Crap to Iraq

Copies of Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five were actually burned in a school furnace in North Dakota for being unwholesome and obscene.  The infraction?  In Slaughterhouse-Five, Vonnuegut had the hardened nerve to have a soldier under fire utter… a curse word.  The horror!  In 1973, Vonnegut wrote to the chairman of that school board:

It is true that some of the characters speak coarsely. That is because people speak coarsely in real life. Especially soldiers and hardworking men speak coarsely, and even our most sheltered children know that.

I sure do hope soldiers of this day still speak coarsely (I’m pretty confident that’s a resounding yes).  My cousin is in Iraq and I try to write him letters semi-regularly.  Lately, I’ve noticed quite a trend.  No matter what topic I start with… I usually end up with a story about poop.  For example, one letter went Greetings->Random News->Sean’s Bad Luck->Sean Stepping in Dog Pee Right Out of The Shower->Poop Story!

I think similiar to Vonnegut’s curse words, my poop stories are pretty benign.  And maybe, just maybe, they have some lessons to teach too.   Here are two examples:

Bandit and Instant Justice
This excerpt is from my June 6, 2007 letter.  Sean says this story is one of the best examples of instant justice he has ever heard.  He compares the satisfaction level to watching someone barrel through a red light and then seeing a cop pull them over.

When we were children, we lived near a family called the Picks.  They had a hearty household– mother, father, four boys and two dogs.  They also had a Nintendo which made the house quite a draw in its day.

One afternoon, Jay and the Pick boys returned to the house.  It became a mad dash to the Ninento.  All [the] boys sprinted their way to the family room.  As they descended the stairs, they discovered one of the dogs, Bandit, had left a present in the form of poo on the stairs.

In the Pick household– they had a rule.  Whoever saw dog crap first had to pick it up.

As the boys ran down the stairs, the oldest one, Ryan, shielded his eyes and said, “I didn’t see it!  Haha!  Kevin [the second oldest] has to clean it! Ha ha!”

Ryan’s laughter did not last long.  It turns out Bandit had also peed on the linoleum at the bottom of the stairs, making an extremely slick surface.  As soon as Ryan stepped foot on it he slipped and fell…backwards…on to the stairs… and the dog poo!

So it turns out Ryan had to clean it afterall.  🙂

In case my words didn’t quite capture the moment, I included an illustration in the letter:

Cartoon from my June 6, 2007 Letter.  Larger version available on Flickr.

Jay Teaches Thomas
This one is from my July 2, 2007 letter.  It shows that you may not be able to teach young dogs new tricks.

Oh!  Can you believe it– “beagle” and “dump” brings to mind a childhood memory!!!

That last line was sarcastic because this was just one in a line of letters where something reminded me of poop.

JAY TEACHES THOMAS
My Grandmother Turnock was always fond of beagles.  Perhaps you remember Thomas– the three-legged one?

When Thomas was a puppy– Carolyn, Jay and I were charged with watching him while Grandma was out of town.  We had a good ole time, but one rainy day posed a problem.  No matter hard hard we tried, we couldn’t get that puppy to poo.

Little Jay came up with an idea.  He had to answer nature’s call himself.

“Why don’t I go out there and show [Thomas] what to do?” he said.

It sounded like a good idea– so Jay ran out into the rain, squatted and did his business while Thomas watched from inside.

As soon as Jay was done, Thomas sprinted outside.  All three of use shrieked with glee.

“It worked!  It worked!”

The power of demonstration reaches beyond species!

Our celebration, however, was premature– […] Thomas came sprinting back into the house… with Jay’s dump in his mouth!!!  🙂

I don’t remember what happened after that.  I’m willing to bet money that it involved my mother cleaning something up!

After weathering the deserts and dangers of Iraq, I’m quite certain these tales wouldn’t even register on my cousin’s coarse radar.

Uh oh.  Unless his morale was irreparably damaged by the Roanoke Star being white…

Trouble with the Roanoke Star Helps Troubled Marriage

There is a NOFX song called “American Errorist” whose lyrics I’m particular fond of.  The section I’m thinking about today goes:

Enemies of the planet
We finally have a common aim
A reason to forget about
our differences
and stand as a united front
It’s up to us
We must expose
humilate
American Errorists

We’ll start with one

(Can you guess which one they want to start with?)

Well, I didn’t realize it at the time, but it turns out traveling 22 days out of 30 adds quite a bit of strain on a marriage.  As such, my time at home after my Colorado-Montana-Kansas tour has had its friction.  The evenings in particular are accompanied by moments of quick conclusions and quick tempers.

Last night we were both settled in the awkward stances that had become all too typical the past week when the local news came on.  Suddenly with the first story, Sean and I found a common aim, a reason to unite.

Ridiculousness over the Roanoke Star.

For those who don’t know, Roanoke calls itself the Star City.  Roanoke has really embraced that identity – the local airport even has stars on its the carpet (I have become well aquainted with the Roanoke Airport carpet, thanks to frequent flight delays).  Why stars?  In 1949, a 88.5 neon star was placed on top of the prominent Mill Mountain,  the Roanoke Star.

WDBJ’s lead story last night was about a color controversy with the star.  Apparently, the star had been lit red, white and blue as a sign of support to the troops in Iraq.  I was oblivious to that fact.  I was also oblivious that as a sign of hope after the Virginia Tech shootings, the star was changed to all white.

 
Red, White and Blue…. or White?

The star has been white for 17 days now and apparently the city council recently said it would stay that way indefinitely (I believe their original intent was to keep it white for 32 days).  Local veterans are upset by that fact and promising a fight.  Some quotes from Vietnam Veteran, Steve Goodwin:

“I think the worst way to be perceived would be that city council is withdrawing their support of our troops.”

“We had a saying from the beginning that never again will one generation of veterans let down another generation.  And it’s our job.  We have to support them.”

Now, I am all for supporting the soldiers.  I’m all for gestures of support for Virginia Tech as well.  I’m also for people and cities keeping their commitments.  But where Sean and I bonded is that we don’t think it is that big of a deal either way.  We found Steve Goodwin, although he has admirable passion, to be a little on the dramatic side.  He’s reading an awful lot of meaning into neon.  Sure, it was a nice surprise to discover the colors had purpose, but the star is not an accurate sign of support of anything.  I think the fact that I had no idea why the star was red, white and blue to begin with (This is horrible — I assumed people were lazy after July 4th) demonstrates the color scheme is not clearcut.  I think white for Virginia Tech is just as ambigious.

Finally, I certainly don’t think we are letting down an entire generation of troops because the star is *gasp* white.  I highly doubt my cousin in Iraq is going about his day thinking, “Well, at least the Roanoke Star is red, white and blue.”  No!  He is more likely thinking about doing his job right, how to keep his men and himself safe, the welfare of his wife and two sons, and looking forward to hear news from home. 

Sean had a different speculation about my cousin’s thoughts, “He’s not thinking about the star.  He’s thinking about other things like… oh yeah, how to NOT TO GET KILLED!”

Sure, a visual symbol is nice, but there a lot better ways to show your support.  I think writing a letter to one of the soldiers or making a nice meal for his state-side family are simple gestures that would have a much more direct effect.  Those simple acts of kindess will impact a soldier and his family a heck of a lot more than what color the Roanoke Star is.

That said, a survey indicates a majority of Roanokers want the star returned to its patriotic colors and that’s fine.  It makes no difference to me and Sean.  We already got our value out of the story.  It brought us back to a common ground.  Our conversation calibrated, we were able to move on to tougher topics.

And normalcy returned.