ONE DAY OF A SOLDIER · 18.10.2026
Today was another day of our work. An ordinary military vehicle, machine guns, soldiers scanning the sky. For some, this is just another day of war, briefly mentioned on the evening news. For us, it is our life. I want to tell you what lies behind this daily work.
People see weapons, uniforms and a vehicle. They do not see a person waking after only a few hours of sleep, silently preparing for duty, checking a phone for a message from loved ones. They do not see how much he wants a hot coffee, a proper meal, even an hour of warmth without thinking about the next alarm. And how all of that becomes unimportant the moment a warning about enemy drones arrives.
Have you ever waited for death to come from the sky?
I often think about people at home: a mother putting her child to bed, an elderly man asleep in front of the television, a young family finally sharing dinner. They may not even know danger is already heading toward them. That is what frightens me most. A Russian drone does not care who lives in a house. It does not distinguish a soldier from a child.
It does not know how many years a family saved to buy their home. It does not know about the teddy bear in a child’s room or the unfinished cup of tea in the kitchen. It simply flies toward its target. And we have to stop it. When you look into the sky, you are not thinking about medals, thanks or beautiful photographs.
You are thinking about doing your job in time, about not having to read tomorrow’s news of more deaths, about a mother waking her child instead of searching for that child beneath the ruins of their home. This may be the hardest thing to explain to someone who has never lived under the constant threat of attack.
We have mothers too. We have families too.
Sometimes I feel the world is becoming used to our war. The news speaks again of drones, explosions, fires and deaths. Someone abroad reads a headline, feels sorrow and goes back to everyday life. I do not blame them. They have their own worries and children.
But for us, the war does not end when the television is switched off. It stays with us when we eat, when we try to sleep, when we call home. Even when we laugh, a question remains inside: what will happen tomorrow? I am not twenty anymore. I remember life before the war, when you could make plans for next month or get in a car and drive somewhere without thinking about orders, alarms or danger.
Now the greatest happiness can seem to be simple silence. Not a heroic silence. Just a silence without explosions. I want people to understand that a uniform does not erase the person underneath it. A soldier still misses home, still feels fear, still grows exhausted, still wonders how many more years of life this war will take.
We all know people who will never come back. The most painful thought is that someone will call a fellow soldier today and never hear an answer again. Somewhere a mother still keeps her son’s number, knowing he will never call. These are not statistics. They are people, with faces, voices, habits and dreams they never had the chance to fulfill.
збиття російського дрону
A few seconds on which far too much depends
Our work is to protect Ukrainian skies from Russian drones. Sometimes there are only seconds to make a decision. There is no time to think about cold, exhaustion or personal troubles. You know there are people behind you. Perhaps a child is sleeping with a favorite toy.
Perhaps doctors are fighting for someone’s life in a hospital. Perhaps a young family has finally gathered together after a long separation. You do everything you can so that their morning will come. Behind those brief moments lie long shifts, fatigue, tension and responsibility. There is no beautiful stage set here.
There is the sky, the weapons and people who must be ready to act. Perhaps someone’s back aches after a shift. Perhaps he has not slept properly in days. Perhaps it is his birthday, but instead of a family table there is cold air and another watch beneath the sky. Perhaps a message from his wife has just arrived: “Please be careful.” What can he say?
“Everything is fine”? We often say that even when it is not true, because we do not want our loved ones to worry even more.
What I fear most is not for myself
People often ask what we need most. Of course we need equipment: reliable vehicles, batteries, spare parts, fuel and repairs. Without them, we cannot do this work day after day. Vehicles break down, tires wear out and equipment needs maintenance. The war does not pause while we search for money to repair a vehicle.
But there is something else we desperately need: to feel that we have not been forgotten. To know that someone thousands of kilometers away read our story and did not simply scroll past it. That they understood Ukrainian soldiers are not anonymous figures holding weapons. They are ordinary men and women forced by Russia to live in terrible, extraordinary circumstances. We do not ask the world to fight our war in our place.
We ask not to be left alone with it.
I want to ask you for one thing
If you have read this far, perhaps these words have touched you. I do not know which country you are in. Maybe the United States, Canada, Britain, Germany or Australia. Maybe it is morning where you are and you are drinking coffee before work. I truly want you to have a peaceful day.
I want your children never to learn the sound of an air-raid alarm, never to have to distinguish the sound of drones from explosions. And I ask you: please do not forget us. Tell your friends our story. Show them these photographs. Share our website.
If you can, help us maintain the vehicles and equipment on which our daily work depends. I created this website not because I know how to write beautifully, but because I do not want our lives, our pain and the memory of those we have lost to go unnoticed. I want more than numbers of casualties and photographs of ruined homes to remain after the war. I want our voices to remain. And if one day my words reach even one person who never understood our lives before, then writing them will have been worthwhile.
Today I looked up at the Ukrainian sky again. Tomorrow will be another day. I want so much for that day to come for all of us.
