April 5, 2003

I don't give myself to the music. It grabs ahold of me and takes what it wants. It takes away everything until there's nothing left but the music, and I am the music, and when I put my lips to the mouthpiece, it closes the circuit on a filter, and when the music gives back what it took, it's more pure than it was before. When the music takes hold, there isn't any fat on your body to hate, or any loneliness or shame to feel. There's only the feel of the keys and your lips and the sound of the horn, and when it ends, nothing matters anymore, because it wraps you up in itself and shields you from the world. Carry that song in your soul, and you can take on the world.

I wondered about that airport they renamed. If al Sahaf is correct and some devastating attack against our soldiers holding it comes to fruition, will they change the name back? Is that what it's all about, renaming the airport? It seems so silly to me.

I wondered about the broken and dissipating Republican Guard many members of which are reportedly lying dead around the airport. I worry that the Republican Guard represents a good 80 - 90% of the evil that Bush perceives in Saddam Hussein (and the man himself, perhaps like Bush, represents a mere 10 or 20 percent of what his regime represents), a bad man, yes, but perhaps not a kingpin of the regime.

I wondered what tactics aside from pretending to surrender might be employed by such warriors. We know that they have used fear to make their own less faithful soldiers stay in line (the front one and the one of fire). What if they've done the same thing now with regular Iraqi citizens? What if those dead Iraqis lying around the airport in Republican Guard uniforms are men and boys from the city, forced at gunpoint to don the uniforms and go defend the airport?

I wondered for many years if maybe the end could justify the means, but now I see that there is no end. We can have all the success imaginable, and let us therefore imagine years of rebuilding, years of inspiring other non-democratic countries to come around. And after these years, the young sons of top, well-paid and well-loved aides of Saddam have grown with a vengeance they believe to be righteous against the hubris of America. How are we then to steer our planes around our pillars of democracy and capitalism when they are hi-jacked? We need to start repairing the damage we're doing. We need to start it now. Violence begets violence. I have children too.

I miss KamikazeOrigami.

She's been a member of e2 for roughly three times as long as I have, but has much, much less time to node. She's a geek like I am, but of a different kind. I'm more of a classical math and computer geek; she's a tech theatre geek. When we go to a play, I try to immerse myself in the story and fail to notice anything else. She absorbs the story as well as I do and walks out swooning about the lighting.

She is thruhiking the Appalachian Trail, all 2,167.1 miles of it. I have known her for some five years, and she will not cop out 700 miles in. She's going to walk the whole thing, and it will take her upwards of five months, and during those five or so months I will be in contact with her only intermittently, when she reaches a mail drop or gets a chance to charge her cell phone. I have been, to use a quaint yet wholly inadequate high school term, her boyfriend since about 3:00 in the morning on July 1, 2002. That's eight months, roughly four of which I have actually been able to spend in the same state as her. I study mathematics and computer science at Macalester College; she studies theatre at the University of Maryland, College Park.

She is the first person outside my family to whom I have said "I love you."

She is the reason for my going outside my specialty and writing things like this. She inspires me. She is hardcore. She loves nature and duct tape and Douglas Adams's books. She reads science fiction and plays computer games, when she has time.

She can get me away from my computer.

When she is with me, I like to do things for her, even though I know she doesn't need me to, because she is hardcore. Half the time she won't let me. She tickles me when I make a smart-ass comment. She tells stories to me. She has made me a better person. She has helped me to understand love, or to think I do. Whatever may become of us, I have been changed by her.

I miss her.

/me is crying
/me wishes the best for the families in coping with such tragedy

---

The bodies of US soldiers that were reported missing in action that were recovered from an Iraqi hospital had been identified - all but the ninth body has been identified.

Sgt. George E. Buggs, 31
Barnwell, South Carolina
3rd Division Support Battalion

Master Sgt. Robert J. Dowdy, 38
Cleveland, Ohio
507th Maintenance Company

Pvt. Ruben Estrella-Soto, 18
El Paso, Texas
507th Maintenance Company

Spc. James M. Kiehl, 22
Comfort, Texas
507th Maintenance Company

Chief Warrant Officer Johnny Villareal Mata, 35
Amarillo, Texas
507th Maintenance Company

Pfc. Lori Ann Piestewa, 23
Tuba City, Arizona
507th Maintenance Company

Pvt. Brandon U. Sloan, 19
Cleveland, Ohio
507th Maintenance Company

Sgt. Donald R. Walters, 33
Kansas City, Missouri
507th Maintenance Company