Msing Something

So, honestly now, I'm in a bit of a quandary. Not that that would bad per se - it's a nice word really; sounds like a sort of Lewis Carrollesque* type place with improbable animals floating around and talking in mathematical riddles. Besides, it's not really a big quandary, it's just a sort of niggling one (another fine word).

*How sad am I to Google Lewis Carroll to make sure I had the correct number of r's and l's, while misspelling quandary twice? Oh, and on Carroll? I got it right all by myself.

It's filling out forms that gets me. What am I now? Not Miss... haven't been that for a very long time and I don't really want to try now. It would sort of be like putting on a pair of jeans from high-school: an uncomfortable fit, and sadly inappropriate. I know some widows (NOT a nice word) use Mrs still, but that entails explanations sometimes. So - Ms? But I don't really like Ms. It's got baggage of its own for one thing, and for another it's really pretty ugly. It looks all truncated and angry on the page, and spoken it's just a nasally buzz.

Throwing out a fourth category just for women seems a little selfish though when men have to make do with the catchall Mr. Besides, political correctness has lumbered us with too many cautious alternatives to labels and conditions and things. Still maybe it's the answer.

The question is, what?

I suggest: Msn't

Random Monday Notes

Piercings, tattoos, unwashed hair, goat-inspired facial growths and saggy black clothing even in combination still cannot overcome a genetic heritage of baby-fat cheeks and a slightly receding chin. Sorry, you just end up looking like a slightly cranky but still lovable hamster.

There is no minor sin more egregious than that of not flushing a public toilet. Just saying.*

*note... sin is magnified if the toilet stall in question is the Prime Toilet Stall, the one whose door still latches and everything.

Americans are unbelievably naive. Apparently we're all stunned that a woman who spent her adult life in a slow, very public journey of self-destruction somehow managed to die of an accidental drug overdose. I mean, who saw that coming?

I still believe BBC news headline writers are superb. Viz today's use of, "EU snaps up Gaza croc woman," to sum up the story of a Palestinian woman trying to smuggled live crocodiles under her dress.

ETA: To get credit for massive self-restraint.

I did not post on the display order of the following books:
"Wine for Dummies" "Sex for Dummies" "Potty-training for Dummies"
however, truth forces me to admit that I've changed the order...

AND I'm not really posting on the man on Antiques Roadshow from Mobile Alabama who attended an auction to buy shawtguuuuns and ended up with 'spensive blew joooars.' Well, not really....

... okay, I AM! I'm posting on this man because he's amazing! And his expensive blue jars are worth $4,000. Wonder how much he would have paid for the shawtguuuuns?

Cars

I couldn't believe what I saw this morning. Haven't seen one of those in years - in fact I thought there was only one in the world (who would make two?). I only saw it for a moment; it turned left and lumbered away. But it was enough to spark off the automotive memories.

We had a lot of cars in our time. Quickly adding up... 12.5 in our marriage of 15 years (the .5 is for a mini-van neither of us wanted that we drove for two weeks before finding out it had multiple-personality disorder and was also probably a bio-hazard. The kids loved it). It started before that though, and I present: The Cars We Dated In.

19-scary-something Brown Cutlass Pimp Car: First car Kirk every drove me home in. It was his father's actually since Kirk had just gotten back from Thailand and hadn't yet replaced his own car that had been stolen while he was away.

Anonymous Tan Truck: Actually, this belonged to one of Kirk's best friends, the one I called Wookie. They had thrown a lot of egg-crate foam things in the back to make it more comfortable, and spent happy afternoons four-wheeling out in the desert. Wookie's main goal was to crack the heads of the unfortunates in the back against the ceiling. He was very good. My main memory of this truck though is that with great determination we managed to kiss extensively under those circumstances. Can't imagine now how we did that - suction?

Yellow Datsun: Hideous car, constantly breaking down, and fitted out with furry gray seat covers. However, two important things about it - one, it's the car we got engaged in (Halloween night, Kirk dressed as a punk-rocker. The driver's furry gray seat was always a little purple on the head-rest after that night) two, it introduced me to Kirk's amazing ability to kill cars viz: 'Kirk, my dad's VW made that noise right before it threw a rod. Do you think we should check it?' 'Nah, it'll be fine!' *catastrophic clunk and complete engine failure* '[unmentionable verbiage]'

Green Van: Wookie replaced his truck with this. Really awful thing - a sort of avocado green with a white stripe all the way around it. But it was huge, he could throw all of his camping gear AND all of his friends into it, and it had tinted windows. We called it The Love Melon. I think I only rode in it twice - it also came with a very unusual smell.

But that's what I saw this morning - a Love Melon sailing down the main street as though it didn't know how anachronistic it was. And the first thing I thought?

I cant wait to tell Kirk I saw this thing!

I have my anachronistic moments as well.

Media Conspiracy

There was a while there when I was pretty sure the media was out to get me. Well, there was the day or two when they were literally out to get me, and camped outside my door and tried to film my children and shoved business cards in my friends's hands, but that was different. This is the entertainment media - specifically television.

Surely I'm not the only one who noticed, but for a bit wasn't there a time when half the schedule looked like:

"Lost!"
"Cold Case Files"
"Vanished!"
"Kidnapped!"
"Without a Trace"

Then I think there were about a dozen or so versions of CSI (CSI Tulsa! CSI Baton Rouge!) and... for heaven's sake, how many Law and Order versions are there now?

Thank goodness a lot of those didn't make the ratings and have, well, disappeared.

Now we're mostly back to the reality shows about how tough it is when someone takes away your toilet paper, because it's lots of fun to see how people cope with real trials.

Yeah. I'm pretty sure the media is out to get me.

I Used Up My Brain At The Interviews

So I only broke down and got a cell phone recently. I finally decided that yes, regardless of all the excellent arguments to the contrary, it might be a reasonable idea to have the kids able to contact me in an emergency. Also I've found it handy when being picked up at airports and things as rides can then actually find me. Who knew?

But the whole cell phone thing isn't quite part of my psyche yet, so when packing to leave I tend to have at least four panicked moments of where's-my-cell-phone. This time I got smart though, I called myself.

Now, luckily I had taken the phone off silent (interview) mode, and returned it to just-barely-ring mode, so if I listened really really carefully I would be able to hear it. Probably. So I dialed myself. Now, I'm a reasonably thoughtful guest, and this would be a long-distance call. I didn't want it to actually go to voice mail or anything, so I had to let it ring four times and then hang up really quickly.

I spent several rounds of this wandering through the place, thinking 'is it getting louder? No, I think it was louder over here...' then wandering back again. I had definitely ruled out the kitchen, dining-room and bathroom, and was standing in the bedroom wondering if I should look under the bed for the third time, when I noticed something.

Yes, I found it.

In my pocket.

pantyhose postscript

Does anyone know why certain airlines put pantyhose destruction booby traps on their seats?

Bad enough that the man next to me was hogging the armrest and infringing at least two inches into my personal space, but when I shift my left leg back a bit I'm suddenly struggling in the grips of a strip of super-velcro that's seized my calf and wont let go! I can either try to release the tiny hooks one by one without further damaging the pantyhose, or do one great rip (sort of like tearing off a bandaid) and resign myself to an enormous hole on my left leg. I settle for middle ground and end up with no holes or runs, but a sort of fuzzy/liney effect on my calf.

Grrrr...

The rest of the flight went well.

Until the armrest hog next to me began to snore.

Why I'm not going to post about pantyhose

I did think about it, and felt I should do it because I kind of sort of promised at the end of the last post, but you all don't need to know that, do you?

You don't need to know that I'm 5'7" and I weigh... I dunno... about 125 or 130 pounds or so? Which puts me right on that marginal place between one pantyhose size and the next one up.

(Which brings up the point that I think clothes manufacturers, at least those for the southerly areas of the body, go by area covered more than anything. So with my shape I have a choice between either fall-off-the-hips too big around, but long enough to cover my socks, or just fine around the waist, but flashing my knees to the world every time I sit down. I am particularly irritated that my super-cheap Costco flannel comfy pants leave my ankles to the cool breezes! Stupid clothing manufacturers...)

.... so anyway, the point is you don't really need to know that I am chronically torn between two imagined pantyhose extremes. In one, I buy the smaller size and have that horrible feeling that they'll shoot off towards my feet with a "twang!!!!" right in the middle of an important meeting. In the other, I end up with the larger size, hoisting the waistband up to my armpits in a vain attempt to avoid elephant wrinkles around my knees and ankles. Neither has ever happened, but they could, and dithering between two equally dreadful outcomes makes pantyhose buying a dreadful ordeal.

Aren't you glad I spared you?

Modifying Insanity

I like to think I'm not the only crazy person out there. Surely there are others like me, others who say things like "hey! Let's completely cover a bodice with hand-beading for a six-year-old's halloween costume!" or "gee, it really does sound like a great idea to design and craft a dozen or so three-dimensional, watercolored pop-up invitations to a birthday party!"

So, I'm going to just assume that somewhere out there is someone else who decides it's a brilliant idea to cut their hair mere days before two major job interviews AND to do it themselves. For those people, the following tips:

1. Start with very long hair. This leaves much room for error.
2. Try to finish with slightly less long but still quite long hair.
3. Particularly keep #2 in mind every time you go to 'even things up' because that's the sort of perfectionism that results in unintentional mullets.
3. Cut your hair dry if possible. For those of us blessed with naturally curly hair (and let's all spare a moment now for that little girl in the Peanuts who probably only had that brief period of time to actually like her hair) straighten it if you can, if not, sigh and just do the thing wet. But dry is good since you can see at once what damage you've done.
4. Cheat. In my case this involved looking like a complete idiot while juggling scissors, comb and a metal ruler.
5. Cut small sections that are close together in both latitude and longitude - that bit should probably all be about the same length, right, and possibly around the same length as the bit next to it... and so on.
6. Nice tip is to twist the little sections tightly up, then cut on the twist. This makes the cut a little less AUGH! IT'S A HUGE STRAIGHT BOX OF HAIR!!
7. Cut on a day when you have at least three days before leaving for said interviews. That way someone else can come along and fix whatever you did.

However, if once I wash it and fuss with it it still looks like it does at the moment, I think I might have just gotten away with it this time. I look pretty good!

Tune in tomorrow. I might have really exciting tips about buying pantyhose.

Ms Direction

The building in which I work (ooooh, I'm a grammar goddess! Did you see that "in which" construction?) has a few peculiarities. There is the unfortunate tendency to leak when it rains which I've mentioned before, but that's structural and apparently nothing can be done. But there's a really strange bit that no one has an explanation for. (darn it, lost goddess status by ending sentence with 'for')

When you head out of the stairwell, you're faced with two options, unsurprisingly, right and left (okay, West and East for the fussy). But someone, in their wisdom, decided that all the East offices would be odd numbered, and all the West would be even.

This has, oddly enough, caused a little bit of confusion.

So there is a large sign posted just outside of the stairs saying, in firm white text: Odd ---> and so forth. Clearly this isn't enough, because beneath it is often a paper sign shouting in bold "Odd numbered offices are to the LEFT do not remove this sign." Naturally the sign has to be replaced every few weeks or so because some bright button takes it down.

This, in theory should be enough, but at least once a day some poor lost soul with big pathetic eyes shows up at the front desk and lisps "Th'cuthe me, but I was looking for..." and has to be pointed gently in the right direction.

Note that this is three levels of intervention - two signs and a front desk gargoyle whose sole job (okay, not sole job, but part of job) is to intercept the lost and forlorn and reorient them. However, nothing overcomes the inherent cluelessness of two sub-categories: the undergraduate, and the text-book salesman.

To get to my door you have to really try. You have to go through the front door, down the hall, round two corners, all the way to the end and to the left (dang, I just led the stalkers right to me!). Yet at least once or twice a week some poor lost lamb pokes its little head around my door and bleats "is this [instructor/professor]'s office?" and then has to be firmly sent on its way.

But the undergraduates are nothing compared to the text book people. These folks have little wheely bags that either contain samples of their wares (Anthologies! Grammars! Criticisms!), or possibly bribes in unmarked bills (this honestly just now occurred to me. Believe me, I'm frisking these people thoroughly before I let them go next time.). The men all look a lot like Gil, the sad act desperate sales-guy from the Simpsons, while the women all look like the frighteningly successful real estate woman from ditto. They have a firm, we-workshopped-this-knock address to the door, and a beaming, freshly Crest-stripped smile when you answer. Most of them, when you announce that no, you actually are not someone who will be assigning a text book for an upcoming course, will give you an insincere but rapid farewell. But not the last one.

"I'm sorry, I'm the web designer."

"I see. So you don't teach any classes?"

"Well, I think they'd notice if I tried."

"Do you try?" (hopefully - hey, she might still be a target!)

"Um, no. You see, they wouldn't pay me if I did that, and no one would be in the class, so I'd just be talking to myself."

"Oh." Dejected, but trying to make the last five minutes less than a complete waste, "well, if you did teach, what would your specialty be?"

...

"Sales and marketing. I'll let you know if I decide to list the course!"

And... poor guy... he thanked me.

proximity

It's funny how context changes things, how something has an entirely different meaning simply because it's plonked down next to one thing or another.

Take the Rolling Stone issue that has Ryan and Kirk's story in.

The cover headline, the one meant to sell the issue, is "FALL OUT BOY (in white outlined red type, serif font, all caps) The Fabulous Life, the Secret Torment of America's Hottest Band" which must relate directly to the cover image.

Now, I admit I'm old....er, older - (00h, watch me rationalize!) slightly above the age of Fall Out Boy's primary marketing audience and therefore my reaction to their branding is just possibly both outside the desired effect and not of interest to their handlers/image boffins. However, the picture, in context with the headline made me immediately figure that the secret torment was perhaps directly related to Far Left Guy's lousy taste in glasses, his slightly rat-nibbled facial hair, and his unfortunate do, or Center Left Guy's inexplicable desire to resurrect the 80's fedora (none of us need that), or Center Right and Sex God For the Band Guy's... sorry, kind of stupid tattoos (come on, "unlovable," combined with heart-shaped lock, combined with coffin combined with wings?) or even Far Right Guy's utter lack of personality.

But then, add that headline to the boxed in story below it: "Death of a Contractor: Greed and Murder in Iraq's Lawless Desert" and, well, doesn't it sort of make any fabulous life or secret torment these 20-some-year-olds might be coping with a little... well... trivial?

Constructed Criticism

At the coffee shop:

Earnest Girl 1: It's just irresponsible to keep talking about it. Everyone should, like, shut up about her.

Earnest Girl 2: I know. How many times do we have to hear about her now? It's not like she did anything important.

Earnest Girl 1: Exactly. Like, she didn't, like, cure anything or anything. She didn't, like, speak for peace or have a cause or anything.

Earnest Girl 2: Yah. I mean, she like, had really big boobs.

Earnest Girl 1: Yeah. And they weren't even real, you know? So, she's like famous for something that was all fake.

Earnest Girl 2: For real?

Earnest Girl 1: What, you thought those were real?

Earnest Girl 2: No, I like, no...

Earnest Girl 1: Serious. Like, look, I'll google it, they're so fake!

Earnest Girl 2: Oh my god! Look at those!

*** several minutes of expository dialogue complete with Googled illustrations on: silicon vs saline, how many sizes up is too many, incision sites and scarring, tasteful vs non tasteful enlargements (DD appears to be the deciding line) and whether art in nudity should or should not depend on the natural state of the accessories in question, all directly relating back to the individual under discussion***

Earnest Girl 1: And they still, like talk about her all the time. I mean, give it a rest.

Earnest Girl 2: I know. I'm so over it. I don't know why they don't just, like let it go.

People Watching - Bookstore

I remember hearing an actor once... somewhere... in some context I can't remember now... saying they've met people and thought, if I tried to put that on stage, no one would believe it, it's too extreme. Nice to know it's not just my town!

Book store the other day, doing some quiet work, the chair next to me was taken by a man about sixty-five. He was wearing high-heeled boots, big stacked heels at least three inches high. I admit, he worked them though, not a stagger, not a wobble, complete confidence. And even with the boots he was still a good inch or so shorter than I.

He snuggled himself firmly into the chair and screwed tiny ear bud headphones into his ears, then turned his ipod up to full. Immediately, the music took him. He writhed, he quivered, he shimmied in his chair while the tinny tones of whatever he was listening to drum-thumped audibly.

He had exceptionally long, slim fingers, and as the music rose and fell he tapped out rhythms on his "learn Spanish!" cd-rom box. This sort of performance is usually accompanied by a deliberate lack of awareness: eyes firmly closed, person utterly oblivious to the world around. Not him though. He kept craning his neck around to see who was watching, trying to catch people's eyes.

Since I was right next to him, I was the obvious victim. But I'm one of those, "oh please, don't embarrass me by pointing out your humanity, 'cause then I'll have to admit to mine," people, and I'm practiced in this sort of thing. After all, I've managed to avoid Hari-Krishna man for over a year now. So I quietly worked on my computer as though there wasn't an ear-muffled concert going on a few feet away, as though Carmen Miranda minus the tutti-frutti hat hadn't plonked herself down in male form in the chair next to mine. He escalated, I added a frown of concentration. He began chair-dancing subtly closer and closer to my side. I shifted to present him with 10% more of my back.

Eventually he got fed up and stood to leave. I didn't have a clear victory though. As he got up he stretched extravagantly, and when I looked involuntarily up he winked broadly.

"Don't you just love the Monkees?" He asked.

Oh, I do, I really do.

Rolling Stone Article

The current issue of Rolling Stone has a feature article on the death of Ryan Manelick, called "Death of a Contractor: Greed and Murder in Iraq's Lawless Desert." Ryan worked with Kirk for Ultra-Services. He was killed in December, 2003 just a day or two before he was supposed to leave Iraq for a holiday. His death is still unsolved.

Originally, the article was going to talk about Kirk as well. I did an interview by phone with the author, Daniel Halpern, way back in spring of last year. However, while he was still gathering information and doing research, we heard from the CID, and it was made clear that Kirk's death, despite the coincidence, was not related to the fraud investigation and Ryan's murder. I let Daniel know at once because I knew it would change how he wrote his article. Recently Daniel contacted me to let me know that Rolling Stone was going to drop Kirk's part of the story, and I told him I had expected something like that to happen, and understood why they made that decision.

I'm very glad that the Manelick family has this chance to get their story told. They have been dealing with the same stress and uncertainty, the frustration and pain that we have. They knew, at least, that Ryan had been killed, while for so long we didn't know even that. But they still don't know who did it or why.

Maybe this article will help somehow. Maybe someone somewhere knows something, and they will finally be willing to talk. Maybe it will just help for people to know that a bright, enthusiastic man, a father, a veteran, was killed on the streets of Iraq and no one knows why.

I haven't read it yet, so I can't tell you anything about it. But I will pick up a copy today, for Ryan, for his family.

Thinking about Thinking about Posting

Things I've thought about posting on:

1. An article forthcoming in Rolling Stone which was originally going to talk a bit about Kirk but has decided to concentrate on the Manelick case instead (which is understandable). Conclusion? Eh, not so much. But I'll try and post the issue information when I know it so people who are interested can go buy a copy.

2. Job hunting - good times, and much more entertaining when done long distance. Conclusion? I'll post when a get a job. Anyone wanna hire me? I code! I design! I write! I market - oooh, just watch me brand...

3. Odd people seen while on the way to and from work. Conclusion? Now that is quality content!

I've always told my kids they can do just about anything non-permanent to themselves. Child Three has sported at least four hair colors at various times, and has had a semi-successful mohawk for a while (child 3 is cursed with floppy hair. It's very, very sad) . Child One was streaked with pink for a time and Child Two hopes to have bright red soon. I don't even break a sweat. Like I tell them, there's no other time in their lives when they can work so hard to look so stupid and be so utterly convinced they're cool. So the deal is, reversible? Fine, but nothing, absolutely nothing permanent can be done that can't be easily hidden, and nothing that could even possibly compromise health and safety. No eyebrow piercings, no nose rings or tongue studs. Sorry guys.

Some things make these things easier though. Like seeing the guy in Target who wasn't wearing his massive sized ear gauges. Ear gauges in? Scary goth punk man. Gauges out? Young guy with ear lobes that look like chicken butts. Really takes a lot of the edge off it somehow.

It's like the time I saw my friend's mom's tattoo. She had a dragon that wound around her calf - probably looked dead cool when she was eighteen. Trouble is, by the time I saw it, she was around sixty. To this day I can't see a tramp stamp without remembering that sad, toothless, crepey dragon. But I never was tempted to get a tattoo.

Usually the people I see around work are pretty young, so even if they have misspelled body art, or are trying desperately to pull off a convincing set of dreadlocks on top of a freshly scrubbed pale pink face, there's something about being young that makes it, well not attractive, but sort of touching. However, walking past the Einstein's Bagels I got a shocking look at what happened to all those punk rockers from the seventies who didn't die tragically young. There was so much wrong there... and I think really the internet should be spared most of it... but I did have one question answered -

- yes, nose piercings do stretch with age.

Contractors

We (us that is, America) have never used contractors the way we are now. We're using more people, doing more jobs in more dangerous conditions than we ever have. It's hard to get good statistics on just how many people are over there helping re-build, doing security work, transporting things, planning things, building things. They aren't all Americans of course, many are Iraqi, or people from nearby nations. Many are Australian or British, German or French.
[edit: Thanks for the link Susie (see comments). There are estimated to be 100,000 contractors working in Iraq alone. The government also hires contractors in Afghanistan, Columbia, and other conflict areas.]

Naturally it's not the first time contractors have been involved in a war zone, so you'd think someone would have figured out how things should be done by now. And in fact, there are some laws and guidelines in place, things that were written decades ago that spell out some of what needs to be done to make sure contractors are protected.

Every company that contracts with the government is by law required to carry insurance. This insurance is meant to pay the contractor or his or her family in the case of injury, death or disappearance. Under the terms of this law, the government has to make sure the company does carry insurance before they are allowed to do business. Then, in case something happens, the family simply files a claim with the labor department, and the labor department makes sure the insurance company pays up. Simple and tidy.

The problem is, the government didn't bother with that. No one checked to see if the companies were covered before contracts were signed - they just let them in. So Kirk's company didn't have insurance. C didn't even know they were required to do so. I'm not sure about the higher ups in the company - they had previous experience in Afghanistan, so in theory they should have known, but if the requirement wasn't made clear to them then either...

There is no system in place that makes sure contractors know their rights before they enter a war zone. There's no group that is there to help a family or contractor after a tragedy to tell them what to file, how to work with various agencies, what help might be available. There's nothing.

I know everyone has heard the stories of corruption, of companies making millions through graft, bribery and fraud. Sometimes I think those stories have colored the way people view anyone who works as a contractor - as though they believe that everyone over there is a thief and a liar.

But many of them are family people. Many of them, like Kirk, like Ryan Manelick, are former military who already served their country once and are now doing it again. Yes, many are there because the pay is good, but they are also trying to do a difficult and dangerous job because it needs doing.

It's a shame, then that the government that sent them there isn't doing everything it can to take care of them.

Thank you

Thanks - to all of you, to family and friends who came from all over to remember Kirk and share your stories. It was wonderful to see you, wonderful to hear what you had to say.

For those who couldn't come, we thought of you, and we know you were thinking of us.
I'm trying to get a transcript together of the talks that were given so I can share them with the people who wanted them, but it will take a little time so please be patient.

What I can do is share a few of the moments that I remember, a few more stories to tell. It's not that these are the most important, or even those that struck me most at the time. These are just the ones that I'm thinking of now.

Kirk's brother spoke. He talked about Kirk's honesty, his integrity. But the story I particularly liked was when he talked about how they would fight as kids. I had heard Kirk's version of some of this so it was fun to hear from the 'little' brother as well. They would really tear into each other, he said, but Kirk would never punch him in the face. Nope, he would just smack him. Because Kirk, said his brother, he was kind.

Now... I never had a brother, so I admit I don't own a copy of the male dictionary. and I'd have to take S's word on this definition of kind, but I noticed that while many of the women in the room were laughing, but shaking their heads, many of the men were laughing and nodding in approval.

A colleague of Kirk's spoke as well, a man I feel I know quite well although I've only met him twice now. He had worked with Kirk in Virginia, during that endless frantic year. He shared a view of Kirk that most people in the room had never seen. I know it made our son smile when he heard this man say that Kirk was the finest analyst he had ever met.

But it made the rest of us laugh out loud when he told us about a guy in their unit who had bought a suit to go for his first civilian interview. He was awfully proud of himself, and had come in to show off and get everyone's opinion. There he stood, J said, like a big... purple... dinosaur. Everyone was trying to be kind, of course, trying to be nice and give him some confidence. But a bit of a crowd was gathering, as you would expect when something very large, very purple, and sporting a cheerful tie spotted with dolphins is in the room. J couldn't remember just what Kirk sang, very quietly, but whether it was 'I Heard it Through the Grapevine,' or 'I Love You, You Love Me' the effect was the same. J responded with a dolphin squeal... I think things just got worse from there.

Kirk's best friend from California spoke. Kirk tended to form extremely close friendships, but this one was unusual. They shared, initially, a military background that gave them something in common, but then something happened to S's family. He talked about that, about the bonds that happen in struggle. Kirk was the person S called when he first heard the news that would shatter his life; S was the person Kirk called from Turkey, from Iraq. S read from Henry V, paraphrasing the words before the gates of Agincourt:

"But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive...
...This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember'd;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother...
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day."

My mother talked about her impressions of Kirk over our 15 year marriage. She talked about the words that came to mind when she thought of him, the picture his memory painted, from the day she first met him, long before I dated him. I saw different faces light up as her words reflected memories of their own.

And afterwards other people had a chance to say things that they needed to say, that others needed to hear. Over again I had people mention to me how good it was to hear from such diverse people, to hear diverse versions of who Kirk was.

It was a good day.

Thank you.

Obituary

I just submitted Kirk's obituary to the local paper. Just one of a long list of things I didn't imagine myself doing at my age - heck, at any age really.

I was thinking about what an odd thing it is to do - paying to write a few words that are meant to sum someone up. Naturally, as I'm sure anyone would do, I had to go look up the etymology of the darn word. (Do you want to hire me? I speak dead languages and know what 'etymology' means!)

Obituary: 1706, "register of deaths," from M.L. obituarius "a record of the death of a person," lit. "pertaining to death," from L. obitus "departure, a going to meet, encounter" (a euphemism for "death"), from stem of obire "go to meet" (as in mortem obire "meet death"), from ob "to, toward" + ire "go." Meaning "record or announcement of a death, esp. in a newspaper, and including a brief biographical sketch" is from 1738. A similar euphemism is in O.E. cognate forðfaran "to die," lit. "to go forth."

So before 1706 no one bothered with the whole litany of life and survivors thing. Maybe it was a great newspaper coup with some brilliant marketing mind putting together the miracle of cheap press and the strange fact that nothing sells like death.

I've read a few obituaries recently in a market-research kind of way. It's an odd sort of writing - there was one gentleman who apparently managed to 'pass on' "without tasting the fear or pain of death." I rather wish they'd said a bit more about that; I'd like to know how he managed it. There was a woman who boldly suggested that instead of flowers, people should contribute to her family's trust fund. I quite liked that one - she'd written it herself in the first person and someone had just filled in the dates and things. Talk about having the last word.

Kirk's is, I'm afraid, pretty plain. I felt that the obituary (I'm starting to hate that word, but I think if I just use it three more times in this post it'll suddenly become really, really funny. Maybe) was the place to say what Kirk would want said about him. The memorial, the one we're having this weekend, that's where we can say what we want. But the obituary should say what was important to him. Of course, once I decided that, it became nearly impossible to write anything that seemed adequate. My family tends to save things - understatement that is perhaps explained best by saying that they catalogue and save Instant Messaging conversations - so there's a horrifying feeling that writing this simple obituary (two more to go) is Talking To History. Still, the kids helped me, and we did our best.

It's just... well, if you feel the need to clip it out of the paper and stick it in some scrapbook or something, keep in mind that Kirk... well, Kirk couldn't really be summed up that way.

Maybe we should have just said:

Kirk von Ackermann. Father, husband, friend.

I have a tendency to assume that other people are privy to my internal dialog - that everyone must know what I've already thrashed out inside my mind. It leads to complications naturally, and it's not helped by the fact that I often feel I'm stating the obvious so I don't spell things out. Maybe I need to say out loud why I started this blog, and exactly why I'm unsure what to do now.

When I began writing, Kirk had been missing for two and a half years. I had no feeling that the investigation was going anywhere, no way of knowing if the situation would ever be resolved. I also realized that there was a sort of power in the hands of the CID (people who, by the way, had treated me with enormous respect and care) who could re-write Kirk's entire life and character with their conclusion.

It's hard to articulate this properly. I was trained as a historian, and part of that training is learning that everyone who writes history or participates in it (through interview, diary - whatever) brings a bias, and that bias changes how history is remembered. Sometimes that effect is very small, but sometimes one person or group has enormous power, and can write history in their own vision.

I realized that the CID had that chance. They could, with their conclusion, decide not only what had happened to Kirk (and how could I say they were wrong?) but who he was, what he was thinking, why he did what he did.

So I began to write some of Kirk's story. I can't write it really, and I think that's obvious because of all the times I've had to say "I don't know exactly what happened..." or "Kirk couldn't tell me..." But I could write about the Kirk I knew.

I made the choice right from the start to keep my name, and the names of other people out of it. It was, basically, a love letter to Kirk, and all the rest of us are supporting cast.

Finding the moment to end isn't easy. I'm selfish - I didn't want to end with Kirk's disappearance because I didn't want that to define him. But I know that's not really the end of the story, and I do realize that there are other things that could be told.

So now I'm not sure what happens next. I've finished what I set out to do. I certainly haven't written all of it, but the narrative has come to an end point. Obviously the story goes on, obviously there is a great deal more that happened, but it happened once Kirk dropped out of the story, and it's hard to know what to do when the hero leaves the stage. I was always comfortable with Kirk as the star of the show - I'm not at all happy about stepping into that role myself.

I have to decide if there's a valid reason to go on. I need to figure out why I would tell what happened next, and I need to believe that this is the right medium to do it in.

New Year

Hmmmm.... I've gotten enough emails that I think I have to post!

I'm still here, still checking comments and (eventually - I didn't have internet access over the holidays) posting the ones that were actual comments and not advertisements for pyramid schemes or dodgy plans to enhance body parts I don't actually have.

I'm not sure what happens next. There have been a few requests to go on with the story, but since it sort of ceases to be Kirk's story and (inevitably) becomes my own, I'm not quite sure what to do about that.

But thanks for the emails and the warm thoughts. We'll just have to figure things out as they happen.

Memorial

We're holding a memorial for Kirk on January 14th. Kirk would probably think of it as his party. Friends who want to come, please email me at missinginiraq@yahoo.com for details.