On my mind

Okay, I have to get this off my chest.

My little brother, who is a senior in college, just called me, and asked me what it would take for me to be he and his friends designated driver tonight. I told him "a tank of gas and the new Jam at the BBC CD." I'm fully prepared for vomiting in the Jeep.

Luckily for me, my hetero life-mate, Stacy, was a Contiki travel guide in Europe, and has passed on to me many ways of dealing with inebriates. She should know, escorting 30-40 drunken 18-25 year-olds round the Old World every three weeks for three years. Mainly, looping carrier bag handles round their ears to reduce projectile mess in moving vehicles.

This is not a normal occurence, though my brother is a great deal more responsible than I was at that age, as God only knows. 3.97 GPA versus my own pitiful at 21 GPA of 2.3. For you see, he and his friends are out on the town tonight because one of their buddies is back from the Army in Iraq.

While my baby brother worries about grades and getting a job in June, his friend- whom he attended K-12 with, is praying the military doesn't start the Stop-Gap thing again, and he's able to come home in January. While Z is planning the semi-annual Beer Olympics, he's hoping that the car that his Humvee is passing won't explode.

We have a picture of all the guys that I'm picking up at the bar tonight, when they were at my brother's 6th birthday party. They are all without their shirts on, and their skinny white boy chests are covered with fake tattoos, as they flex their non-existent muscles, grinning fit to kill, wired on cheap frosting.

This war is, well, I don't know where to start. What I do know, is that my mom can't talk about my brother's 3 friends who are in the military without crying, and neither can I. We pray that God blesses our troops, but what if that isn't enough? Doesn't every country pray for their soldiers? Who are the truly blessed? And why....

So, I will happily schelp my ass to pick them up tonight, hoping all the while, that I don't weep while driving them to their homes, as I am now.