I promised myself that I would not be consumed with what is going on in Iraq now that I know someone over there. I figured that if I distanced myself from the events in Iraq I would get through this waiting period and it would go by quickly. However, I was wrong. I seem to be glued to the news. Television, radio, internet. Whatever, whenever I hear of something new going on over there I am tuned in. I find myself telling people about the Shiites, the Sunni's and the Kurdish people. Not just tid-bits of information, I suddenly know so much about what is going on in the middle east it's almost scary. Every time I hear on the TV that more US soldiers have been killed I find myself on my computer scanning the names of the dead and praying that it's not someone I know. Still feeling deep sadness for the ones whose lives have been taken from them, ones I don't know. Wondering how their families are doing. I wonder how they continue their lives, because life does go on. But do they ever wonder if the rest of us realize what their son, daughter, husband, wife, brother, sister, girlfriend, boyfriend did for our nation? We're heading into spring and ads depict getting away to warmer weather or taking a skiing vacation out West. Life just continues...like nothing is even going on anywhere. Except for the news at six during dinner, we really don't think about it unless you know someone. Maybe some concern but really you can't possibly know what it's like for those waiting at home for their loved ones unless you are one of those people waiting.

It's the unknown that's the scarriest. Not knowing what is going on except what the media chooses to tell you. But one person did tell me that there's a saying in the army and I have heard it elsewhere but "no news is good news". I guess that may be true.

How interesting it is for this to be going on. All the horrible things going on in this world. Today the trains were bombed in Madrid, Spain killing more than 180 people. I often wonder if this is what God, or Allah, or Buddah, or whatever higher power one believes in...is this what they intended for us?
Fighting and killing our own? For land? For the right to believe whatever we want to believe? For basic freedoms? Is this really how it's supposed to be?

So today's blog doesn't flow very well, but that's my right. If my blog doesn't flow...well, there are worse things that could happen.