When the phone rang, I was in that twilight of semi-sleep, my girlfriend having gotten up and left with an early call on set that day, squeezing my eyes shut against the growing sunlight through the window. At the second ring, I opened an eye and glanced at the clock on the bedstand.
You won't win many friends with this column but it needed to be said. I expect lots of articles today moaning about the 3000 dead 20 years ago. But forgetting the 10s of millions killed by Americans directly or indirectly before and after. I just read an article in the New Yorker about the Afghan war as told by the rural women who lived through it. Throw in Indonesia, Granada, Panama with all the others you list and is there any place on earth that doesn't have reason to hate America?
One of my few regrets in life, and there are several, is the length of time it took to open my eyes to the realities of the Government, and the Country that I so willingly served for years, and continued to support without question for years later. It took 9/11, and the Shrubs Daddy Issue inspired attack on Iraq to make me wake up. Thanks, Tom for reminding me again of what it is we are opposing.
What TC? The Oleo Strut Coffeehouse? What a concept. Tell me more. Tell me more. I know a strut is something in an engine. Is that where the name came from? Is there anything today resembling what grew within Oleo Strut walls?
I have said this before but I really like the way you tell the story through your own experience as well as your larger knowledge. You surely describe the ugly under belly of the beast in which we are complicit in our own times. Want to share this thought of Christian Wiman I found in his book , My Bright Abyss, which I read to ward off despair at our wilful destruction in the world (M/I):
" Radical change remains a possibility within us right up until our last breath. The greatest tragedy of human existence is not to live in time, in both senses of that phrase." You are a good example of someone living IN your time, as well as living in time to help us pull the threads together.
( I read Shakira's story in the NYT. I know why they hate us!!)
You won't win many friends with this column but it needed to be said. I expect lots of articles today moaning about the 3000 dead 20 years ago. But forgetting the 10s of millions killed by Americans directly or indirectly before and after. I just read an article in the New Yorker about the Afghan war as told by the rural women who lived through it. Throw in Indonesia, Granada, Panama with all the others you list and is there any place on earth that doesn't have reason to hate America?
All of us, guilty. But at least some of us realized how ugly we Americans really are.
Nicely done, TC.
One of my few regrets in life, and there are several, is the length of time it took to open my eyes to the realities of the Government, and the Country that I so willingly served for years, and continued to support without question for years later. It took 9/11, and the Shrubs Daddy Issue inspired attack on Iraq to make me wake up. Thanks, Tom for reminding me again of what it is we are opposing.
What TC? The Oleo Strut Coffeehouse? What a concept. Tell me more. Tell me more. I know a strut is something in an engine. Is that where the name came from? Is there anything today resembling what grew within Oleo Strut walls?
Such important insights.
I have said this before but I really like the way you tell the story through your own experience as well as your larger knowledge. You surely describe the ugly under belly of the beast in which we are complicit in our own times. Want to share this thought of Christian Wiman I found in his book , My Bright Abyss, which I read to ward off despair at our wilful destruction in the world (M/I):
" Radical change remains a possibility within us right up until our last breath. The greatest tragedy of human existence is not to live in time, in both senses of that phrase." You are a good example of someone living IN your time, as well as living in time to help us pull the threads together.
( I read Shakira's story in the NYT. I know why they hate us!!)