What do you think of when you hear the word hero? Do you think of the capes, the tights and the superhuman powers? Do you think of those fictional characters seen in movies and comic books? Well me, I think of that man who stands at my bus stop every day with a cup of starbucks in his hand, who is silent, we casually nod at each other in politeness. His names Daniel, this I got from my mother. The rest he told me one morning when we both missed the bus. This is his story, and how he's an unlikely hero to me.
Daniel grew up in Longford, in a quiet little village, all that was there was a butchers, and 3 other basic shops and a pub.He never like the quietness of country life. Which is why after leaving school he joined the British Army.
He was trained in a camp in Luton. He would be made run for five miles twice a day and then more training in between. He learned how to handle and shoot a gun, how to defuse a bomb how to throw a grenade. He was given target practise and basic first aid. After almost blowing himself and anyone at the camp up he was shipped off to Afghanistan to try and hold the peace.
He stepped off the plane onto dusty land, thinking to himself how this was so much more different then the green and wet and muddyness found in Longford. He found the landscape to be too orange and dusty for him. He could see everywhere, no mountains blocking the way, no walls or houses. The sky was blue, the clearest of blue, no wispy white clouds that floated overhead, no rain clouds looming. All Daniel could see was blue, and yellow and the grey of the tents. It was hot and it didn't help how heavy his uniform was. Sure the initial one is quite light, he thought it was made of a type of linen, but over this linen was an entrapment of a rucsack filled with supplies of water and food, Gun Powder, Bullets, flash lights, batteries and other neccessities. This was weighing him down, as was the belt of hand guns and grenades.
Daniel was brave and he was strong. He stood proudly at the front line each day, often requesting it. That was until one of those days they were attacked by terrorists. Bullets were flying everywhere hand grenades going off and exploding. Other men ran and hid from these men, but Daniel, well he stood there as the masked men ran towards him, he seen them as just a sea, he said it was like a red tidal wave was coming towards him and he knew he couldn't hide from it. Daniel says he could see his life flash before his eyes, his first soccer game, his first snowball fight, his first kiss, first date, the sound of the ice cream truck that would got through his street in the middle of Summer, the sound of the bell when he walked into the candy shop in the middle of town.
That's when he picked up the gun and shot into the sea of people. He could hear the shock from his comrades. They then joined him, one by one, out there on the frontline. Daniel smiled when he said this, he was proud. He fought these men back, losing countless lives. Daniel even lost his leg, when a hand grenade was thrown near him, 5 people lost there lives at that moment, and all Daniel lost was a leg. He showed me the the prosthetic leg. He's proud of it. He's even named his leg Bobby Lee.
He told me more of these stories, about how he was held kidnapped by terrorists and became a bomb expert, learning hor to defuse bombs. Daniel is a hero to me, because he has been through all of this stuff but still looks at it positively and continues to do what he wants to do without letting a loss of a limb stop him. We still say hi to each other, and talk on rare occasions, but it doesn't matter, he's an inspirational person to me and one of the unlikelieness of heros.
