My heart might explode.

Do you ever have those moments where you feel like your heart is going to explode and you might begin to cry like a blubbering idiot at any moment?  I have had a lot of those moments lately and I’m not exactly sure why.  It’s like a feeling of gratitude, and hope, and despair, and happiness and anguish all at once.  It makes me feel like I have an atomic bomb of emotions sitting inside my chest that might go off at any minute. 

I had one of those atomic bomb moments tonight.  I attended a church event tonight where a soldier from the Colombian army gave a short speech.  As he spoke, I felt all of these emotions building inside of me and I started to cry.  The soldier speaking had both arms amputated at the elbows and a glass eye.  He said that he was so grateful that God gave him a second chance at life, and that he was so happy to live in a safe Colombia.  The young man also said he was grateful not to have to invest in wristwatches anymore and that he loved hearing our applause because he cannot hear his own.  This guy didn’t choose this life (military service is compulsory in Colombia) but he is going forward with it full speed ahead. 

Unfortunately you see men like this all over Colombia.  You would be hard pressed to go even one day without seeing a soldier missing a limb.  It is shocking at first, the number of young amputees that you see in Colombia.  They are everywhere and the reason is the high number of landmines in Colombia.  Members of the Colombian army are often maimed as a result of the landmines planted by the FARC, ELN and various paramilitary groups.  The ongoing conflict between these groups and the Colombian government has led to 65% of the country being affected by landmines and nearly 10,000 Colombians have been victims since 1990.  The situation in the country has drastically improved over the last several years but decades of war have left the country full of landmines that now need to be demined. 

I was so touched by the soldier that spoke and he made me feel grateful; grateful for his service to his country and for the service of all military personnel around the world.  Evil people are everywhere; the FARC in Colombia, ISIS in Syria, etc. and these people are literally giving life and limb to thwart them so that we can enjoy our lives and all of the beauty that a free life has to offer.  There was something so beautiful about his gratitude in spite of the disability that he has been left with. 

I think the reason that my heart almost exploded was because the gratitude and happiness of the soldier was contagious; it spilled over into my heart.  I hope that someday my outlook on life can be that influential on others but right now I will just settle for being happy.