In hindsight, the war had no such rallying cry and those who were at the top used body counts as an artificial means to keep score. Those who decide to go to war, he says, are generally not the ones who must fight and he urges the students not to forget this fact when they become decision makers. Farley and about 350 other disabled veterans will gather this year for an annual ski trip to Colorado. He says this is his eighth year attending as a ski instructor. Some of those attending are younger veterans who served in the Persian Gulf, Somalia and Grenada.
Some skiers use artificial limbs.
Others, like Farley, go slalom. Many of the attendees bear deep emotional scars. There are some guys who come out for that trip and they ve got post-traumatic stress disorder so bad it s the only time they come out, he says. The former captain of the Holy Cross lacrosse team, Farley recalled lying in the hospital in a full-body cast thinking about the fact that he would never run again. He says he realized, humorously, that he was never a very good runner anyway.