Current mood:	content
Current music:	Fight Night 2 soundtrack stuck in my head

You say Mohammed, I say...Steve?
I talked for a while with an Iraqi teenager two nights ago. What struck me about the boy was that while we talked he stopped mid sentence and asked to touch my face. Sure, says I. He places his hand on my cheek feeling stubble and bug bites and in a sort of surpised and contemplative voice says "So you are human too."

Aren't we all? I ask. And we switch topics to Futbol. He's a Manchester United fan, I love Liverpool. He favors Saudi Arabia in the next cup, I think Germany will be strong at home but South Korea could be a suprise. His dad comes up and gives me a cigarette and I look around as they talk to me. Doc is treating wounded kids from a VBIED that hit their mosque. Their car lights and our Humvee lights surround the makeshift triage. And a little girl is harrassing our soldiers for beanie babies, dollar bills, and chocolate. what else could an 8 year old girl want from a foreign military.

"I don't like english." Says Mohammed. "It's difficult." Yeah, I gave up on Arabic, so I can't blame ya.

His father thinks we'll be here for 20 years. That Iraq and the US are one now. Maybe so. Hopefully in that time we can all figure out what Mohammed did. The other guy is human too.

But what if the guys who boobytrapped the corpses I went to see yesterday don't recognize anyone but themselves as human? And here I say that like we're much better.

Humanity, I think, is what fills the little gaps between all the broken shit, all the breaking, and all the plans, schematics, graphics and orders. Its the sand slipping out of grasping fingers. Its our instinct without progress as a motivator. It's who we are when we concentrate on being more than doing.

Should a soldier feel bad about an eager kid pulling a beanie baby out of the razor wire it landed in, due to poor throw? Or should he/she take heart in the child's eagerness and the opportunity to girlishly throw a stuffed toy?

I think its win win. And not a bad way to spend a day.

REV