Pre/post

You know, it just occurred to me why you don't see a lot of visible protest against the impending invasion of Iraq. Sure, there's dissent in the press and among citizen groups, but you don't see massive street protests, like in 1990-91 (protests which yours truly took part in as a wide-eyed college freshman). Protests give the impression that if a bunch of you got together and marched through the streets, you'll generate enough momentum to your cause that the powers-at-be would hear you and change policy.

This time around, I don't think anyone is protesting because they know it'll be futile. Team Bush has already made up its mind about invading Iraq. It's merely a matter of time.

Well, it turns out that Iraq itself is leading the antiwar movement, most likely in a desperate attempt to save its own hide by allowing in U.N. inspectors back into Iraq.

Golly, I bet this must really piss off Bush, all eager to attack a stubborn Saddam Hussein, and then, poof, all the war plans are on hold. Although I'm not sure how glad I should feel that war isn't imminent. On one hand, there won't be a rapid explosion in anti-U.S. terrorism caused by an invasion of Iraq and you can scratch any thought of the U.S. acting like madmen by going against the world's wishes with their little war. On the other, I can envision Bush grinning from ear-to-ear, congratulating himself on pushing Iraq into letting U.N. inspectors back into the country. Team Bush will probably carve this into a victory and, emboldened, the U.S. will push other countries around to meet its ends.

Depends how you look at it, I guess. I'll see it as a pragmatic win for international law and a victory for negotiation and peace.

Anyway, I planned on writing this earlier, just after Sept. 11, but I got tired after writing my essays. I needed to take a break and I didn't want to write about Team Bush, which I end writing about, despite all my protests and plans to the contrary. Every time I think I'm out, they pull me back in.

Okay, no more quoting Al Pacino tonight. Consider this my pre-one week after post-9/11 anniversary recollection essay.

How I Spent my Sept. 11

Woke up after the second alarm on my radio. Turned it off just before I comprehended the NPR coverage. Stumbled out of bed. Went to do some yoga in the living room. Dodged the news stations. Tried to find safe harbor on the Weather Channel, but it too was taken over by One Year Later coverage. Just what do meteorologists have to do with terrorism? Well, I didn't stick around to find out. I returned to yoga with G4, the video game channel, keeping me company. Happily...nearly blissfully, G4 didn't cave to 9/11 anniversary programming.

Had breakfast, showered, dressed myself and kissed my dozing wife. Driving to work, I skipped NPR for KEXP, which kept talk to a bare minimum and only recognized the day by playing songs about New York or with artists from the Big Apple.

Traffic sucked. Everyone was slow and cranky, perhaps on edge from too much drive-through espresso and self-imposed scary shadows of terrorists who like anniversary bombings.

Only saw a small smattering of flags on the back of vehicles. The flag-waving explosion just after Sept. 11, 2001 has a tepid echo on this anniversary.

No one called me at work, which I like. I get a lot of phone calls for the features wing of the newspaper I work at. Maybe people were too spooked to use the phone, fearing that's how those crafty terrorists will strike next.

My co-worker came in a little after 10 a.m., fresh from her domestic partnership paperwork signing with her lesbian partner. She rolled in, smiling. "I'm hitched."

It was on the way to work that I forgot to get her and her partner something to celebrate this grand occasion. But just what do you get a lesbian couple who are now domestic partners? Flowers? A tea kettle? The complete works of Margaret Atwood? Argh, the pressure. I'm so bad in social settings. Drop me in front of a first-person shooter, however...

Listened to a lot of Moby, whose birthday is Sept. 11.

In a fit of Diet Pepsi madness, I submitted this blog to The Weblog Review. I don’t know why I did this. Maybe I’m desperate for attention. Maybe this introvert is ready for an audience. There’s a knot in my stomach: Geez, what if my site sucks? What if I’m just a rambling fool with a blog template and mediocre copy-editing skills? Oh well, I’ll have to clean a few things up. Company is coming over in a few days to review my swanky pad o' text.

Filed all my articles before deadline. Got in my car and drove home. Traffic was the usual for the biomass of workers leaving Seattle at 4:30 p.m. Slow in parts. Drivers forgetting which lane they want. Drivers looking for that extra couple feet of road to creep up on despite a traffic stoppage.

Again, the radio was locked on the alternative music channel.

Among the things I saw driving home:

• Inside a Persian-Mediterranean grocery store, a Middle-Eastern couple with their gaze transfixed at a point up on a wall, something I could only assume was a television.
  
• An incredibly stylish young blonde woman who looked like she chose her perfect-fitted late-summer casual outfit to match her ruby-red Walkman headphones.
  
• A sign for "Couples Get in For Free on Wednesdays" at my local nationally franchised strip club.