prev on the prospect of war next
2001-09-13 | 1:47 p.m.

I've been in tears since eight o'clock this morning. I really hope I am getting my period because otherwise this could get to be a serious problem.

My sister came over this morning and said she'd finally seen a headline she liked. It was in the Contra Costa Times, and it said, "U.S. Prepares for War." I think she expected me to agree with her. I'm not a complete pacifist, but close enough for our purposes here. Let me be clear: I would have no problem with an action that actually took out bin Laden and his gang--whether they did it or not. No problem with that whatsoever. But I have no confidence that it will happen. I think that my government will go to Afghanistan and kill more civilians. That seems wrong to me.

"Fine, let's bomb everybody," I said, snippily.

"I don't have a problem with that," she said, snippily.

I began to think that my sister is bloodthirsty, just like my mother. I can't say that I am not bloodthirsty, exactly, but I don't want just any old blood. It is important to me that the right blood be shed.

I don't think my father was so bloodthirsty. I'm not really sure if that's true or not. I can't remember. Of course, I have no real basis for comparison. Certainly he was more conservative than I am, and he was a patriot, as am I. He did re-enlist when Pearl Harbor was attacked, after having first enlisted at 15 and served a two-year tour. He was willing to go. But he was a Navy man, and I think the bloodthirsty men tend to opt for other branches. Perhaps I am wrong.

But my father never seemed particularly gung ho on war. He was a lover, not a fighter. Bit of a scoundrel, too. But he served. Unlike some people I could name, such as our president, who never spent so much as a day in the National Guard. He had been to war and when I asked him if he had ever killed anyone, he said yes, he had.

I was already angry with Leo when my sister showed up. I feel as if our friendship may end; I may end it. (Yesterday I have the idea that I wanted to end all my friendships but three. Mostly because I can't bear worrying about whether people like me or not.) I can't agree with his opinions and more than that, I feel like I am not free to say what I think with him. I'm not good at arguing, and I would have to argue, do research, support my assertions endlessly. Easier to go silent.

I started to think this morning that my father was "a real man." This is pretty crazy thinking, I admit. But I was missing him so much. I want to scream at Leo that he has never even been to war, so it's easy for him to be cavalier about killing people. I want to tell him to fuck off. He talks so much about the importance of feelings but I feel that mine would engender nothing but his contempt.

I thought about Duff and how, despite everything else, he is a truly brave man. I really respect his bravery, I depend upon it, at least when I'm not afraid he's going to get me killed. For an ordinary man, he is very close to fearless. That also seemed to matter to me this morning.

Later this morning I called Duff out of frustration and actually reached him. I had thought he might be on his way home at last, but when he answered I knew he couldn't be. I said, "Where are you?" which has become my standard greeting to him. He said, "On I-294, heading toward LaPorte, Indiana." He had reserved seats on two different flights today but both were cancelled, so now he was driving to Indiana to visit relatives. I told him I felt alone and he said that 1 in 7 people in the country feel as I do. But I'm not even sure what he means. He's a math guy; he uses numbers as shorthand for ideas.

Leo complained that the Michael Moore letter I sent was narcissistic. He said It is important to allow yourself absorb the reality of the attacks before finding some way not to feel what you otherwise might. Arab apologists are already at work, though thousands of dead in the wreckage have yet to be identified. This is the insensitivity of who present themselves as being exceptionally sensitive.

What I cannot say to him is that I think he assumes too much. Just because people don't go on about their feelings in an essay doesn't mean that they aren't crying, too. Everybody is crying. It's not news. For me to talk about my feelings feels incredibly "narcissistic." That's why I feel I must confine them to the diary if I write about them at all. What could I say about my own feelings that wouldn't seem banal and beside the point? The New Yorkers, the military brass have a lock on authentic feeling right now. I'm not saying that in a sarcastic way. What would I say? "I've been listening to NPR, and it's really upsetting"? Nobody wants to hear about that. Nobody wants to hear about how I feel as a mother. Yes, I have moved from thinking about the feelings of American victims to thinking about American victims AND worrying about the prospect of dead civilians in Afghanistan. I know there must be other people who feel as I do but there are none at hand. At least Stephen called me, and he listened to me blubber, and he interrupted me just long enough to say "But I agree."

This entry is a jumbled mess, and it doesn't say everything I would like to say, but I don't have time to edit it or continue writing. It's a probably a reasonably accurate reflection of my thoughts. I'm sure I'll be back, but I've got to shift gears now. Everybody is mad at me. One thing I meant to write was that I stood at the gas station pumping gas this morning and thought very seriously about quitting the writing business altogether and trying to get involved in some kind of peace work. Put my head where my heart is. Just do something to lessen the suffering in the world. I know that sounds lame, especially if I don't actually do anything, but that's what's on my mind.

More than anything else, I'm agitated by this feeling that I must not say how I feel to the people I'm accustomed to speaking with, because I must be excruciatingly careful about their feelings, yet I also feel this tremendous urgency, this compulsion to change people's minds about the usefulness of killing more innocent people. So I sit here mutely and bang away on my keyboard, and think that I would just as soon dig a hole and crawl into it as anything else.

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