Wednesday, February 14, 2007
On the Streets of Philadelphia
At work I try not to react to jungle outside, even if for a few minutes a day. Sometimes I succeed. But today the events came rushing in and rudely intruded upon my precariously sustained neutrality.
I was called from home to be told that a nephew of mine was killed in the explosion in the city center....Then they called me to say it may not be him after all because there was no way to identify what was left ... only his cell phone in the pants' pocket.
Now I'm waiting, fearfully, for confirmation either way.
The problem doesn't end there.
If it isn't him, it's someone's son anyway. But if it is him ... whom are we willing to risk going to the Morgue to receive the remains?? If and when we receive him ... where do we bury him?? Almost none who take the path to Abu Ghraib Cemetary return unscathed.
Perhaps we should revive the tradition of burying our dead in our gardens. It's certainly a lot better that losing other members of our family on the way to the cemetery or on the way back.
According to Glenn Reynolds and the boys, it's hard to tell the difference. Or at least it would be if the treasonous press would just tell the whole story. Like how that school just got painted in Baghdad - you, know, the one that no parents send their kids to for fear that they will be killed, and then the parents would have to face the dilemma of the morgue, the cemetery and the home garden.
Like they do in Philly.
