A conversation with the blogger's brother, in Iraq.

Sounds like the name of an 1837 poem, doesn't it? Oh, that it were.

Here it is, as best as I can recall:

Brother: I'm going to re-enlist. I want to finish my 20 years in the Guard so I can collect my retirement.
Me: You're going to WHAT?
B: Re-enlist. If I re-sign in-country, I get a $15,000 bonus, tax free. Plus all the money I make is tax free.
M: Not to be an asshole, but $15,000 won't mean a lot to your kids if you're dead.
[I'm omitting, here, a lot of back-and-forth wherein he kept insisting, "You don't understand," and me explaining that I was fully and completely familiar with the concept of tax-free. I even understand how it differs from "tax-deferred," its good-but-not-as-great brother.]
B: My $500,000 insurance policy will.
M: Uh, no, really, I think they'd rather have their dad.
B: I don't have to stay here, just complete my re-enlistment before I leave here.
M: They'll send you right back there, as soon as they can, you know.
B: I've been in for eight years and this is the first time I've been deployed.
M: It's the first time we've been at war.
B: No, this country carries out 500 combat missions a day around the world, aside from Iraq and Afghanistan. [If you didn't know my brother, you would believe this, sounding as authoritative as it did. Knowing him, I'm certain it was a number pulled out of his ass, completely at random.]
M: Whatever. [What I always say to his made-up arguments...what else CAN you say?] The point is, about half the soldiers there are Guard and Reserves.
B: Try 90%. [I checked this factoid later. It's a bit less than half, even according to Fox News. Again, pulled right out of his ass.]
M: Whatever. You're proving my point. I want you and others like you--who've done your part, by the way, to quit, come home, and let Bush start the draft if he needs more soldiers. Maybe when rich kids start facing the possibility of a draft, this will end a bit sooner.
B: I want to stand for something. I don't know many people I can look at and know they've stood for something.

It continued, mostly with me saying that I think being a teacher is standing for something, that being a parent is standing for something, that simply being a good person is standing for something. What I didn't say--and what he already KNOWS I think--is that voting against George Bush is standing for something.

I cautioned him, also, in the manner of all annoying, overbearing elder siblings everywhere, to make use of any and all transition help the Army provides him as he begins to prepare to come home. He indicated, unsurprisingly, that there is very little, but also that he doesn't think anything will ever stress him out again. If one of his daughters tells him she's pregnant at 17, he said his response will be, "Is anyone shooting at you, or firing mortars at the house? No? Fine, let's go to sleep and it'll all work out."

Two things here that worry me:
1. I don't think it'll be the big things that will bother him when he comes home. I think it'll be the difficulty in coming down from that level of adrenaline and excitement and fear to deal with everyday shit like a broken-down car or backed-up toilet or bounced check, and
2. I already know this will be a license for him to trivialize everyone else's experience. I'm sure in war, as in cancer or any other life-threatening situation, your priorities come into focus. But it shouldn't mean that nothing else will ever matter, and that nothing anyone else experiences is really important because it isn't THE WAR.

In all fairness, my brother's been nothing but appreciative of our contribution to his service, and he's in a very stressful situation. But he can get on my last nerve, truly. Found out on a phone call with my mother that apparently he and his wife harbor some fear that we will keep their child. I'm insulted by this because I would NEVER do that to someone unless they were abusing or neglecting their child, which they aren't. He told my mom that if I kept the baby, he'd kill me to get her back if he had to, and he'd spend the rest of his life in prison but his wife would have her baby. Well, the irony here is, it's only when he says stupid shit like that, that I'd ever even consider keeping her, just so she won't have to put up with Mr. Absolute. But no, you can have your baby back, even if she is too cool for you.

P.S. If you've made it this far, and want to be truly depressed, go to the Department of Defense website and sign up for their e-mailed press releases. I received them for a few weeks, with a special release for each casualty. That's a real downer. I finally had to unsubscribe.