3000 Dead: Everything must change.

200,000+ Dead: Business as usual

Maybe the headline to this post offers a mental conundrum.

It does to me. Sometimes, I find myself in an odd position. Reconciling my British-birth and formative years with my somewhat Americanized teen and grown-up professional years is a challenge. We think differently, our two different spheres. At different speeds. In different terms. But too often to be ignored, we think the same.

Different cultures. Different mind-sets.

I have an older brother (step-brother, technically, but who counts that) who chose to remain in England when my career-USAF father was told, circa 1974, to haul ass to CONTUS to teach newbie technicians the nuances of the then-new A-10 and F-16.

The brother (who never really much liked said Yank stepfather, nor was given reason to) stayed behind in England, and began his REAL journey, to flight, away from flight, and, now, back to flight. Regardless of their differences, our differences, we bond around the idea of flying machines. The man, my dad, had tremendous faith in these machines, a love even. And he, and his very colourful friends, transferred it, and every element of understanding and their unique aviational Darwinism to anybody in earshot.

I, and my brother, were in earshot. Had I not had such miserable sight, and should my choice have been granted, maybe I would be driving an A-10 over Falujah today, rather than twisting the arms of executives. Maybe.

Anyway, the old man bailed, shortly thereafter. He'd burned out and had enough. Had seen too many friends float to earth, not nobly, not as eagles downed, but instead as dust in service of some half-assed guess. He couldn't service an American Ideal that sounded righteous and fancy, and, in the abstract, should be cared for, whilst his brothers were dying for no sensible reason beyond thier leader's unwillingness to truly manage--to understand, and to lead. It wasn't the "ideal" of America he remembered representing during his second rotation at Royal Thailand AFB Ubon Ratchitani, in '69-1971.

My point? Sometimes, oftentimes, duty is a statement, an action that can be focused or be misdirected. People die as you pursue your ideals. And as you practice them. Sometimes it's your wing-man, sometimes its 3000 of your countrymen. Very seldom is it 200,000+ unsuspecting bystanders.

But my dad's recollection: Thai people: beautiful, helpful and curious.

And also, calmness and centered-ness, which maybe are eqiuvalent.

Perhaps this sounds harsh, but maybe that's also the requirement of success. Of living. Of acceptance.

But, if you allow it to become personal--which we should--yet you pretend it's not personal, and instead, make it "definitional," in the sense that my guy[s] got killled by those evil, evil, Godless bastards or by waves, instead of personal in the sense of decisons and events can make enemies out of past and future friends and I must look for knowoledge in these ineviable things, well...

Well, you know what that requires? Think of them as friends first, not enemies. Not as different animals, but as breathers and strivers. Just like you. Or me. It's no joke. And no wave or 9-11 or shootdown can tear you apart.

Sorry. I don't know the point of this post beyond the fact that these ideas were in my head, intermingling, and I felt the need to shout the frustration.