It's so jarring to go from Baghdad to Cambridge, to go from a place where people are fighting and striving and dying to a place where the biggest concern is what kind of cheese to put in your sandwich.
Interpretation
The quote highlights the stark differences between war-torn regions and peaceful environments.
Dexter Filkins contrasts the harsh realities of life in Baghdad, where survival is a challenge and people face violence daily, with the trivial concerns of everyday life in Cambridge, epitomized by an inconsequential choice like selecting cheese for a sandwich. This juxtaposition emphasizes the vast disparities in human experiences and the way perspective shifts depend on one's environment and circumstances.
In practice
This quote can be shared during a discussion on the impact of war on societies.
Any American who has spent time in Iraq or Afghanistan will tell you: the closer you get, the less certain you are of anything. If you are in Iraq, if you are in Afghanistan, everything is ambiguous. Everything is murky and gray and uncertain and possibly lethal.
The part of life which we really live is short.
I had been simply treating water, settling on surviving and avoiding pain rather than being actively involved in seeking out life.
If someone really wants to hurt you, they'll find a way whatever. I don't want to live my life worrying about it.
Life is a compromise of what your ego wants to do, what experience tells you to do, and what your nerves let you do.
What you've done becomes the judge of what you're going to do - especially in other people's minds. When you're traveling, you are what you are right there and then. People don't have your past to hold against you. No yesterdays on the road.
Life is short. Kiss slowly, laugh insanely, love truly and forgive quickly
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