Haven't posted in a while...

Been tossing around the idea of getting back into the mix. We'll see how it goes.

Some people have asked me to post the speech I gave at the Leadership Banquet last week. And you all know how I love to give the people what they want...

2^nd lieutenant Benjamin Warren Golemo, 101^st Airborne, United States Military Academy at West Point class of 2007 left this morning for his first-ever platoon command somewhere in Baghdad.

My best friend. My closest soul. My biggest fan. My favorite person in the world. God’s greatest gift to me. My brother.

He’s leaving to fight a war about which I don’t think anyone knows exactly how to feel to defend a country, that while I love it with all my heart… I don’t know is always right.

And the job my brother is doing. His M.O.S. is without a doubt the most dangerous job in all of the Allied forces. He’s leading a platoon whose job it is to find, disarm or discharge the IED’s (Improvised Explosive Devices) that are responsible for nearly 40% of all of our soldiers killed or injured during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

And he fought for the job.

When he told me this, I screamed at him. “The world’s got enough heroes, Ben! And you’re not good-looking enough to have your face plastered on the dollar. Cause your nose is huge.” (He has a beak, I’m not kidding. The man can smoke a cigar in the shower.)

I asked him why? Your degree is in mechanical and electrical engineering. You should be behind a desk. A big, metal, desk…. Behind concrete walls… underground.

And he told me that there is no way he’d let someone else take his bullet. Those men need people who do, not assign. I’m here to lead.

Yeah.

Well never one to let the fact that I’m completely wrong keep me from making my point, I responded to him to spare me the “Hooah Army Poster-boy shhhstuff” and I reminded him that he has a family to worry about. I told him what it would do to me if he were to get hurt… or worse…

And he told me that he couldn’t think of a better way to honor our family than to lead where others might falter. What’s more, he said that he learned this not from weeks at Boot camp, or 4 years at the Point, or much less, an Army of One poster.

He said he learned it from a lifetime of watching me.

Yeah. Life has a way of putting you in your place.

He began to talk about my job and where I went versus where I could have gone and why.

You know, the best thing I have ever done in my life is be the big brother in a family. I went to Baylor, 854 miles from my doorstep, because a hot girl talked me into applying and I didn’t know a soul.

I became a Community Leader on that campus because I missed my family. I missed being a brother. That was one thing I knew I was good at it. I believe we are all called to honor each other; to be brothers and sisters to one another.

And then I found out I could get paid to talk other people believing that load, too.

I’ve got the best job on campus. Maybe I don’t get to sit in my Ivory tower… I mean CLB. Maybe I don't have a really intimidating nickname like "The Grinder." Maybe I don’t get a snazzy office with a sorta creepy Paper Mache Sarge to make my head look proportional by comparison... And no, maybe I don’t have the honor or contumacious grit to pull off the bow tie.

Yeah, Ricki, I said contumacious…. You DON’T want to play me in facebook scrabble.

I have the honor of working with a group of students. 15 fine young men and women willing to put their hearts and butts on the line, 15 men and women with hearts set for service, 15 men and women trying to be big brothers and sisters worrying about the rules only because they inform the safety and well-being of the community on campus.

15 men and women trying to be big brothers and sisters to people who sometimes don’t want a big brother or a sister… and they can be quite vocal about saying so.

William Quillen. What’s your number one job? (God, I hope he says: "To know all your residents.")

Why? (Because if we’re all doing our job, there’s not a single resident on campus who can say that someone doesn’t know their name.)

I have the privilege and blessing of rolling out of bed and walking 40 yards to an office full of people who refuse do put up with anything less.

I look around this room and I see the knowing glances that we don’t lead because it looks good on a resume, or because it gives our egos a nice stroke. We lead because, leading in right direction, is a service to our brothers and sisters.

As I look around this room, I see that the idea of honoring each other by being brother and sister to one another; to get in each other’s way and cheer them on when they’re doing well and maybe kick them in the rear when they’re living a little left…I can see that see very clearly in the eyes of each of you, each and every one of you, that this idea is not lost on a generation.

I don’t care what Todd Sutherland says.

(The speech went over well)