Future Primal. Louis G. Herman

his running heels as he dove into another bunker. At that range, had I wished to, I could have shot hit him square in the chest. But suddenly it seemed pointless. Strangely, there was no follow-up, and we let a potentially dangerous combatant escape. Everyone was sick of killing. But the moment I pulled the trigger, I knew I had crossed a line. There was no doubt, had I felt even slightly threatened, I would have shot to kill. I realized with grim satisfaction that I had transformed myself from a sensitive scholar into a soldier who would do his murderous duty mechanically, without feeling very much at all. It was an encounter with some dark part of myself I had previously doubted existed. It was a bottoming out, both sobering and empowering. I started to realize all possibilities are within us. Saint or sinner, killer or hero, it all depends on circumstance and choice. And choice depends on awareness.

      When I met up with my company, they had been moving south toward the city of Suez, fighting down the Egyptian side of the canal. As they advanced, their commander, my old lieutenant, ordered that all wounded Egyptians were to be taken along and cared for. A close friend told me how he had watched an Egyptian soldier die slowly of terrible wounds we had inflicted, dying with a bloodstained photograph of loved ones in his hand. We were sharing intimacies with strangers we were trying to kill. It was a sad and wretched business. At one time I had imagined signing on for officers’ school. Now the adventure of a lifetime had dead-ended in another cave — a mausoleum.

      Two months later, the peace accord with Egypt was under way, and we hitched home. For days and weeks afterward, when I would see a bundle by the roadside as I drove along, I would think I was looking at a corpse. Yet I was very fortunate. The war was a glancing blow, not enough to damage or disable me, but enough to get my full attention. I returned to civilian life with no interest in pursuing family and professional life. Instead of leaving me cynical, the war reinforced my conviction that the quest was critical. The question “What’s it all about?” took on a life-and-death urgency. A life of action pushed me back into the university and back into philosophy.

       A Path with a Heart