Heart-Wrenching

He approached our patrol carrying a very large sack.

Men further down the street were watching us.

I feared a concealed explosive device.

One to be remotely detonated.

But instead of killing this little boy…

I told him to stop and took this picture…

That if my memory card survived…

Someone would have seen…

The face of a little boy…

Who had killed me.

——
I just explained the story behind this picture to my daughter.

One Hell of an Awesome Quote

At the end of our journey, we all come back together.

— Modobs

If my personal philosophy of life had to be reduced to one sentence, it would be this.

The Thing About Tattoos

My love in her attire doth show her wit,
It doth so well become her:
For every season she hath dressings fit,
For winter, spring, and summer.
No beauty she doth miss,
When all her robes are on:
But Beauty’s self she is,
When all her robes are gone.

— Anonymous

Whenever I meet an attractive woman with tattoos, I am always disappointed as tattoos are yet another layer of dress from which she is never able to completely disrobe.

There is a beauty to the human body—and soul—
That is best left unblemished and unsoiled.

The Flag I Wore in Iraq

I gave it to my friend and fellow Marine after we returned home…

During the memorial service for his three-year old son…

Who had died in a most tragic accident.

We suffered so much together.

It just did not seem right.

The price of our flag…

To keep for myself.

Gandhi with a Bottle of Red

There are many causes that I am prepared to die for but no causes that I am prepared to kill for.

— Mahatma Gandhi

This time last year I was in Iraq serving a combat tour with the United States Marine Corps. And when I reflect upon how much I have changed since then, I think my thoughts regarding killing have changed the most.

The genesis of this change has to do with the belief that the soul might continue to exist in some form or another after death, whether the soul is reincarnated or whether it continues to exist in some place of Heaven or Hell. If the soul continues to exist after death, then the absolute impermanence of everything that exists in the world puts into perspective the ultimate insignificance of all the reasons one might have to harm or kill another human being.

This idea is still quite new to me and made more sense as I was watching the movie Gandhi while drinking a nice bottle of French wine. And it would certainly make much more sense if everyone adopted this precept and decided to stop acting so [insert your own appropriate adverb here] towards one another.

But until then, I will always be prepared to do so.

A Lesson in Racism

My wife and I recently invited several of my friends over for a nice little Korean-style grill dinner, complete with plenty of beer and raspberry wine. During the course of the evening, I asked my daughter if she noticed any differences among my three friends who were sitting at the table.

“No,” she said. “I don’t.”

Then I pointed to each of my friends in turn.

“Well,” I told her, “he’s white, he’s hispanic, and he’s black.”

My friends immediately objected, telling me that of course now she knows.

But the point was not for my daughter; it was for my friends.

Everything begins with how we treat each other.

And affects how everything tends to end.

Something I Did See

While returning home from a recent business trip, I saw something that I had never seen before. A mother had just boarded the airport’s concourse with her two young children, and she kneeled next to their stroller. After some very pleasant words about their trip to see their grandparents, the mother said something to her daughter who nodded her head slightly. Then the mother removed a doll from her travel bag and gave it to her daughter.

The daughter cradled the doll ever so affectionately.

The mother and her children were white.

But the little doll was black.

As the mother stepped off the concourse with her children, I had to tell the mother—without ever mentioning the specifics—that seeing how her daughter was being raised gives me so much hope for the future. Likewise, the mother kindly replied that me actually saying that gives her hope for the future and also very much made her day.

There is still such a thing as hope in this world.

Nurture it wherever you find it…

No Reason to Love

Love not me for comely grace,
For my pleasing eye or face,
Nor for any outward part:
No, nor for a constant heart!
For these may fail or turn to ill:
So thou and I shall sever.
Keep therefore a true woman’s eye,
And love me still, but know not why!
So hast thou the same reason still
To doat upon me ever.

— Anonymous

——
I don’t know why I love her so much.

And that is perhaps a good thing…

The Perfect Kiss

What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its values.

— Thomas Paine, The American Crisis

——
I had to wait fifteen years for the perfect kiss.

And it was absolutely worth the wait.

It Hurts

A Marine Corps friend of mine committed suicide last week.