Off to War

Well, I'm writing this because my brother, John Craig, has left to go join the fighting in Afghanistan. He's in the Army, 82nd Airborne division and though we all said goodbye in December, I had sort of kept it in the back of my head that I would fly out and say goodbye one more time before he left.

Schedules and money prevented me from doing so, and to be absolutely honest I don't think either he or I really wanted to go through that last goodbye before he left. And so we did it over the phone. When he had landed in Maine. It's funny how conversations like that are so mundane, when really you want to say something much more important . . . but if you say it then you just might be acknowledging just how serious this all really is - and no one wants to do that.

So we talked of books, and of his new address, and how vets were there at the airports handing out phones for our troops to dial home one last time before they left for parts unknown as well as food to keep them comfortable during their flight. Their kindness touched John and his buddies. That these older men would take the time to drive to Maine to say goodbye to younger men they don't even know. . .

And, finally, it was with a heavy heart that I got off the phone with my brother, and said that last 'I love you' and 'Goodbye'. I'mcertain we'll speak again on the phone sometime within the next 16 months while he is there, and I'm also pretty sure that my brother will be safe. But there's something strange about that last goodbye when your loved one is leaving the relative saftey of your home country. Something that has to do with trusting that everything will be OK that makes it especially difficult. Something about knowing that the next time you see him he will be 2 years older than he is right now and that life will have shaped him in ways you will never know about or be able to share with him.