Lieutenant Jason McEwan is a bit like a younger and entirely more Canadian (less brusque, more polite) version of Lt. Dan from the movie Forrest Gump.

Dressed impeccably in Canada’s iconic woodland-‘relish’ camouflage, McEwan, like his filmic counterpart, speaks with the confidence of someone certain in his beliefs.

“They call it attention to detail. It matters if your uniform isn’t on right or your button isn’t done up,” explained McEwan, regarding the image he likes to project as a member of the military.

“It’s not just how you look: attention to detail can pick up mistakes in more critical functions.”

Lt. Dan emphasized the importance of fresh socks along similar lines.

At a time in his life when many were debating whether to go backpacking in Thailand or Australia, McEwan already knew that he was going to serve with the Canadian Forces.

“After high school I applied to the RMC [Royal Military College] with the intent of ‘going air force,’” he recalled with a chuckle and a disarming grin. “I wanted to go fly jets and helicopters.”

Like most teenagers, McEwan soon faced the all too familiar conflict between his adolescent aspirations and certain annoying existential forces.

“The application didn’t work out for me,” McEwan said. “I didn’t end up getting in [to the RMC].”

McEwan didn’t have time to be wistful. After accepting that he wasn’t going to fly jets, he immediately began to work on his contingency plans for both school and the military.

McEwan’s narrow, L-shaped office is lined with posters of men in traditional military garb, maps and placards inscribed with slogans of the Seaforth Highlanders of Canada. It’s an office filled with military nostalgia.

It occupies one of the many rooms of the Seaforth Armoury, a veritable fortress on the corner of Burrard and 1st, which, despite its immensity, is dwarfed by the neighbouring Molson Brewery.

“As a backup I had UBC and a couple other universities. I attended UBC, and halfway through the first year I started thinking, ‘Maybe I’ll go back and try [joining the forces] again.”

At the end of his first year, McEwan became a reservist. He spent that summer doing training before starting his part-time career with the military the following September, beginning with weekly training sessions called “Parade Nights.”

“There wasn’t much parading involved,” he said.

McEwan majored in political science but continued to aspire to a career in the military.

“I was encouraged to look at the officer route as an additional challenge, to get some leadership training and exposure out of it and to make use of my degree.”

Now, several years later, McEwan works as a commissioned officer—a second lieutenant.

“I do a bit more of the administrative and the leadership side of things, and a bit less of the hands-on, boots-on-the-ground sort of stuff.”

His day-to-day work largely involves the administrative intricacies of large-scale conflict and emergency management.

And when he is on the ground, his duties include “developing training plans, giving orders, leading platoon-sized elements and following up with details and reports.

“It’s quite a wide range of responsibilities, [including] some very challenging leadership situations, constantly pushing my own perceived limitations and boundaries.”

McEwan argued that there aren’t many jobs that make the same kind of rigorous demands, or that require such highly-organized and well-coordinated levels of leadership.

“You wouldn’t normally get off the couch one morning and coordinate a forty-man raid on an objective at night in a swamp. Those kind of horror stories that you hear about training are actually very rewarding.”

As a reservist, McEwan does not have an obligation to serve abroad. Nonetheless, last year he spent seven months in one of the most punishing environments in the world: Afghanistan.

McEwan served as a “force-protection platoon commander” within the National Support Element, providing logistical support to forward units in Kandahar.

“I had a platoon of 45 traveling all around Kandahar province dropping supplies at forward operating units. Essentially, convoy security was our big deal.”

Regardless, McEwan said that he was never “in the shit.”

“We had a remarkably quiet tour. Some of the more intense situations that we were involved with included providing first-aid at traffic accidents, or to civilians who had been injured by explosive devices.”

McEwan said that he was not looking for a fire-fight, contrary to what he said one might assume about a member of the Armed Forces.

He said that what he believes may highlight a difference between the perception and reality of the armed forces.

“What I found is that like almost all members of the forces, I have no interest in promoting conflict,” he said.

“I see this as an opportunity to prevent and solve existing troubles, rather than to be involved in some kind of violent adventure.”

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