Red and Black

It's a Saturday, tomorrow of course is Sunday, and I pull a 24-hour staff duty shift. Exciting! Well, that's all right, I get Monday off that way. Which is kind of cool. What a busy week! We've been out and about on post all week, finally managing to get the post in some semblance of order. Supposedly everyone has their power, water and heat back, too. There was quite a furor about this, and the town must have been running in circles trying to get everything done. We finally figured out we can use the giant crane built onto the back of the flatbed trucks we were using to move lots of branches all at once, after driving around and doing it by hand all week. Well, we figured it out eventually!
In other post news, there's a new drug in town called Spice. I haven't seen it anywhere, haven't tried it either, but apparently it's perfectly legal. The effect is similar to mary jane, at least that's what I'm told. Tried that once, didn't like it, called it quits after that. So at any rate, Spice is probably soon to become illegal, and we're soon to have another briefing on it. The best bet is avoid all that hassle when in the Army- you can do a lot of things in my unit, but drugs aren't one of them. If you get caught using, woe betide you, the chain of command will wrap itself around your neck and squeeze. Though some things about the Army have changed, that's not one of them. Drugs are still widely available and occasionally abused. I don't know of anyone who does, but drugs are just two or three phone calls away here on post. Is this a problem? Well, I don't really think so. Lawton is a town like any other, although the Army does its part to either kill or cure any drug problem- cure by getting people into a substance abuse program, or kill by having them kicked out. Not that it matters to me, drugs or no, I still have to report in to work and do my job.
Apart from that, we wonder- are things as bad as they seem? Or is it just all in how you look at it? In part, perhaps a great big part, perception defines reality for a person. What you think of it is what it becomes to you. In a sociological sense, these things are 'real'- that is, if everyone believes something to be true, and acts on it as if it were true, the consequences of that action or actions are the same regardless of whether or not it actually is true. This is true on a smaller, individual scale too- what we believe, we act on- thus, consequences become the reality of our beliefs. So if we keep a positive outlook, keep things in perspective, and keep an open mind, even the worst days all fall into context. At least, I hope so.