Sometimes you know exactly what you want. Then you realize that you were wrong and you want exactly the opposite of what you thought you wanted. But then you come back and know you’ve made a mistake and you were right all along. And then you see that you can’t have what you wanted and convince yourself that you didn’t want it anyway. Then, however, you find out that this is what you’ve been dreaming of all along and wouldn’t have it any other way.

It’s human nature to never be satisfied, but… geez, don’t second [and third and fourth and fifth] guess your feelings. Turns out, you were right from the start.

           The most unbearable things in the world to me are the tears of a father and mother. I guess maybe only the starkness of reality can snap you out of selfishness and stupidity. It makes you realize what’s really important and helps you come to terms with who you are. Or at least, who you know you can be. I never knew Frederick Henry Eissler, but we had a lot of things in common. We were both twenty years old, we were both the elder siblings of sisters, we both went to preparatory school, and we’re both midshipmen of the United States Naval Academy. That last part, being the most important. People like us go to a university different from any other in the world. When you’re a student here, of course, it’s very easy to say you hate this place and ask yourself why you ever signed up to be here in the first place. As far as you’re concerned, you’d rather be anywhere but here. You wear the same thing everyday, eat the same things everyday, can’t leave when you want to, can’t drive a car and wear normal clothes until you’re a junior [and even then, it’s only on the weekends], and it doesn't matter if you're from Hawaii or Annapolis, MD, you are very far from home. It’s easy to get caught up in the trivial things and lose sight of your goals for a while, but this place is so much more than rules and strict restraints. How many schools do you know of that have a cemetery just for their students? When we graduate to join the workforce, we don’t leave to work in corporations, schools, restaurants, or laboratories. We leave this place to become officers in the U.S. Military, and when we go to work, we’re in charge of lives. When we make mistakes, people die.

            Freddy’s father, CDR Eissler, said of Freddy that all he ever wanted to do was attend the U.S Naval Academy and become a Midshipman. That he’d have done anything to get here, and he did. He accomplished his goal. I remember wanting the same thing and dreaming about coming here for the longest time, and I’m sure that I’m not alone in that. Up until a little while ago, I knew that I belonged here and that I would do anything to stay and graduate with my classmates. To leave this place was unthinkable to me. Somewhere along the way, however, my grades began to decline in just about everything. I made some bad decisions and I began to grow unhappy with who I was turning into. I kept thinking, “Maybe, I’m not cut out for this place after all.” I wasn’t so sure that someone who couldn’t even handle the strain of academics here was prepared to take on the charge of hundreds of lives. So, I began to seriously consider leaving. The bad part is that I hated myself for wanting to leave. I could no longer find the person who would sacrifice anything to earn the right to be here, and all I could come up with was someone who wanted to run away when the going got tough. It’s true that I never knew Freddy Eissler, but I couldn’t handle the fact that someone so young and determined was denied the chance to live out his dream, and yet I was still here. The only thing I could keep asking myself was, “so, why was I allowed to stay?” The answer to that question doesn’t exist, of course. No one was allowed to stay, and no one is more worthy than the other of being here, though I severely like to think Freddy was. The truth is that sometimes the world doesn’t make sense and even good people have to die. The fact that people live while others are gone, and that I thought I wasn’t worthy or that he should be here and I shouldn’t, is completely irrelevant. What matters is that we’re here now, and the most we can do to honor our loved ones passed is to be true to our dreams and accomplish what we set out to in the first place.

            I no longer think about leaving this place. I don’t think I ever could have anyway.  Though somewhere down the road, I know things will get rough for me and for a lot of people, that’s the point of this school and I guess that’s the point of life. We have to learn to give ourselves a chance and remember why we believed we could do it in the first place, because if we quit everything when it got hard, who knows where we’d be.

In honor of Freddy Eissler.