I remember the night we took this picture...it was sometime in late fall of 2004 and i picked up some KFC for supper...and just for the heck of it, i pulled out the camera and snapped some shots of everybody.
My stepson Mark, (he's the cute kid sitting next to my daughter whose sticking her tongue out) asked me "why are you taking pictures, nothing special is going on" to which i replied "exactly, that's why i'm taking pictures." I mean, there wasn't any particular reason to be taking pictures except maybe that disposable camera had been sitting on top of the tv for half a year and i was curious to see what i had taken pictures of so i was gonna finish up the film and take it in to Walgreens...
But when i flash forward to the year 2007 and look back at these pictures...they suddenly take on a new meaning to me...there's my incredibly handsome 17 year old stepson sitting in the front room with his brother and stepsister enjoying original recipe chicken and mashed potatoes...nothing special...he's probably thinking about how he's going to convince his dad and me to let him go out with his friends for a couple of hours, we're gonna tell him we really don't think it's wise on a school night and he's always gone and why doesn't he just stay put tonight and hang with the family...then he's going to complain we're too strict and that he stayed home a couple of nights ago and maybe he'll stay home tomorrow and c'mon, it's just for a couple of hours he'll be home by ten.
He's in Iraq now....it's about 9 hours later then here which means he's probably just waking up now and getting ready to do God knows what...his dad, mom, and me watch a lot of CNN and FOX especially when the headlines "new blood bath in Bahgdad" scroll across the screen...before he left in February he told us he was going to be guarding a water tank and it turned out to be a lie...he's the guy in back of the machine gun on top of a hummer guarding a convoy...when he calls it's at odd hours--late at night for us OR early morning...he's already had two close calls...one, where the missle hit a car up ahead of his convoy and blew it and it's occupants to bits...he had to help clean it up, and one where he got scrapnel on his feet and didn't notice his foot was covered in blood til later...he has had children run up to his humvee and plead for food and watch as their mothers rush out and beat their kids for approaching an American...(he's not allowed to feed them anyway as the children are being trained to throw grenades at them making it too dangerous to help)...
So this picture is just a snapshot of a "nothing special" night in late fall of 2004...a another boring night where nothing special was going on...and i'm glad i got a picture of it.
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