Still at War

Forgive me, beat me if you must (hey, thrills where I can get them) for 3 days worth of linkage but they have been exceptionally perfect for us Infidels. And this one starts and ends with trains. I mean, c'mon, you catch my moniker, looked at my avatar lately? You knew this one had me right off.

But the real message here is what we all here at IBA feel, write and fight for.

So here again (begging her indulgence) is the incomparable Brigid from Home on the Range. God I hope she writes a book of this stuff someday. . .

The Sound of a . . .

I love the sound of a train. When I left the big city to move here I asked the Realtor before I made a bid on the place, "can I hear a train at night?" She looked apologetic when she said, "yes, there's one that runs about a mile away, you can hear it most nights", not realizing that to me that's exactly what I wanted to hear, that comforting sound.

I grew up in a town with a small log mill in the mountains of the West and I used to lay in bed at night and listen to the soulful melody of a train running a mile behind our house. I remember those damp nights when the rumble of the train came right up into the house and made my whole room resonate with the melancholy beauty of its sound. That haunting sound today simply brings back memories of those nights safely in my bed, home safe and surrounded by people that love me, the laughter of my Mom in the kitchen with my Dad, a tonic for any worries a child could have.

I'm probably unique in this affection. Henry David Thoreau complained that his life and tranquility were interrupted daily by the sound of the train passing near Walden. "The whistle of the locomotive penetrates my woods, sounding like the scream of a hawk sailing over some farmer's yard". So, although I love the sound of a train, I identified with Thoreau briefly, after I first moved to one of my first post-college apartments, right across the street from an airport where rent was cheap and where the sounds of aircraft were a constant. It wasn't just airplanes, for there was a helicopter flight school, and my morning's sleep was often interrupted as their blades beat the air into submission outside my window at first light. When the helicopters weren't flying the students were, and although, as a fledgling pilot I loved the sound of an airplane, hearing them 24 and 7 wasn't really what I had planned on.

But on the morning 9-12-2001, I'd have given anything to hear the sound of a airplane over my house, to see a contrail in the sky. The heavens were still and vaporless, as we as a people collectively came to a halt in mourning and awakening to a devastation we'd never dreamed of. I knew we'd go to war over this. It would be the 3rd war of my generations time, the 5th of my Fathers', and I was afraid it would be the worst. Like any war, there would be casualties.

However, where we would go was so different than the trenches of France or the skies above Germany. We would be fighting in a land that is violent and raw, a place and a culture that does not lend itself to leniency or the principals of freedom. There is a fine honed edge between daily life and senseless violence in those lands and the price of any innocence would be high. Raised mostly in affluent times, like myself, with safety and security, the soldiers would be saying their goodbyes to parents and loved ones, with courage driven by fear and hope, with only their training and an admirable commitment to the duty they had taken on.

As I sit at my little table writing this, an old train style lantern lighting my keyboard, nearly 7 years have gone by, and though my world is quiet except the occasional sound of the train, we are still at war. As I write, I listen to the song of Gordon Lightfoot who sings "Who are these ones who would lead us now; To the sound of a thousand guns; Who'd storm the gates of hell itself; To the tune of a single drum; Where are the girls of the neighborhood bars; Whose loves were lost at sea; In the hills of France and on German soil; From Saigon to Wounded Knee; Who come from long lines of soldiers; Whose duty was fulfilled; In the words of a warriors will; And protocol".

It seems as if some of our leaders wish to forget why we fight; forget what duty is. In God We Trust is on our dollar, but how long until that is replaced with some new age slogan and the visage of someone not ever tested in battle, honed under fire. How long until "One Nation Under God" is repealed for a catchy phrase that won't offend those that don't embrace the principals and Christian faith this country was founded on?

"In the words of a warriors will, and protocol". As the song ends, I pray for the future of our great nation. I pray for the the safety of all the troops that took the call of duty, in Afghanistan, in Iraq, wherever they may serve. I yearn for simpler times long ago, for other sights and sounds, log trains curving down forested hills in the rain, the whistle of their steadfast engines lulling me to sleep in a house in a nation Under God.

- - Brigid