I have the thing, I might as well use it.
Jun. 27th, 2004 11:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pecuniumIt's been a year, well more like a year and a half.
It feels like less, as though the desert swallowed it, a temporal tesseract wherein a vast amount of the real world went by while I was sleeping.
And the sleep seems to have been so real, and vague.
Notes, at semi-random.
Saw Farenheit 9/11 yesterday, with some reservations. I dislike much of HOW Moore says things, his distortions, presented as though they were fact do more harm than the good he is attempting (for more on this a column a few months ago, or perhaps last month, see above) in a gun magazine on the parts of Bowling for Columbine which are important matters for discussion, and the difficulty if getting past the lies in the piece... where a discussion of the merits might come, it is slain abed because someone will bring up, e.g., the rifle at the bank) but I am not fond of Bush fils (I thought I was displeased with his father, how wrong I was, that was a momentary fit of pique, compared to my sentiments about the man presently at the helm) and I wanted to see to it the film was well received.
I was also given a ticket, and it was a family outing.
The last half of the film was hard to watch... it was almost all in Iraq, and most of that from when I was there...
I was very contained when I got out... probably looked, as one friend commented I looked back in Oct., scary.
It's been a hell of a year, and only just recently rounded out. I am, finally, home, inasmuch as I can be, since we are moving in Sept..
The trip to Seattle was the last gasp of far travelling... a nice (ignoring the cause) capstone to some 20,000 miles I rambled last year. Spring, shading into summer.
It was good to feel useful, I've been at odds and ends since I was sent from theater. Two-months in Walter Reed (topped off with a near death/disfiguring illness), a month of screwy leave (to convalesce) and then six months of limbo, and waiting... I had structure; in that there were, at any given time, about 15 people I had to oversee, and a half dozen others I had to keep tabs on.
But I was broken... I wasn't home, and I wasn't away. I didn't want to go back to Iraq, but I did (sometimes) wish I'd never left. The news was painful... the dread of the daily casualty figures, the joy at some trivial piece of e-mail (Mills on a toilet in a palace in Tikrit... the Library staff gave me ugly looks when I guffawed).
The wondering about my disease (it's in remission, talk to me in a couple of years and I'll better know how I am).
So I stewed. I ate fried clams, and I drank some beer, I hung out with friends, and knit myself back together.
I went to Arlington, the only time while I was at Walter Reed when I wore my uniform, the only time from May to Oct. which I wore boots.
I am home now... dirt under my fingernails, plants in the ground, horses in the yard... not enough books, or film, or money (since I'm between jobs and living off the fat I stored up on deployment) hanging with friends, and being reminded, at wedding receptions, movies, by odd sounds, that I am not who I was before.
There are small kernels of grief, sadness, anger and (dare I say it) rage nestled in my bosom... dark moments in the wee hours, clouds before the sun on days of brilliant sunshine.
They make me wonder for the rest of the world, I had a quiet war, no one (so far as I know) tried to kill me retail, and I saw little of the horrors of the immediate aftermath of battle. My fight was all at a distance, some of it a great distance, but I am less, and more than I was.
It's been a hell of a year.
It feels like less, as though the desert swallowed it, a temporal tesseract wherein a vast amount of the real world went by while I was sleeping.
And the sleep seems to have been so real, and vague.
Notes, at semi-random.
Saw Farenheit 9/11 yesterday, with some reservations. I dislike much of HOW Moore says things, his distortions, presented as though they were fact do more harm than the good he is attempting (for more on this a column a few months ago, or perhaps last month, see above) in a gun magazine on the parts of Bowling for Columbine which are important matters for discussion, and the difficulty if getting past the lies in the piece... where a discussion of the merits might come, it is slain abed because someone will bring up, e.g., the rifle at the bank) but I am not fond of Bush fils (I thought I was displeased with his father, how wrong I was, that was a momentary fit of pique, compared to my sentiments about the man presently at the helm) and I wanted to see to it the film was well received.
I was also given a ticket, and it was a family outing.
The last half of the film was hard to watch... it was almost all in Iraq, and most of that from when I was there...
I was very contained when I got out... probably looked, as one friend commented I looked back in Oct., scary.
It's been a hell of a year, and only just recently rounded out. I am, finally, home, inasmuch as I can be, since we are moving in Sept..
The trip to Seattle was the last gasp of far travelling... a nice (ignoring the cause) capstone to some 20,000 miles I rambled last year. Spring, shading into summer.
It was good to feel useful, I've been at odds and ends since I was sent from theater. Two-months in Walter Reed (topped off with a near death/disfiguring illness), a month of screwy leave (to convalesce) and then six months of limbo, and waiting... I had structure; in that there were, at any given time, about 15 people I had to oversee, and a half dozen others I had to keep tabs on.
But I was broken... I wasn't home, and I wasn't away. I didn't want to go back to Iraq, but I did (sometimes) wish I'd never left. The news was painful... the dread of the daily casualty figures, the joy at some trivial piece of e-mail (Mills on a toilet in a palace in Tikrit... the Library staff gave me ugly looks when I guffawed).
The wondering about my disease (it's in remission, talk to me in a couple of years and I'll better know how I am).
So I stewed. I ate fried clams, and I drank some beer, I hung out with friends, and knit myself back together.
I went to Arlington, the only time while I was at Walter Reed when I wore my uniform, the only time from May to Oct. which I wore boots.
I am home now... dirt under my fingernails, plants in the ground, horses in the yard... not enough books, or film, or money (since I'm between jobs and living off the fat I stored up on deployment) hanging with friends, and being reminded, at wedding receptions, movies, by odd sounds, that I am not who I was before.
There are small kernels of grief, sadness, anger and (dare I say it) rage nestled in my bosom... dark moments in the wee hours, clouds before the sun on days of brilliant sunshine.
They make me wonder for the rest of the world, I had a quiet war, no one (so far as I know) tried to kill me retail, and I saw little of the horrors of the immediate aftermath of battle. My fight was all at a distance, some of it a great distance, but I am less, and more than I was.
It's been a hell of a year.
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no subject
Date: 2004-06-28 07:29 pm (UTC)Can you do me a favor... easy one. I need info, bt Thursday, for wahle-watching out to the Skellwejian (sp.?) Banks, out of Salem.
Maia, et familia, will be in the area, and they leave on Friday.
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-06-28 07:50 pm (UTC)Here's some information:
The East India Cruise Company, 57 Wharf Street, Salem, departs daily at 9 AM and 2 PM in July/August (schedule is different in other months, so call ahead). Phone 978-741-0434 or 800-745-9594 for reservations. Tickets are $27 for adults, $22 for seniors, and $18 for children under 14. Children under 3 are free. Whale sightings are guaranteed, or your next trip is free. This had the added feature of on-board exhibits to help the kids (and adults) pass the time.
I took a cruise out of Gloucester, but if cruises are in Salem, it's just as easy to do from there (and if they have a chance, they should visit the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem. It's awesome.).