How Do I Explain?

Friday, August 11, 2000

Something happened last night that..well...it just struck something in me.

I happened to have been talking about the situation here with 2 friends in a Werewolf roleplay channel I play in yesterday morning. Once again, talk turned to solutions. This time, the conversationalists were a bit, if not more intelligent at least they spoke and asked intelligently. I told them that living in the middle of it all, without the media's skewed spin on things, no matter what the descission is, there will be a war.

After finally getting home (I had tried for 6 hours, see next entry), my kids and I went to a neighbor's house and hung out till 11 pm when the kids finally said they wanted to go to sleep. We walked home, living on a settlement of 100 families no one lives far from another and we passed concrete U shaped blocks that had been set up on an outlook of the settlement. Fresh sandbags had been piled on top.

We're in the middle of the worst drought in 80 years. These weren't set out to stop floodwaters. Also, the settlement is perched on top of one of the higher hills in the area and we'd be in big trouble if the valley flooded that much that WE'D need sandbags.

No, this wasn't to fight Mother Nature. This was to fight out enemies.

And my daughter, the almost 8 year old, asked as we passed these by what they were.

How do I explain to a child what fortified trenches are, and why we need them without instilling in her a blind hatred, a general hatred rather, of an entire people?

So I told here that there were some Arabs who might want to start fighting with us and these places were so that our soldiers can stand with guns and make sure the Arabs don't come.

The settlement sent out memos to the residents that we should stock up on bottled water, tanks of propane, food and perscription medication. It's sad that I know exactly where my gas mask is...