2004-11-11
VETERANS' DAY
When it is ended, it matters little who keeps the body count | The dead do not return |
It really does not matter what the present conflagration, be it Verdun, Little Big Horn, the Mekong Delta or Fajullah; the outcome is the same | Death wins
| Those who survive the battles, have to figure out how to deal with what they experienced singularly |
Some do this better than others | Sloan Wilson's protagonist in the Man in the Grey Flannel Suit, Tom Rath, copes with living with first hand memories of atrocities by, essentially, forgetting about them |
Others, including many American soldiers who went to Vietnam, remain tormented by private, psychic demons even today | What is occurring even as we speak, in Fajullah, even the entire Middle East, shall, for the survivors, result in similar discontinuities in acceptance and denial |
And whether or not the souls departed, or damaged, went to fight to "Good War" or to wrest precious resources from others so a handful of greed mongers live richly is secondary, for the moment, to the fact that people died | People suffered, and suffer the rest of their lives | And in both instances, their efforts, even if not fully understood what role each played in the large scheme of things, were valiant |
So today, we pay homage to the veterans | Rest easy soldiers | Your efforts do not go unappreciated |
¶ 21:00 
click on the images on the right to see the complete picture and the full size of the essay |
When it is ended, it matters little who keeps the body count | The dead do not return |
It really does not matter what the present conflagration, be it Verdun, Little Big Horn, the Mekong Delta or Fajullah; the outcome is the same | Death wins
| Those who survive the battles, have to figure out how to deal with what they experienced singularly |
Some do this better than others | Sloan Wilson's protagonist in the Man in the Grey Flannel Suit, Tom Rath, copes with living with first hand memories of atrocities by, essentially, forgetting about them |
Others, including many American soldiers who went to Vietnam, remain tormented by private, psychic demons even today | What is occurring even as we speak, in Fajullah, even the entire Middle East, shall, for the survivors, result in similar discontinuities in acceptance and denial |
And whether or not the souls departed, or damaged, went to fight to "Good War" or to wrest precious resources from others so a handful of greed mongers live richly is secondary, for the moment, to the fact that people died | People suffered, and suffer the rest of their lives | And in both instances, their efforts, even if not fully understood what role each played in the large scheme of things, were valiant |
So today, we pay homage to the veterans | Rest easy soldiers | Your efforts do not go unappreciated |
