I Can't Pretend Like Everything Is OK Anymore
I first met my oldest, now-19-year-old nephew when he was about four days old. I thought he was pretty cute. In one of those memories that stay with you as a Polaroid of when life was good, I remember my grandparents -- all of them still alive -- converging on my parents house on what was probably Labor Day weekend to meet this new little chapter in all our lives. He peed on my dad. He seemed to like me. All in all, I was pretty thrilled with the little dude.
We'd go on to have a lot of good times, this kid and I. I sang "Little Bunny Foo Foo" a bazillion times to calm him down. I gave him cookies when maybe I shouldn't have. I walked into a room and caught him pulling himself up for the first time so he could inspect the fish in my dad's aquarium. I rocked him when he had colic.
A few years after he came around, we both met his brother. We liked him too, but I think we both wondered what this meant for us. We stayed pretty tight. He learned to talk in a hurry after the brother arrived, and he took to telling me when I was screwing things up. ("Mommy doesn't do it that way" was very popular when I was babysitting.) I remember when he learned to read and proudly showed off his new skill. He'd do jigsaw puzzles and demonstrate his handiwork, because his aunt LOVES puzzles. When he got his tonsils out, he took the giant encyclopedia of animals that I'd bought him to the hospital. When I visited him, he held it up proudly with his ginger ale -- his aunt's favorite soda. When I made myself sick on stuffing one Thanksgiving and had to lay down, he stuck his little head in the room and asked me if I needed some of his "buddies" (stuffed animals) to keep me company and help me feel better.
Then he grew up. Went to school. And there were holiday programs and church plays. T-ball games and swim meets. Christmases and birthdays. He got older and busier. There were girlfriends, proms, dances, more swimming, driver's tests, jobs, fights and hugs and fishing.
Then he left last summer to join the Marines.
The decision hit us all hard, but I experienced more pride and love -- and horror and worry -- than I'd ever felt in my life. Like most of the men he'd go on to meet, he wanted to make a difference and saw the Marines as the most badass way to do it. After 13 weeks without him, we traveled to Parris Island last fall to celebrate his graduation. I can't even express how I felt the first time I saw him and the first time I hugged him. Because as the spinster aunt, these kids whose lives your sister has so graciously shared with you — these kids become a part of you. And all those memories, from the first time you held him at four days old until the moment you threw your arms around him on a remote island in South Carolina 19 years later, they come at you in a rush. Here is a life you have witnessed from its start. Here is someone accomplishing a dream to which you bear witness. Here is love and family and life.
But here, also, is fear.
Right now, this kid -- and all the kids with him (Do you realize, does anyone realize, that our freedom is kept by folks who can't even legally drink alcohol?) are doing some advanced training stuff in the desert in the US. It's not top-secret. It's just training. As of now, he's not set to deploy until January.
But then we bombed a place last week. And today we dropped one of our largest non-nukes somewhere else. And I can't pretend like I'm OK anymore.
Maybe the blog isn't the best place to express it, but the decisions of our turbulent administration directly impact so many people and so many families and it's incredibly upsetting. A special forces soldier died in Afghanistan last week. The US is thinking of sending more troops there. We're sending "an armada" to the Pacific to monitor North Korea. Our foreign policy changes every day, and everything seems to be nothing but chaos.
I'm preparing myself for news that my nephew will deploy much earlier than January. And I'm preparing myself for the constant worry this will bring to his entire family, me included. He does not have a "safe" job -- if those even exist. I will always support him. But as a lover, not a fighter, I can't understand how we can be infinitely at war. I can't understand how leaders so easily put the lives of so many young men and women at risk without an endgame. Without thought. Without concern. With, instead, bland statements about getting the bad guys. With denials and refusals to say who authorized which action. With blame. With hatred. With fear-mongering and derision.
This is a mess. And it scares me.
I can only hope that it scares my nephew a lot less than it scares me. He can do the fighting. I'll do the worrying. And the next time I see him, you can bet he gets a bigger hug than usual.
(We'll return to our regular limericks soon, I promise.)
We'd go on to have a lot of good times, this kid and I. I sang "Little Bunny Foo Foo" a bazillion times to calm him down. I gave him cookies when maybe I shouldn't have. I walked into a room and caught him pulling himself up for the first time so he could inspect the fish in my dad's aquarium. I rocked him when he had colic.
A few years after he came around, we both met his brother. We liked him too, but I think we both wondered what this meant for us. We stayed pretty tight. He learned to talk in a hurry after the brother arrived, and he took to telling me when I was screwing things up. ("Mommy doesn't do it that way" was very popular when I was babysitting.) I remember when he learned to read and proudly showed off his new skill. He'd do jigsaw puzzles and demonstrate his handiwork, because his aunt LOVES puzzles. When he got his tonsils out, he took the giant encyclopedia of animals that I'd bought him to the hospital. When I visited him, he held it up proudly with his ginger ale -- his aunt's favorite soda. When I made myself sick on stuffing one Thanksgiving and had to lay down, he stuck his little head in the room and asked me if I needed some of his "buddies" (stuffed animals) to keep me company and help me feel better.
Then he grew up. Went to school. And there were holiday programs and church plays. T-ball games and swim meets. Christmases and birthdays. He got older and busier. There were girlfriends, proms, dances, more swimming, driver's tests, jobs, fights and hugs and fishing.
Then he left last summer to join the Marines.
The decision hit us all hard, but I experienced more pride and love -- and horror and worry -- than I'd ever felt in my life. Like most of the men he'd go on to meet, he wanted to make a difference and saw the Marines as the most badass way to do it. After 13 weeks without him, we traveled to Parris Island last fall to celebrate his graduation. I can't even express how I felt the first time I saw him and the first time I hugged him. Because as the spinster aunt, these kids whose lives your sister has so graciously shared with you — these kids become a part of you. And all those memories, from the first time you held him at four days old until the moment you threw your arms around him on a remote island in South Carolina 19 years later, they come at you in a rush. Here is a life you have witnessed from its start. Here is someone accomplishing a dream to which you bear witness. Here is love and family and life.
But here, also, is fear.
Right now, this kid -- and all the kids with him (Do you realize, does anyone realize, that our freedom is kept by folks who can't even legally drink alcohol?) are doing some advanced training stuff in the desert in the US. It's not top-secret. It's just training. As of now, he's not set to deploy until January.
But then we bombed a place last week. And today we dropped one of our largest non-nukes somewhere else. And I can't pretend like I'm OK anymore.
Maybe the blog isn't the best place to express it, but the decisions of our turbulent administration directly impact so many people and so many families and it's incredibly upsetting. A special forces soldier died in Afghanistan last week. The US is thinking of sending more troops there. We're sending "an armada" to the Pacific to monitor North Korea. Our foreign policy changes every day, and everything seems to be nothing but chaos.
I'm preparing myself for news that my nephew will deploy much earlier than January. And I'm preparing myself for the constant worry this will bring to his entire family, me included. He does not have a "safe" job -- if those even exist. I will always support him. But as a lover, not a fighter, I can't understand how we can be infinitely at war. I can't understand how leaders so easily put the lives of so many young men and women at risk without an endgame. Without thought. Without concern. With, instead, bland statements about getting the bad guys. With denials and refusals to say who authorized which action. With blame. With hatred. With fear-mongering and derision.
This is a mess. And it scares me.
I can only hope that it scares my nephew a lot less than it scares me. He can do the fighting. I'll do the worrying. And the next time I see him, you can bet he gets a bigger hug than usual.
(We'll return to our regular limericks soon, I promise.)
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