Why I Respect Veterans
By Rian Adams
I’m thankful that I served the United States, and I proudly respect veterans who served before me, and after me.
Recently I realized, yet again, why I respect veterans so much. A few days ago I drove up on a bad wreck, I didn’t know exactly what happened as I approached in my little green pick-up truck with 210,000 miles but I could see a van overturned in the middle of the highway.
There were a few people, perhaps five or six gathered around the van. I parked my truck and ran to the incident. There was a man in the middle of the highway, face down and unconscious. The road rash was terrible, his elbow was raw, and his broken bone protruded about an inch past his skin. Blood leaked from his mouth and blood streaked down the back of his neck from his ear.
It was gruesome, everyone else stood back. But a few men knelt beside the injured man in the street.
I respect veterans because they push forward in spite of what they have seen.
I grabbed my first aid kit and ran to the accident. “How can I help? I have emergency medical training,” I said. The men I saw on arrival were still by the injured man’s side. They checked for a pulse, and for his breath.
It’s interesting that veterans can spot veterans. There’s a way that a person acts, talks, and carries themselves, that suggests they served their country in combat. We recognize one another with no words.
There was a man at the scene, only twenty-four years old, kneeling next to the injured man. The young man had blood on his hands, he had no gloves. It amazed me because the blood didn’t stop him; he saw a person in need and went towardthe scene. This young man was identifiable by his grunt style brand of T-shirt. I knew he served in Afghanistan as an 11 Bravo.
Another man knelt beside the injured man, he was older than the first, perhaps thirty. I could tell he was a veteran by the soldier’s cross tattooed on his arm. It had the names of his friend’s birth and death dates tattooed inside dog tags that hung over boots. Below the tattoo was an ink script that read “OIF 08-10.” He was in Operation Iraqi Freedom for fifteen months between 2008 and 2010.
I respect veterans because they never forget those who didn’t come home.
I looked back down at the injured man to see blood pooling under his leg femur. The training seemed automatic for me, and for the two veterans too. As we worked together, they seemed to recognize me as “one of them.” I think my shirt told on me. It was green with a unit crest.
The second veteran said, “Sir, I’m a paramedic in training, but I don’t have a license yet.” I told him “That doesn’t matter, check the man’s leg and see if it needs a tourniquet.” The two men had carried tourniquets during deployments, like so many of us did, in the bottom cargo pocket of their uniforms.
A third man, much older than the first two, knelt at the injured man’s side and kept his hand on the wounded man’s back. He comforted him even though the injured man was unconscious. The older man rubbed his back and told him it would be okay that help was on the way. When I saw his Vietnam Veteran’s hat, I knew he had said those words in the rice patties of southeast Asia decades ago.
Others stood by watching as the three men, veterans of war only separated by years but not hearts, help when an injured man lay in the middle of the highway ejected from his vehicle.
I respect veterans like these men because they can act quickly in a crisis.
Someone said an ambulance was four minutes out. I stepped back and waited for them to arrive.
The paramedics arrived and said a medical flight from Tallahassee was in route. The veterans knew the “golden hour” was the most critical for the man’s survival.
Then I noticed the helicopter had no place to land. I got into cars to move them. I flagged cars away from the potential landing site and pointed to an alternative route.
They waited for the life flight to Tallahassee Memorial Hospital.
After the injured man was in the care of the paramedics, I walked toward my truck and left the scene. I pressed the clutch, started the ignition, and put her in first gear. I looked in my rearview mirror, and I fought the frog in my throat and a tear in my eye, as I realized that, for but a moment, I served with brothers again.
The real heroes that day were three men who loved a person they didn’t even know enough to get their hands in his blood. They were from various generations, battlefields, and backgrounds, but the soldier’s core values united them:
- Loyalty
- Duty
- Respect
- Selfless Service
- Honor
- Integrity
- Courage
To those men, thank you. I know we will probably never meet again but, in our own way, we became brothers serving alongside one another in a wreck that resembled the war zones where we learned the value of loyalty and love. Gentlemen, Thank you!
UPDATE: I hear the injured man survived the accident and is expected to make a recovery after intensive physical therapy.