Email from Cindy

-----Original Message-----
From: Cindy
Sent: Tuesday, May 30, 2006 9:44 PM
To: sonny
Subject: email

Sonny,
Thanks for sending the site. Pop forwarded it to me. Attached is the most recent photo Geoff sent today. He is on the left with floppy hat (takes after granddad) I have many photos that cannot be shared, please know know he is well and working hard. Give Aunt Donnie a great big hug and kiss for us.
Love Cindy



From: Sonny
Sent: Tuesday, May 30, 2006 11:30 PM
To: Cindy
Subject: email

Cindy,

You’re certainly welcome.

I think a lot about the soldiers and Marines in Iraq and Afghanistan, and everywhere that our men and women in uniform are in danger on behalf of what this country stands for. I know that while it is different from my own experience in Vietnam, some aspects will always be the same in war, i.e., the feeling that every day you’re alive is a good day, handed to you more by fate than good sense; the ache inside the fear, wondering if you’re being remembered by your loved ones as they carry out their routine, stateside lives going to jobs, paying bills, sleeping in comfortable beds, waking to a secure world every day; … feeling like your own life has been suspended for reasons you’re not sure you completely understand or agree with but you endure because of a larger belief that, right or wrong, if not you, who?

The poignant pictures found seemingly everywhere on the internet these days often bring tears to my eyes. I worry that my sensitivity might be noticed by those near me so I hide it, not wanting my friends and family to think there’s something left over in me from my own experiences … I don’t know why … a soldier sitting, staring into space, holding a letter from home; a soldier with his arms around his buddies laughing, in a bunker, dirty, seemingly oblivious to the danger outside, mistakenly understood by those who haven’t been there as “courage.” I saw one the other day of two women soldiers asleep in the sand, one resting her head on a hard metal box in the shade of an armored vehicle, the other with her head resting on her comrades thigh, both obviously bone tired, not ready to go back to their sleeping area before getting up and doing again whatever it was that was so needed by their fellow soldiers. I reacted, I guess, because of the exposed innocence it portrayed on the violent edge of war that is in all young soldiers. It’s called allegiance to duty, unquestioned loyalty, camaraderie, passing of childhood, unwitting participation in history, sensing change in one’s self as one never thought possible …and more, so much more. I guess I hide my emotions because I don’t want to appear sappy about what is so common “there.” Maybe I shouldn’t.

Satellite phones and e-mail may have changed it all now. I don’t know. I’m sure it’s different … but in many ways, it’ll always be the same.

Tell Geoff, we think about him … every minute, every day.

Sonny