Head down
heart up
a cool breeze
balm to my desert soul

The wanderer
came my way again
like a night star
seen through tired eyes

Soul flames
remain as
night dies and
the day opens

Background music
a familar tune
heart sinks
soul sunrise

Momentum gathers and the majority believe we should not be in Iraq.War is a messy business. It brings out the worst in people. Heros are invented in wartime.

World War II created Audie Murphy. He was a friend of my Dad's a tortured man, who never returned from his nightmares. The true heros are usually the dead and their stories die with them. So the powers that puppet the war invent ways to champion it.

My friend Roy a Korean war survivor says that it is the ones who never fought who think wars are noble. His wounds are a dull ache in his old age. Never free from his pain or his memories. My friend Earl was a veteren of World War II he died screaming at the visions of the dead. The battle that had ended lived on in his soul.

I am struck by how a war can be downgraded to a police action. I hear echos of the South in a time when gentlemen rode off to war telling their wives they would be back in a week. Too many believe that might makes right, or victory is inevitable. Few realize that a history of success is not a predictor of future wins.

No one remembers the shining moments of the Nazis before their well oiled machines were defeated by a hibrenating bear in Russian winter. Or contemplates that same Bear leaving pesky Afganistan, tail between massive legs.

LBJ understood the personal cost of war when he saw the doctored numbers of death in Vietnam. He passed it down, torn between trusting the generals and believing his oath to America. The blustering lifetime politician, pulled hurricane victims from their broken houses. He believed he was responsible to the citizens so he did not run again and turned away from a certain win.

Tread carefully if you believe because you are well armed or "right' you will win the war. When the "breakaway war" with our British Mother started America had no army or no government. It formed quickly as the occupied rise of necessity.

This war to free the people we destroy....this war that Bush jokes about in a mock "search for weapons of mass destruction". This war that is growing around the edges and turns from a foreign invasion to a civil explosion....More people have died in Iraq during this war than at the hands of the demented dictator Saddam.

Even Dr Kevorkian ended up in prison....."First do no harm" was lost to his ego. Death should be God's business not left to politicians. The Constitution is "only a piece of paper" and Americans are hostages to the collective ego of the Vulcans. I see metaphors in wars, even one that was planned in Texas. War truly is a messy business. It is only arrogance that assures America it is right. It is lack of hindsight that convinces us we will win.

Sometimes I wish I was multifaceted or mysterious or subtle. Actually my face has no real disguises. My fire sign is in control....maybe the cowardly Lioness.....but the Lioness nonetheless. I often have good intentions that fail to result in the good results I would like. Most of my "sins" are of omission or denial or a result of scattering optimism and struggling ego.

Looking back I must be really getting ahead in this lifetime, because the Karma has been intense.....Sometimes my beliefs have kept me sane....I believe my children and I chose each other to work out certain lessons....then we have the opportunity and challenge if we work them out this time around or not, but I believe we are trying....

I usually get in trouble for a failure to be still and quiet. My sense of the absurd is hard to control. Sometimes life makes me laugh when it should make me cry. I am a flawed woman. I believe it is my spiritual awakening that has made me lack cyncism, where my life experience, should have given me a healthy dose of it....

Duhhhhhhhh.....John is coming into town tomorrow or Tuesday maybe I just need to dance.....Still flawed after all these years...and all my crazy friends have not settled down...

http://bushsyndrome.blogstream.com/

As far as sex goes, I am for it. I love erotica and I can't handle porn. I guess my recent experience on the stream proves I can still be impulsive, but I have learned that sex is not something I can afford to take lightly.

I have said before that I have always had a problem with commitment...I still prefer threads not chains. I did not get married until I was 30. I tried to sneak out of the wedding chapel before the ceremony. I was engaged several times...I know how to break up.

Living in seperate states and cities from my ex throughout my marriage kept us together......I used to joke that it was how we maintained a honeymoon stage. It wasn't a joke. It was the truth. My husband and I had terrible communications problems. The sex was outstanding. Who the hell needed to talk anyway?

Technically, I slept with John, my current lover, on the first date. But actually we had known each other for months, we had talked for hours, we had gone places with other people and worked parties together as Blackjack dealers. We had "the talk". I told him that we should not expect anything from each other and I knew how to be monogamous without being exclusive. I explained that I wasn't looking for marriage again. I realize now that John listened more than talked. He told me later he thought I was setting ground rules and he would have agreed to anything.

We spent 5 life affirming hours together. When he drove me home he started laughing. He said..."Everything you said sounded good. But I'm the kinda guy that shows up every day. I'm the kinda guy that grows on you."

The last few years I have had the best sex of my life. I have also at various times given it up. The last time I think because I was worried that the threads would grow ropes and turn into chains. I played with a fantasy to avoid the real thing,

With sex I like to take my time now because I am not sure when we will get together again. I understand that this relationship is flawed. But I am flawed. It is on my terms. I am still not looking for marriage. Although I wish John could be more supportive in some ways, I don't really encourage it. I know my limitations. But it is still a good thing. I didn't know I could fall in love again. And I did.

I wouldn't cheat on John. So when my ex-fiancee showed back up I was a little confused. We had a nice chess game and a great talk. I figured closure.... So he calls me today. He offers to stop by and fix a little plumbing problem he noted when he was here. He's a plumber so I figure what the Hell why not. He stops by and fixes it. Now he wants to come over and replace some stuff under the bathroom sink (some of Johns repairs). Well I am not inclined to turn down home repairs. But he said a couple of things that make me think he really wants to relive the 80's. Sorry but "that dog won't hunt"

I don't think there would be anything there for me at all. Oh yeah sex..... but it's not that important anyway. I am not even tempted. I know what I have to lose. It doesn't hurt that John is really great looking and in good shape....but who wants to relive the 80's anyway.

I have one major regret where sex is concerned. When I had my head injury I was 45. I was having an affair with a 26 year old. Do you call it an affair if you are both single? My short term memory was the most directly affected by my accident. So I don't remember the sex with this gorgeous man at all. I lost the entire year and haven't gotten much of it back at all. I ended our relationship the minute a friend told me I was in it. Later I found out he had transferred back to Arkansas. A mutual friend told me he was heartbroken. He looked like he would be a fast healer. He was a tall dark intense guy (prematurely graying). I know where he lived. I know he played guitar. He was an environmental scientist. I remember a couple of dates (kinda). I remember that my friend Lori pointed out that he was young enough to be my son. My guess is he found someone more age appropriate and got married.


I am hoping someday to remember enough of this relationship so I can use it for a fantasy in my old age......

Colo