Doctor Zhivago

he party look to the conscript peasants. Most of them wearing their first pair of boots. When the boots worn out, they’d be ready to listen. There were too many volunteers like me. Mostly it was merely hysteria. There were men with better motives, men who saw the times critical and wanted a man’s part. Good men, wasted. Unhappy men, too. Unhappy with their job, unhappy with their wives, doubting themselves. Happy men don’t volunteer. They wait their turn and thank God if their age or work delayed it. The one who got back home with the price of an arm, an eye or a leg… these were the lucky ones.