a year ago, it looked like there was never enough time. Time for working things out, time for getting the calculations right, time for having a new brilliant idea that would change the course of a stagnating project, sometimes not even time for having a drink before going to bed. Less than a year ago, I hated my job (and I have some really angry posts dated from back then to prove it). Less than a year ago I was thinking of my military service as a way out from a way of life I thought I was fed up with.

But last night, while walking up and down that empty basketball court, listening to Explosions in the Sky's powerful medleys of appeasing and awe-inspiring melodies, the unthinkable happened. Suddenly, I wanted my old life back. Despite all the burdens of it, despite all the load that made me hate my job back then. Last night, I would gladly take off my uniform and join the people on the other side of the wall, take up their problems, read the papers they would hand me, allow their problems to bother my little mind. Despite of all the time they would be lacking, the stress and anxiety of getting things done before Monday's group meeting, I would gladly offer to take their place. I realized that all the things that seemed meaningless and boring, less than a year ago, had regained their old electric-like aura.

And I knew that because there, in the middle of that stupid basketball court, in that incredibly uncomfortable uniform, with "Explosions in the Sky" on my headphones and all that time on my hands, all I could think of doing, all I could do, was to take out my small pocket notepad and write down, single-handedly what appeared to be my next "brilliant" idea.