Sept. 26, 2001 ~ A little more than twenty years ago
I was at a small radio station in Dallas, Texas. There to use the recording studio, I sat and talked with the disc jockey, who was a good friend.
"Would you like to say something on the air?" he asked.
"Not really. What would I say?"
"You could read a story on the news. Just one little story."
I thought about that for a few minutes and decided it would be okay. HE talked on the air every day, and if he could do it, so could I. Right?
We went to a machine which put out something that looked like a ticker tape (does anybody even remember ticker tape?). This was from one of the news services -- AP, I think -- and it contained news items, lots and lots of news. We looked at the breaking stories and my friend said, "Pick something."
There was a small story that caught my eye, about trouble in a country far away. I stumbled over the words... as I practiced what I would say.
"How do you pronounce this word?" I asked.
"Hmmm. Don't know."
The unfamiliar word was "Kabul." The country was Afghanistan.
I sat there and read that story, while Charlie held my young son on his lap. My baby wasn't even eighteen months old. Somewhere there are photographs, images from that day. Charlie with my boy, my boy holding his bottle.
And now that boy is grown, a soldier boy, and there is talk that he could go to that troubled country one day. It seems like only weeks ago that I stumbled over the words about that unfamiliar place. I know my child is grown... I know this, I do. But to me, he is also that baby with the bottle in his hands, sitting on a friend's lap, innocent and small. I can close my eyes and see him there... I know nothing about the trouble in that country with the words I can't pronouce, and my biggest concern is making my truck payment, buying diapers and baby food. I want those days back, and they are gone. I want to hold my children close, want to snuggle against their precious baby flesh, smell the sweetness of their hair, but my children are grown.
I want my boys home. Don't we all? When people talk of war, they don't realize that it is MY child who might be called upon to do the unthinkable. Of course I'm not the only mother with a child in the military, or with children who might wind up there, but for me, at this moment, it's personal.
You'll have to forgive me for all this sentimental rambling. It will pass. If I could turn back the hands of time, I'd do that in a heartbeat.
I can't. Can't go back, can't change a thing, can't go to sleep and wake up to an unchanged world, to a safe place. So I guess I'll have to do what mothers do, what mothers have always done. Be brave, or try to. Pray. Hope for the best. Remember those baby days, and hope there will be grandchildren someday, that there are more baby days ahead of us all.
There will be moments when I'm afraid. Moments when I'm sad... lots of those.
And there will be moments when I remember.
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