T.E. Lawrence wrote in a
letter to a friend:
“You wonder what I am
doing? Well, so do I, in truth. Days seem to dawn, suns to shine, evenings to
follow, and then I sleep. What I have done, what I am doing, what I am going to
do, puzzles and bewilders me. Have you ever been a leaf and fallen from your
tree in autumn and been really puzzled about it? That's the feeling."
An Army Captain I was
working with turned me on to Lawrence and his “7 Pillars of Wisdom.” Before
Hollywood made him into “Lawrence of Arabia”, he was, some say, the father of
insurgent fighting here in the desert. He showed the Wahabi how to beat a
superior fighting force by striking at them from dark corners then fading back
into shadows. Then, it was the Turks of The Ottoman Empire. Today,
it’s the United States and its Army of Infidels. It’s obvious why this
Captain is reading Lawrence, the Lion of the Desert…because as a good soldier
and leader of men he wants to know his enemy. But I have become drawn to
Lawrence the poet, the desert daydreamer, the wanderer who felt more at home
under the Arabian stars than he did in his native England. His writing
inspires me to search for meaning here and to not be satisfied with a wind that
buffets my lazy drift downward from what I feel is my own autumn tree.
-Jim Franks
