Good morning, America

"Good morning, America, how are you ...."

Drained. Crawled into bed somewhere after 4 am. Finally was talked into attempting food around 3ish, I think.

Worrying about DG, standing out at crossing guard. All right, worrying a lot. See, DG is dark, very dark, skin, hair, eyes. So much that especially in Hispanic strong areas, people have walked up to him and started speaking in Spanish, expecting him automatically to understand.

It's not a far leap for some minds to assume he's something else. So I'm worried. In the small town we call home, it's not TOO much of a worry, but elsewhere ... I can't help but worry about my husband.

It struck me some time yesterday evening just how very old are our souls becoming, and at an early age as well.

I was born during Vietnam.

I remember the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the collapse of the USSR, and thinking "It will get better now."

I got married during Desert Storm. My in-laws lived in Saudi at the time. They were issued gas masks and chem gear.

I clearly remember the first WTC bombing. And the Sarin Gas attack in the Japanese subways.

We were stationed at Fairchild when a gunman, ex-AF, walked into the HOSPITAL and opened fire -- on everyone. My husband worked in that hospital. He came home with blood on his uniform. My eldest daughter was born in this hospital. I knew most of the dead. One was my doctor.

The same week, a B52 went down on our base with half the flight command staff on board. My husband was on Search and Recovery when Fairchild AFB lost the BUFF. We distantly saw part of the crash from our front yard. We could see and smell the smoke from our house.

At our next base, we felt the shudder when the Alfred P. Murrah Fed Building was bombed in OKC.

Bosnia. Serbia. Yugoslavia. Israel. Palestine. Northern Ireland. Afghanistan.

I watched yesterday as the World Trade Center fell. As the Pentagon burned.

When is it supposed to get better?

I saw so much anger and hatred yesterday -- both directed, and aimless. After a few of the worst, I kept to reading posts from people that I knew to be, on the average, reasonable and intelligent instead of knee-jerk extremists.

Being an ex-military family -- DG was an instructor for Red Flag, the field hospital school -- as soon as the initial shock was over, he was on the phone, making calls, volunteering if needed. We're far away, but it's instinct. Many of my friends are either military, ex-military, or grew up in military families.

There's a saying about military spouses. If you think the soldiers are tough, look at the ones they leave behind.

We have to pull together. It's a pack instinct to the greatest degree. When one is hurt, we're all hurt and work together to solve it.

There's no other way to survive.

The skies are still silent today. There's not a cloud in the sky. The blue is rich, innocent, forgiving. There are no contrails. There is no roar of engines, no flashing of lights.

It remains an eerie silence.