On This Horrid Anniversary of Death and Destruction

I am committing to being more vocal in my opposition to the war. I am committed to helping out the peace and justice organizations in this town. I am committed to being more like Pete Seeger.

I was reading dispatches by New York Times reporters who covered the hostilities for most of the five years of troop deployment in Iraq. Funny how we have forgotten about Afghanistan. Their stories of blood, and death and the chaos of war leaves me pale and sad. The stories of four women who went, fought, and came back in Women's Health magazine this month left me crying for the leg one of them lost in a blast. One will be returning for a third tour soon, I hope she makes it back with all her pieces/parts intact. 

I can't stop this war, although I sometimes like to dream that I am the Supreme Benevolent Amazon Dictator and I do have the power to bring the troops home, and give the people of Iraq the means to create a new way of being in the world. Wonder how they would do? Tribal and religious factions could fight for years and leave the country looking more bombed out than it does now. Like Lebanon looked for 20 years. I remember being in the rubble that was Beirut in the 70s. Hard to look at.... harder still to find your way around in. I would like to go back there now. I hear it is beautiful. I think Baghdad will take a long time to heal once our sneaky-shady leaders call it quits and bring home the tanks, weapons, soldiers, and sailors. 

For now, I will think peaceful thoughts and hope that all the soldiers and sailors will be safe for one day. The later will be harder to manifest. War creates damaged and dead bodies. All for the sake of protecting a substance that when used is killing the planet. I'll never understand men and the games they play with people's lives. Bush is no better than Hitler. Just a different wolf in the same nationalistic sheep's clothing.