Daily responsibilities require our focus Published March 27, 2015 By Lt. Col. Thad Middleton 9th Airlift Squadron TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. -- Recently, as I contemplated a bullet for an Airman's quarterly award, I read the back of my oldest son's shirt. On his yellowish green T-shirt, it had John Muir's most oft-quoted thought: "The mountains are calling and I must go." These words immediately struck a chord with me. In part, it made me think of packing up and heading to Yosemite with a walking stick, a water bottle and my Moleskin to escape. On the other hand it made me rethink Muir's words and his use of the word "mountains" and how it may actually be a synonym for something we, as Airmen, deal with every day. Muir, in a letter back home, captured the exhaustion he felt after weeks of documenting the mountains and the need to rest prior to going back into them to continue his research. Though appreciative of the peace and calm offered by his experiences exploring the rugged, untamed mountains, he understood his responsibility as a conservationist to preserve what he had become so intimately familiar during his countless travels into the valleys and crevices of the mountains. So, if you read his quote, so often used to justify our modern day dalliances into nature, in its entirety you will understand this sense of responsibility. "The mountains are calling and I must go and I will work on while I can, studying incessantly." Muir was a man driven by his responsibility to that which literally loomed over him. Here he was, in a letter to his loved ones, addressing the challenges of mountain life and how they can drain an individual, yet determined to face them again in order to fulfill his duty. As airmen and family members, we all have mountains that are calling us. To a vast majority of you, those mountains are daily responsibilities that require focus and commitment. Daily, you wake up to face the challenges associated with these responsibilities and at the end of the day, find yourself mentally, emotionally or even physically exhausted. Drained of energy, you make it to the end of the day, where hopefully you find the time to reflect and recommit yourself to those same responsibilities that battered you up to that moment. Because as Airmen and their family members, life can be demanding as you know and those mountains can be overwhelming. First term Airmen away from family and friends for the first time tasked with true responsibility, single parents balancing work with the responsibility of family, loved ones of deployed members faced with the responsibility of not becoming lost in loneliness and supervisors focused on the responsibility of caring for their people and the mission can find themselves tattered just as Muir found himself after weeks deep in the wild. Yet as resilient Airmen, I hope you find rejuvenation in facing those mountains at the end of the day or the week. If you read Muir's words again, after understanding the context in which he wrote them, you will see that the looming struggle ahead of him only motivated him to go back because he knew what he was doing mattered. Those mountains in front of you can be beautiful and refreshing. They can offer you comfort. Take a second look at those responsibilities you face and find the beauty in each one of them. You have a job that contributes to a team serving a greater good. You are an example to loved ones on the value of hard work and family balance. You have an opportunity to connect with others in your same situation, making friends you may not have made otherwise. You are growing others to one day walk in your shoes moving the mission that is vital to our service. When I look back down at the name on the quarterly award package, I see bullets of their achievements, but I also see how they embraced their responsibilities and took advantage of the goodness they could achieve by doing so. On the other hand, I see my son playing carefree with his brother and think I have spent too much time on work today. "The mountains are calling and I must go."