Ten yards of red sand
It ripped through his right leg letting loose a flow of wild red warmth. The sand beneath him flooded with his American sense of right, evil, ego… the skin that shrouded his bones flashed to white and then slowly trended to a nice patriotic blue. Protection of the homeland… the distribution of democracy and freedom to all corners of the globe… the eternal battle of good versus evil… the glory of GOD… all of this seemed curiously absurd as it ran through his mind. For the first time in country he started to realize the humanity of the situation. He opened his eyes and could see… about 10 yards from the end of his right index fingertip… the rest of his leg. He looked at it and instantly saw it as not a part of himself, but as an occupying force… a colonialist army bent on controlling, dominating the world’s resources. The standard issue boot looked out of place, foreign, unwelcome against the landscape. The desert fatigue that covered the leg seemed the flag of some strange idea born in some conference room in some think tank buried along a row of office buildings on a sad and lonely stretch of road just outside Washington… back there in the homeland. He had come all this way… travelled thousands of miles to find truth in 10 yards of red sand.