In the first weeks of my English class that is looking at warfare I have come to a personal understanding or maybe more of a personal belief I see war as something a kin to live theater. What do I mean well, when you go to the theater you dress up for it. You make plans you get your tickets so you can have the seat you want. It something you are going to share with every other person in the place and time. It is temporal no matter how many times you come to the same play it will be different, the actors will give a different performance, the crowd will react to that moment in time.

I now see wars in the same light. They are something that feels like a play wars have a time and place a theater on a much larger scale. As matter of fact I would say the military might see it that way as well since a modern combat zone is call a theater of operation. As I was reading my google posts I was think of these comparisons not of only words, but of feelings. In one of the Blogs that I am reading called of all things Everyday is Groundhog Day in Iraq a allusion to the movie Groundhogs Day in where the same day is lived over and over being stuck in a moment in time. She mentions many of the same things that I said you might do for that play.

             “Like I have my dad’s clothes and gear on and I am just playing at being a Marine”. 

The fact that in the time that she has been in the war she has had many people come and go and change the way her duties feel to her.

             “My units advanced party has left for home now and it make me realize how much I am going to miss everyone. Some of the people out here have become like family and seeing them go is so sad…. then there are other people who I just can’t wait to see go because every moment I was trapped here with them felt like a moment down the drain…. completely useless and I will never get it back. You either grow to love or hate someone when you are exposed to them over a 6 month period of time on an almost 24 hour basis. I will miss my roommate so much! We have become like best friends and it have been so refreshing after dealing with men all day and having to play the part of Marine and everything that being a Marine entails, that I could come back to my room and just girl talk and giggle with my roommate like I was back home. Just like we were normal everyday girl”            

These moments of normal life trap in the surroundings of the day after day of the reality of war. This caught my eye and made me wonder who is the actor in a war and who is the audience? We see a war everyday in are papers, tv’s and internet, but are we watching or are we not also living it, with those who have gone away to fight it. Vera Brittain makes a very strong argument that we do live in those moments with them.            

“Time- as in the tense intervals before a great push (knowing their soldiers where getting ready for an offensive into no mans land) – seemed to stop” 

Even when she wad thousands of miles from the front at the time even the poet Rupert Brooke saw time as part of the ideas of war in his poem The Treasure.  

“Still may Time hold some golden space”

Was he talking about the moments when things seem so normal from the everyday dangers of war? This moment when you are just a girl away from home missing life. What is a year? A common year is 365 days or 8,760 hours or 525,600 minutes or 31,536,000 seconds. All of these tick off and for the most part seem to fly by unnoticed. That is unless you or someone close to you are at war then you seem to be trapped in one moment. I know every day I read on the war even before this class because I am one of those stuck in a moment my cousin is in the Army and has been in combat from the 1st Gulf war and Bosnia to Iraq now, but I am fortunate that I am not one of the now almost 4000 whose loved ones are forever stuck on that moment when the act of war ended for them. My heart goes out for them the biggest difference between war and theaters is when you end the night at a play you temporal period is over, war last forever in the stone of the tombstone, the memories of those who carry on, and the ones who must live everyday stuck in a moment.

• The Treasure. Rupert Brooke
• Testament of Youth Vera Brittan
• Everyday is Groundhog Day in Iraq Rachel The Great

Well now that I am able to get on this site I guess I should write about each one of the sites I will be using to get my news and so forth. Choosing a site is in itself bit of a statement about yourself, the process could be as simple as I like to more complex for me, well I guess I will just tell you a little about each site add a link and tell you why I picked it.

The first site was easy it has been part of my life in one form or another for a long time. That would be the Washington Post this paper has been my newspaper since I was in my late teens use to get it every afternoon. Now I get it on the web I like the writers plus I am a big fan of politics and it is at the heart of all American politics both domestic and aboard. In reality I have 3 different links for the Post the main page. Then I also have military and Iraq sections.

For my google search I picked Iraq war it part of are vernacular now it comes up almost everyday in hundreds of ways it has become almost and afterthought to some. I have two military blogs one by a woman and one by a man both of them are Marines. I picked them because I have a special place for the Marines, I was not one, I do have many friends who have been that been out of the daily military life for years and still call themselves Marines. The old motto “once a marine always a marine” seems to ring true. The other reason for me is the for the most part are the first to fight for America and the last to leave. That just speaks to me about the code that they must embrace.

And as my military pod cast I pick one on military history since for the most part we are kind of doing that we are seeing history with words why not with sounds as well, and least but not last I put Fox News on it as well just to see if I would get anyone’s attention with it. Well those are my sites and the why’s behind them maybe also just a little insight to me have fun and I will see you in class.