By SFC Brock Jones
Back in my active duty days with the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, descriptions about what I did in the Army were easily given and understood. I'd pretty much grunt that I was an an artilleryman (grunting is an accepted form of communication in the arty world) and got to shoot huge guns for a living. The curious individual and I would engage in a few more minutes of conversation regarding the particulars of that job and then we'd be on our separate ways. It wasn't too hard to understand.
Fast forward more than a decade. When I'm hit with the question about what I do for the Army now, I usually wish I could just grunt something about big guns and be done with it. I'm not ashamed of what I do, in fact quite the opposite, I just haven't come up with a precise way of explaining it. In the eight years I've been in Public Affairs with the 128th MPAD, even my own wife has said to me a handful of times "Hey hon, remind me what it is exactly you do for the Army?"
In thinking about my inability give the 10-second pitch about my military job, it occurs to me that we quite literally may have stumbled upon the perfect job description in the form of the name for this blog. Here's why: Once the votes were tallied and "Army Bards" had narrowly beaten the other blog-name candidates, I went to the Oxford English Dictionary to read more about "bard" (yes, I'm a word geek, probably not a big revelation to those who know me). Turns out that "bard" is about as close as one could get to a one-word definition of what we, and all Army Public Affairs folks, do. According to the OED, "bard" is of Celtic origin and refers to an ancient order of poets "whose primary function appears to have been to compose and sing verses celebrating the achievements of chiefs and warriors."
We may or may not be poets, and none of us can carry a tune (except Sgt. Chloe Barnes who's got some pipes!), but we most definitely are in the business of writing about, photographing, videotaping, documenting, and publicizing the achievements, actions, deeds and back-breaking work of both Soldiers (warriors) and their leaders (chiefs).
Next time I find myself in one of those dreaded situations of having to explain my job, I think I'm going to simply grunt (old habits die hard) that I'm an Army Bard, and drop the mic.
Back in my active duty days with the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, descriptions about what I did in the Army were easily given and understood. I'd pretty much grunt that I was an an artilleryman (grunting is an accepted form of communication in the arty world) and got to shoot huge guns for a living. The curious individual and I would engage in a few more minutes of conversation regarding the particulars of that job and then we'd be on our separate ways. It wasn't too hard to understand.
Fast forward more than a decade. When I'm hit with the question about what I do for the Army now, I usually wish I could just grunt something about big guns and be done with it. I'm not ashamed of what I do, in fact quite the opposite, I just haven't come up with a precise way of explaining it. In the eight years I've been in Public Affairs with the 128th MPAD, even my own wife has said to me a handful of times "Hey hon, remind me what it is exactly you do for the Army?"
In thinking about my inability give the 10-second pitch about my military job, it occurs to me that we quite literally may have stumbled upon the perfect job description in the form of the name for this blog. Here's why: Once the votes were tallied and "Army Bards" had narrowly beaten the other blog-name candidates, I went to the Oxford English Dictionary to read more about "bard" (yes, I'm a word geek, probably not a big revelation to those who know me). Turns out that "bard" is about as close as one could get to a one-word definition of what we, and all Army Public Affairs folks, do. According to the OED, "bard" is of Celtic origin and refers to an ancient order of poets "whose primary function appears to have been to compose and sing verses celebrating the achievements of chiefs and warriors."
We may or may not be poets, and none of us can carry a tune (except Sgt. Chloe Barnes who's got some pipes!), but we most definitely are in the business of writing about, photographing, videotaping, documenting, and publicizing the achievements, actions, deeds and back-breaking work of both Soldiers (warriors) and their leaders (chiefs).
Next time I find myself in one of those dreaded situations of having to explain my job, I think I'm going to simply grunt (old habits die hard) that I'm an Army Bard, and drop the mic.
No comments:
Post a Comment