Three Years.

Sunday marked three years that the United States has had a military presence in Iraq. I remember the week the war began. I was convinced that NYC was going to be blown up, so much so that I had to buy toothpaste and refused to buy anything larger than a travel size. You don't need all the toothpaste when the world is coming to an end! I was working as a temp at Krispi Kreme's factory in Queens and was working on their filing in the conference room. I sat there (eating donuts) and watched the news coverage on the television they had available for the occasion. And I cried. People would come in for their lunch breaks and talked to me about the war. Most of them were for it. I tried to say nothing. "After all, Saddam was responsible for 9/11. Don't you care about that? You weren't here then. You can't possibly know."

I've discovered in recent weeks that I have no sense of self-preservation. If I were ever in a plane crash in the Andes, I would be the first one eaten. People tell me that this is why I'm so against the war. Because I cannot find the place within me where I want to survive above all else. I have always been a hard-core pacifist, before I knew what a pacifist was. I do not know that there is ever a situation in which I would find it justifiable to fight back like that. It's the same reason I don't believe in spanking children. There's a very fine line between punishment and retaliation. You have to be very calm and very self-aware to be certain that you are not crossing that line.