The Bottom Drops Out

So much has happened in the past month +. After this coming weekend, my life might just go back to normal - the calm life, where I don't miss my tv shows and go out late on some weekend nights.

Before I get back to the purpose of this blog, though, which was bitching about things and talking about how great I am, I have to deal with this one important and awful recent event. I won't feel justified in returning to old me until I get this out. There's a lot to it, and it tears me up to think/write about it, so it's going to be in installments, starting with the day that the world changed.

I.

On my drive to work at 8:30 AM June 23, my mother called. She asked where I was.

"On my way to work. Late, as usual, heh."

"Can you get to where you can slow down for a minute?" The tears in her voice were unmistakable. I immediately knew that something was wrong. "Grandma?" I thought. "Grandpa?" I exited I-44 at Southwest Ave.

No. Not someone two generations ahead of me, 3 times my age. Mom had called to inform me that my cousin Cpl Riley E Baker was killed while on patrol in Iraq on June 22. He was 22 years old, and the best damn person on the planet. The BEST.

I felt like the bottom had dropped out, that I was falling. Through the bottom of the car, through the exit ramp, through pavement and earth. Riley was gone.

"Oh God, Oh God, Oh God." I searched for a place to park my car on this unfamilar road. I parked, and exploded into wailing. My heart was breaking. It wanted justice in a last good-bye, a last hug. It wanted justice in REVENGE.

After 30 minutes on the phone with mom, I called Daren. Then collected myself enough to drive the 20 minutes left to work. What was I going to do? My office is in the back. I could sneak in the back door and no one would be sure I was there. I wanted to hide. But then, I wanted to run away too. Best to go in the front door, and let them know. My boss was awesome. I sucked it up and wrapped up about an hour's worth of work I had to finish, then left to meet Mom and my sister Lacey at the park.

The initial impact of FINDING OUT left me reeling. I've never had anyone else close to me die before. I always said "War? Whatever. They're going to do what they're going to do, and unless it affects me personally in this one way possible, I can live in my little war-less dream world of network reality tv and pizza delivery." No more. I am angry at everyone involved: Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, Tony Blair for not reasoning with Bush, Cindy Sheehan and all the protesters who didn't do a good enough job of bringing my cousin home, myself for not caring until it was too late.

130,000+ troops. I knew one of them.

Lacey and I went forward with our camping plans for that weekend, as Riley, lover of outdoors, would have wanted. On our drive home, we separately saw the same rainbow, the brightest we'd ever seen, and a complete arc. We thought the same thing.