Driving...

When I was younger I often drove long distances to meet a friend or lover. There was always a scrambled departure from home, packing a few belongings, the drive all night, the joy at watching the sun rise behind a bug strew windshield, the warm coffee at a fast food place - the early morning staff as tired as I was...
The excitement and anxiety of travel were sometimes balanced by the thought that the actual meeting might not be as good as the anticipation of it...

I have been driving a good deal recently across Europe...Great roads! 130 km speed limits, pretty decent drivers who understand the right lane is for passing...
In fact in the 3000km or so I have driven recently I have only heard a car horn used twice...and it was by me!

Poem for Today...

Truth in Hotel Rooms

Lying on my bed,

-Purchased daily,

Neck hanging over the edge,

Seems like falling,

Empty head filling with blood.

So scared,

Living in sweat,

Can’t dry my hands.

Waiting for your call,

Telling me to stay or go.

How did it get like this for me?

You rule everything,

I crawl through each day by waiting,

Not even thinking, but just grieving,

Burning each second,

Thinking of losing it all…

I think,

That must mean you are already gone .

Poem for Today...

Alive

On these women I know,

Hair is alive.

A separate living thing,

Moving each tiny glimmering screen,

Having planned, controlled and subtle ways,

Using the wind and sun as its agents.

Playing me with gold and brown.

No strand is the same color twice.

The whole world is there for me.

So, I am lost.

My drug is you,

Deafening me,

Gently numbing me.

Known But to God...

Today I undertook a 7 hour hike to visit the WW 1 battle sites around Mons, Belgium. The first battle of that conflict was fought near here, and there is also a lovely, sad and very beautiful military cemetery that I walked to, ( St . Symphorien war cemetery.)

It took forever to get there, and my ill fitting hiking shoes took a toll on me...But, the quiet and solemn place really brought a tear to my eye. The graves are of both German and British /Irish/Canadian soldiers...They are mingled together in death, and the site is maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission...It is set in a small, tiered area. It contains quiet glades and small sun drenched alcoves and small clusters of graves. It is indescribable, with the leaves, budding flowers, sun and quiet rustling of the trees. I was there alone, yet the place did not feel lonely. It felt like something I can't describe, beautiful...Like love? I don't know...
I determined that there was nothing I could do to honor these men more than just living life. I looked to the sun and felt it warm my face as the shadows flickered over the setting. Thinking of these dead, while I was living life...What else could I do to honor them?

I had packed a Thermos of tea and I quaffed a plastic mug of the stuff - feeling the drink refresh me. How lucky I was to enjoy that...It was all I had to toast them...

I felt honored to be there in their presence...

Great post by another blogger here on this deeply moving place...

thepoormouth.blogspot.com/2008/11/post-for-armistice-day.html

Poem for Today...

Afraid

Trying to dissolve and de-remember you,
With white-out,
With erasers,
With a delete button.

Just the movements,
The thoughts of trying to blot you out,
Bring you nearer to me.

I seek it,
Coming closer to you,
In trying to lose you.

So afraid, that without the pain of missing you,
I will have nothing

Dec 2008

Children...(Ex Post Facto...from Iraq)

Iraq has a very young population with lots of children. Here is a waif in a Northern village... Many children may have developmental, emotional or physical afflictions.

In the same Iraqi town there was a school, and we were waiting in the large courtyard. An old man served us tea off an ancient brass tray. He had a haggard and lined face, and was clad in the typical long Arab-fashioned dress.
With him was a child, dressed in similar clothes, but he the child was burned... What I mean to say is, that he had old healed burn scars on his trunk and arms. I saw them under at the edge of his clothing.
I saw the wrinkled flesh, like scorched cheese, under the lines of his smock as he turned and helped the old man. Perhaps it was his grandfather. ...There are also old burns on the child’s face.

There are a lot of accidental burns in the children here. Heating during the damp winter is often via open flame from compressed fuel tanks. These are also used for cooking.

School was over, but the child was not playing outside with the other kids. He followed the old man, helping him, and distributing the brown heavily sugared tea in tiny etched glass tumblers.

I saw the old man as a comfort for the child. Keeping the youngster engaged and busy, maybe shielding him from more pain...In my mind I picture the child as an outcast, somewhat disfigured, but seeking company. Perhaps he is somewhat shy or shunned ir teased by his schoolmates? Or maybe I am projecting my feelings onto him....(At the time I thought that I should not do that...But perhaps that projection is what gives us empathy.)

I always approach these disfigured children after a short while, and kneel down to shake their hands and communicate with them.

There is always a clamor of kids around us, and I feel that by engaging these special children openly - in a positve way, and with no hesitation - it shows their classmates that they are normal human being too...Or maybe I am doing wrong and should just leave them...

I don't know.

I went to a wedding reception few years ago with my parents as a guest... I knew no one there, and was just tagging along with the folks because I happened to be in town. It was after another (blogless) deployment...Everyone was dressed up, food and drinks and ice sculptures etc.

It was in a fancy hotel complex in Dallas...

At the reception there was a small dark eyed girl sitting quietly. Her dark hair fell over a pair of round glasses that were set far out on her nose. She was perched on a plush couch outside the banquet room, in the hotel's lobby.

She had some form of congenital dwarfism, and was not playing with the children of the other wedding guests. I debated for a long time with myself. It was a time when I was without love, and having lost it, I felt very alone. I sat next to her, but not too close...I wanted to let her know I felt something for her, but did not want her to feel awkward...I did it very casually, as if I was tired. Just making it the most natural thing to do...

At the time, I felt that she was the only one that I had anything in common with there. I talked to her about the weather etc. She never spoke, just smiled back with a small distorted mouth - that seemed too full of teeth.

I didn't want to patronize her. I just didn't want her to feel alone... I know that what I was doing was trying not to feel alone myself... Perhaps I was seeking solace in my own actions...I felt guilty for using her unspeaking company then...

Seems like awhile ago now...I didn't want to do that with the child in Iraq.

(Blog composed from notes made in Nov.2008 in Northern Iraq)

No Place Like...

Well, here I am...Another assignment, this time in Europe. Yeah it's no Iraq...
Actually, and I know this sounds crazy, I do miss my pals and the certainty of some things. For instance, the bureaucracy here is crazy. I was thinking last week during in-processing, "what a pain, wish I was in Iraq." Then I caught myself saying that.

I heard a headline this week about the increased number of suicides in the Army. It has probably been an issue for soldiers for years, not just in this country, but everywhere. I was watching the movie "Ryan's Daughter" last week. It has the hauntingly beautiful Sarah Miles in it. Anyway, she falls in love with a mentally damaged British soldier. He ends up taking his life.

I think that there are so many issues one faces upon returning. Also, each person's experience is so unique. Their reaction to returning may depend upon where in the cycle of their own life they are... Perhaps it is the fact that one sees life continuing, and one is expected to fit in? I don't know, but it is not just a sadness...it is like an emptiness, a palpable nothing that engulfs a person. Perhaps it is a sort of loneliness that one experiences upon returning. I guess "aloneness" is a better word.
Even with crowds around, one walks through the days alone.

If I can motivate anyone to do anything, please watch the movie "The Best Years of Our Lives". It is from 1946. Powerful. Some scenes always move me to tears.

Anyway, I will continue to put up stuff from Iraq, as well as my impressions of this tour in Europe.

Dream in peace.