Good Friday 2005. Enough! website

Every morning I update the deaths on thiswebsite. First I check the Iraqi CoalitionCasualties site to see how many died the day

before. Then I click on Fatality Details. Up come thenames of the dead.

All of them. More than 1,700 now.Each has a DoD report: name, rank, base,

hometown, date and cause of death—hostile or non-hostile. Sometimes there are “news items,” links tomedia stories of the dead.

Sometimes there are no items. I’m not sure why.Maybe the local mediadon’t report their stories.Maybe the webmastersdon’t “google” the namesthat day.

But I google a lot of thenames myself. Up come thestories of the dead.

Husbands, fiancés,sisters, sons, daughters,and—worst of all—fathersand mothers. Everymorning I can’t help butache for the children ofthese KIA—especially thelittles, the ones who willonly vaguely rememberDaddy, the ones who willfeel but not understand theloss of Mama. The babies,too. Most will not remember anything about theirfathers. Some never met them.

Ichoose the stories that break my heart. I writethem to break yours. Unabashedly, I pick out thedetails that make the deaths real—grieving wives,

screaming mothers, weeping fathers. I write ofsoldiers who give toys to Iraqi children, soldiers wholeave their infants with the promise to return, whomarry hours before they’re deployed, who are killedmere days from the end of their tour.

What amazes me is how many families aresurprised about their loved ones’ deaths. Um, folks?It’s a war. That’s what happens. Indeed, it’s the point.So why would you believe your loved one is exempt?

“There are 150,000 kids over there,” DanielGresham’s father, Gene Gresham, said in a localnewspaper story. “Twelve hundred of them have died. Who would have guessed one of them would be mine?”

The story continues: “Gresham said the family ishaving a tough time dealing with the tragedy sincelearning on Thursday about the soldier’s death. ‘We’reall devastated. I haven’t stopped crying since I heardit,’ said Gresham.”

Some stories I didn’t use at first because therewasn’t much to them. Many of the dead were soyoung that nothing much was reported about

them in the media—except football positions and,most often, how proud they were to have signed upfor the military.

I’ve changed my mind. I use them now if only toemphasize their youth—and their waste. And stressingthis waste is the point of “culling the dead.”

Yes, that’s what I said: waste. Tell me all you wantthat their deaths are honorable, you’re wasting yourbreath as much as we wasted theirs. Their lives were

honorable, theircommitment to what theybelieved was honorable,their courage washonorable.

Their deaths are nothonorable simply becausethey died in a war. And thiswar is not honorable—ifthere even is such a thing—simply because honorablepeople died.

B ut we are nowarguing fiercely, leftand right, that the

war must be honorable, forif it is not then our dead aredisgraced. This isbackward. The war doesn’t

confer honor. Their honor came from their inherentprecious life, from the fact that they were brave andloved, that they died doing something they believedwas important. They are not dishonored because theydied in a dishonorable war.

Despite their ultimate sacrifice, it is still anunconscionable fiasco, a colossal error in judgment, amassive manipulation of the American citizenry—anda fools’ errand with none of the fools who got us intothis actually sacrificing anything. And it must bestopped.

This is why I cull the death stories. To make usaware: these are not casualties, they are not statistics.They are fathers and husbands, mothers and wives,sons, daughters, brothers, and sisters.

And I wonder, of all these honorable now-deadmen and women, whom have we killed? Who wouldthey have become? Future architects of peace?Statesmen and women? Or perhaps explorers andscientists, discoverers of cures of our ailments, orparents of children who may be crippled emotionallyand never become what they could have been.

Hell, maybe we even killed the messiah. Again.A Good Friday to you.

©2005 CMDay

Confessions of a death culler

September 2005 ANN ARBOR OBSERVER 11

Kitchen MakeoverNic Sims and David Myers areenjoying their fifteen minutes offame—in an all-new kitchen.

S ims, a culinary student, andMyers, a commercial photogra-pher, starred in the debut episode

of the Food Network’s newest show, All-Star Kitchen Makeover. The couple beatout 8,000 other contenders by submitting avideo parody of chef-wizard AltonBrown’s wacky cooking show, Good Eats.Brown’s show is distinguished by hisscientific focus and offbeat cinematogra-phy—his oven cam and fridge cam, forinstance. Sims and friend Andy Tanguayone-upped him by including shots from a“closet cam.”

Sims learned about her good fortunewhen Brown himself snuck into a cookingclass she was taking at Schoolcraft Col-lege. Disguised as a produce deliveryman,Brown lugged in four banana boxes piledup to hide his face. As he intentionallymade the boxes teeter, Sims rushed tohelp. When the top two fell over, there hewas, the great A.B., with even greaternews: Sims had won an all-new kitchen.

Brown then drove Sims, still dressed inchef’s white, to her northwest-side homeso he could inspect her kitchen himself.He found a retrograde, yellow-and-black1960s-style mess with cupboard doors thatwouldn’t open, a toilet behind a slidingdoor, and so little room that Sims had tohide her cookbooks in a linen closet.

The show intersperses interviews of thecouple with bits of Brown’s biography (hewas a TV cameraman before he hit foodiefame). And of course there are plenty of

WINNERS

Sims and Myers celebrated their good fortune by making dinner with FoodNetwork host Alton Brown.

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construction shots. “We tried to use all AnnArbor products and companies,” says proj-ect designer Linda Mahlmeister of MomusInc. Vinewood Construction did the guttingand building, and Motawi Tileworks createda custom backsplash. “We hired Zinger-man’s to do all the catering,” Mahlmeisteradds, laughing, “because then we could eatZingerman’s for four days.” Pilar’s Cateringalso provided food on one of those days.

The Food Network moved the coupleand their children—son Jackson anddaughter Allyn—to Weber’s Inn during thefrantic three-day makeover. On “reveal”day, the couple returned home to find theirkitchen toilet sitting outside, its bowlstuffed with yellow flowers. “I like it bet-ter here,” Sims said.

Then came the climax—their reactionto their new kitchen. As Nic turned thecorner from her foyer, her expressionmorphed from hope to awe, shock, andgrateful tears. David was a walking smile.Not only had the network given them a

free kitchen—complete with a butcher-block island, a pop-up mixer stand, marblecountertops, cupboards that opened, and afaucet over the stove for filling pots—ithad also built storage cabinets in their din-ing room and an adjoining office withshelves for Sims’s cookbooks.

The last surprise was A.B. himself. Thestar arrived with a box of tissues because,he said, “I heard a lot of blubbering downhere.” He seemed braced for the huge hugthat the six-foot-one Sims enveloped himin. Brown then took the couple on a shop-ping trip to Whole Foods, and togetherthey made the debut dinner in the newdigs. The show aired repeatedly in August,with a final showing scheduled for 4 p.m.September 4.

How much did the completed kitchencost? “No one really knows,” Mahlmeisteradmits. “It was supposed to be a fifty-thousand-dollar kitchen—that’s what thecontest was. At first we were given carteblanche, but we had to pull the reins in.”

December 2005 ANN ARBOR OBSERVER 11

Veterans RadioGoes NationalA WAAM radio show nowreaches 150 stations aroundthe country.

Two-year-old Veterans Radio alreadytakes credit for furthering a story thatbecame a national outrage. This

month the show will be heard far beyondthe bounds of WAAM’s modest 5,000-wattsignal. The weekly program, which streamsacross the world via the Internet, expects tosign a broadcast syndication deal with theGenesis Communications Network.

Bob Gould, one of the show’s four pro-ducers, says the show’s true beginning wasin June 2003. He and Dale Throneberry,then both brokers for Blue Cross BlueShield, had just learned that their commis-sions were going to be cut. They headed toa bar to commiserate. Throneberry, whohas a master’s degree in communicationsfrom the U-M, turned to Gould, who has amatching bachelor’s degree and years ofexperience in TV and radio, and said, “Ihave an idea.” He wanted to do a radioshow about veterans. “I put out my hand,and that was the start of Veterans Radio,”Gould says.

Throneberry, who’s executive producer,met the other two producers through theVietnam Veterans of America. Ken Roggeof Manchester served in the naval reserveand the air force as a broadcaster for theAmerican Forces Radio and TelevisionService. Real estate company owner GaryLillie is a former navy Seabee who helpedbuild fire bases, housing, and airstrips dur-ing his 1966 tour in Vietnam.

The first show aired in November 2003on WSDS, a 750-watt AM station. By July2004 the program had graduated toWAAM and also could stream over theInternet—even to Baghdad, where soldiers

MEDIA

Bob Gould (in black shirt, with Dale Throneberry, Ken Rogge, and Gary Lillie) saysthe show is about “average, ordinary Americans doing extraordinary military things.”

have called in. “We have a really uniqueproduct,” says Throneberry. “We talk tovets about their adventures.” Shows mixmusic, discussion, interviews, stories fromguests and callers, “welcome home”greetings to just-returned vets, a “medal ofhonor” recognition series—and even poet-ry.

Minnesota-based Genesis approachedVeterans Radio after a contact made at aveterans’ convention in Chicago this sum-mer. “We wanted to do that [syndicate theshow] from week one,” says Gould. “Butyou have to show your bones—showthem that you have staying power.”They’ve proved that, he says, with storiesabout how many servicepeople in Iraqwere killed in poorly armored vehicles,and the estimated 40 percent of vets re-turning with post-traumatic stress disor-der. Throneberry, a former helicopter pilotin Vietnam, cites the long lines that veter-ans seeking treatment have to endure na-tionwide, and cuts to their benefits.

“It sounds hokey,” Throneberry says,“but we’re really about duty, honor, andcountry, and we just want our politiciansto do what they say they’re going to do.They promise vets benefits—increase this

and increase that—and it doesn’t happen.”Benefits aside, “I really wanted to stay

as apolitical as possible,” says Throne-berry. When issues get political, “every-body starts yelling at each other,” hesays—as happened on one show that in-terviewed “Swift Boatees” from bothsides of the controversy over senator JohnKerry’s Vietnam service.

Many guests are local veterans: BobHutchinson of Dexter, a flight navigatorwho crash-landed in Nazi-occupied terri-tory; Don Burgett of Ann Arbor, a D-dayparatrooper; and Ann Arbor nursesMildred McGregor, who served in WorldWar II, and Mary Bailey, who served inVietnam.

“The mantra of the show,” Gould says,“is about average, ordinary Americansdoing extraordinary military things. Forsome Americans, being in the militarywas the defining moment in their lives—not high school, not their marriages—themilitary. We try to provide the voice of theveteran, their stories.”

Veterans Radio airs on WAAM, 1600AM, every Sunday “at 1900 hrs Eastern,”as its website, veteransradio.net, says—that’s 7 p.m. for you civilians.

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80 COMMUNITY GUIDE 2005–2006

Disneyland NorthFinding a mom’s “Yeehaw”

I am not a fun person. Just ask my ex-husbands. So going to summer fairs

and festivals is more of an “Uh-oh” than a“Yeehaw!”

When I grew up, going anywhere meantcorralling the six other hellions known asmy siblings. Trouble enough right there.Going to the fair meant hauling us all toscary, faraway places. Going to the Free-dom Festival along the Detroit River meantrisking our lives. Some years a few folkswere killed—or, you know, just shot—inmy hometown’s most macabre sport. Afterone fearful trip, it never again seemedworth it to schlep downtown to ooh andahh at fireworks I could see just as well onTV. Call me a city chicken—that’s dead-onaccurate.

Is this the kind of person to go to thelocal fairs? A neurotic, semiagoraphobic,TV-addicted homebody who hates trafficjams and lines and crowds and who’d re-cover faster on a therapist’s couch than ona merry-go-round?

Well, who better? After all, I have twochildren who aren’t always living it upwith their Disneyland Dads. Sometimesthey’re stuck with Workaday Mom. Sothis could be a way to prove my exeswrong about my being a stick-in-the-mud.Better yet, I could make some good mem-ories with my kids.

I’d done that once at an amusementpark. On a trip to Bob-Lo Island withAlex, now twenty, he saw me laughing sohard on the Tilt-a-Whirl that he called ithis “favorite moment” in his fourth-grade“What I Did on My Summer Vacation”essay. Maybe there’ll be a moment likethat for Liam, who’s seven and three-quarters and far more skeptical than Alex.

“We’re going to the fairs, Liam!” I ex-claim.

“The what?” he says, squinching up hissky-blue eyes at me.

“The fairs!”“What are we going to do there?”“I have no idea. We’ll just open our

minds and see what there is.”“Ooookay,” he says, still uncertain.

“Can I get a souvenir?”

W e start out at the Manchester Chick-en Broil, where 14,000 people eat as

many chicken halves in one afternoon. Justthe thought is enough to gag a vegan. For-tunately I’m omnivorous. And I admit Iwent primarily out of curiosity about howthis feat is accomplished.

Amazingly well, I’d say. A fan of plaincooking, I also found the chicken and slawscrumptious.

Those are just bonuses. The real entreeis a sweet, old-timey event with friendlyfolks and an efficient delivery system.Manchester has this down to a science,

from managing traffic to the 100-foot-longcinder-block grills and swift serving lines.

Even getting there is a big piece ofpleasure pie. As Alex and I drive throughthe countryside, I revel in the beauty of thelush green hills and how peacefully pictur-esque the houses are.

Then comes an uh-oh: a long line ofcars blocks the town’s center. As we sit inline, a little piece of heaven happens. A carahead of us honks. “How utterly rude,” Ithink—until a middle-aged man walkingdown the sidewalk stops, grins, and wavesat the driver.

We spurn the shuttle from the highschool and try to park near Alumni Mem-orial Field. Sure enough, there’s a spot not300 feet from the entrance where we see—uh-oh—more lines: fifty-folk deep at bothentrances. Yet it takes only ten minutes orso to get in. While we wait, we’re serenad-ed by strolling Sweet-Adeline-like groupsof women singing “Over There” and othernumbers my grandma would have loved.

Here’s how you get your food: Sevenmen stand in a row. One plops the chickenon a plate and hands it to the next. Heglops on the famed coleslaw. The nextman, two radishes. Then roll, pat of butter,bag of chips, towelette package, and drinkticket. Less than a minute.

“Thank you!” I say seven times. Veryimpressive.

Joined up with a couple friends, wesearch amid the crowded banquet tablesfor enough seats. Do we go for an emptytable or horn in on someone else? We hornin on what turns out to be a mom, dad,son, and daughter. “May we join you?” Iask. “Sure,” says Ben Baker, eleven. “Wedon’t bite—too hard.” He laughs. “Andwe have enough food,” dad Randy says,“so we won’t be taking yours.” They all

laugh, including mom Mary and daughterMarlene, fifteen.

Turns out the couple have been comingtogether to the broil for twenty-four yearsand Mary, who grew up in the area, foryears before that. Randy has his camera ona short strap so it lies squarely in the mid-dle of his chest. As he regales us with thehistory of the broil and the village, hesnaps shots of friends walking by.

It’s all chummy here: families, pals,neighbors, and an oompah band calledSounds of Germany that plays a worldtour of old standards like “When IrishEyes Are Smiling” and “That’s Amore.”Mary tells me the band members’ lederho-sen were actually bought in Germany.How she knows this I figure has to do withsmall-town neighborliness.

O n our next excursion, Liam and Ihead to the Chelsea Summer Fest. I

knew there was a motorcycle exhibit, butI am astounded at the miles of chromeand the bevy of bad-looking boys inleather vests, ponytails, and do-rags. Ohmy! What a jolt of testosterone. Doesn’tmatter that the rags are hiding gray orno hair. A bad boy is a bad boy is a—mm mm mmm.

But my good boy isn’t into motorcyclesthis week. Nor is he into face painting orpottery making. He’s on a mission: sou-venirs. We stop at the first block from theJiffy factory lot and find a jellyfish yo-yothat blinks like a marquee when you pushits center—and lights up my child’s faceno end.

We could have left then, but there areelephant ears yet to eat, and by God, we’regonna eat one. Liam stops flinging his yo-

yo for a few bites of thefried, sugared dough andpronounces it “oookay.”We’ve missed the bandand parade, so only thesidewalk sale is left.Then we find the Cranes-bill Books table—andboth of us disappear intothe store’s coolness, buythe latest Harry Potter,and meander some more.

Will this be mychild’s memory of sum-mer fairs? Escaping intoa bookstore? Ah, but theChelsea CommunityFair awaits. This is afair: exhibits, animals, amerry-go-round, a Ferriswheel, and rides called“Freak Out” and “Ringof Fire”—which Liamwill never, ever get mypermission to go on.He’ll have to go with hisD-Dad and not ever tellme about it.

We arrive two hoursbefore the rides start, a fortuitous time forparking—there are only twenty cars in thefield—and for building anticipation. Mr.Skeptical bounces like his yo-yo when hesees the cotton candy sign. He delights inthe freakish squash and the miniaturegoats, and he pores over the kids’ art, allthe while questioning, “Mom, when do therides start?”

Alex joins us and we three—finally!—get to play skee ball. Liam’s first throw is afifty-pointer! We veer through balloondarts, the carousel, the train, the old-timefire engine, the ToonTown crazy house (athree-timer), and the giant slide (a four-timer). Alas, though, no Tilt-a-Whirl. Butthere is a Scrambler. And oh mama, is itfast, whipping us around as Liam careensinto me and I white-knuckle the safety bar.

Five hours and many dollars later, wehead out with tummies full of elephantears and plenty of souvenirs: a huggingtroll, a plastic parrot, Spot the stuffed Dal-matian, and an inflatable Spider-Man thatweirdly matches Liam’s T-shirt. Just whenI think we’re almost free, Liam spies theMaze of Mirrors.

“Mom! It’s a maze!” he pleads. Thischild has been fascinated by mazes since, Idon’t know, birth.

“All right,” I say wearily. I wince overand over as my baby boy bangs into wallsfull bore, forehead first. He comes outslipping down a twisty slide, elated.“Mom, that was great! My first maze!

“Can we go to this fair tomorrow?” hebegs.

He looks so happy that in my mind Ihear—not a whimper—but a tiny, squeaky“Yeehaw.” The Saline Community Fair isstill to come, and next year, we just may hit’em all.

—Sally Wright Day

For a homebody and her skeptical son, the local fairs are a revelation.

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Scenes from the DisappearingCountrysideLocal poets and artists have produced a striking book.

T he stark, cracked ground on the cover of In Drought Time,a new book of art and poetry edited by three Chelsea resi-

dents, belies what’s inside: rich but accessible poetry, lushlandscape paintings, and treasured photographs of WashtenawCounty—almost all by local artists.

Chief editor Doug Smith says the 114-page book, publishedin late October after four years of effort, captures “a wistful-ness, a kind of mourning of the loss of a way of life, and alsosome of the loneliness of living on a farm . . . and the loss offamily farms.”

Together, the art and poetry portray what Smith calls a“community in flux.” Most of the poems touch on some aspectof the book’s subtitle, Scenes from Rural and Small Town Life,with subjects like roadkill, the river, preying developers, dairyfarms, and surprise at finding missionaries on your porchthough you live far from the city. The art, masterful on its ownand vividly colorful, is mostly of landscapes—glorious slicesof fields, ponds, sunrises, and moonrises peppered with stolidsilos and farm scenes—with some still lifes and figures.

Smith met most of the poets when he owned the Little Pro-fessor Book Center in Chelsea (now Cranesbill Books) andsponsored the Chelsea Poetry Contest and monthly poetrynights. “There’s so much talent in this area that I wanted tobring that to the world,” he says. Almost all contributors arefrom Washtenaw County, with concentrations in Chelsea, Man-chester, and Ann Arbor—and even a few “big names,” Smithsays. “We invited all the ones we knew and liked.”

He and his fellow editors, Melody Vassoff and Karen Wool-lams, turned to the Chelsea Painters and several local galleriesto find artwork appropriate for the poetry. All the artists, visualand literary, agreed to allow their work to be included withoutcharge. “Everyone was doing it for the love of it,” Smith says.

Even so, it was not easy to find a publisher for a poetry an-thology—especially one full of four-color art. Many publish-ers showed serious initial interest but ultimately declined be-cause of the steep cost of printing so much color. After twoyears of rejections and delays, Smith and his colleagues hadalmost given up when Judith Kerman of Mayapple Pressagreed to publish it.

“I’m doing this book because it’s beautiful,” says Kerman,who runs the small Bay City independent press. Also a poetand English professor at Saginaw Valley State University, Ker-man says the title is the most expensive she’s ever published—$6,000 for 500 copies.

It eased Kerman’s decision that the editors agreed to pro-mote the book, and Woollams typeset and designed it. Theyand about ten contributors have been doing readings and sign-ings at area bookstores, cafes, and galleries (see Events for up-coming dates).

In Drought Time is available on-line at mayapplepress.com,at local bookstores, and at Faith in Action in Chelsea, for$24.95.

—Sally Wright Day

Nancy Feldman’s Funky Landscape.

March 2006 ANN ARBOR OBSERVER 23

The Lion DanceLettuce blessings at Eastern Accents

It was raining as I hurried my eight-year-old son into his gi so we could

slog over to Fourth Avenue for his karateclass. Only the prospect of going twodoors down to the bakery during Liam’ssession kept me patient on this especiallydreary Saturday.

I love Eastern Accents. You can sit cozi-ly in its bright confines, sip rich coffee, andeat bibim bob or some exotic Asian pastry.The servers are so sweet and friendly thatall sorts of folks—students with laptops,families with toddlers, friends and lovers,and we singles—feel comfortable.

This unassuming little storefront is amicrocosm of the city. You can’t help lis-tening to the polyglot of languages from allover—the speakers’ chairs are inches fromyours. Along with Asian languages, I’veeavesdropped on French, German, some-thing Slavic, and even Swedish, I think.And those are just the ones I can identify.

I’d just settled in with my bibim boband latte (extra shot, no foam, dash of nut-meg) when in walked a muscular man, hisgraying hair in a brush cut. He agitatedlyplunked himself down at the table a footaway. In a few minutes, he had pulled overa friend to sit with him.

“Yeah, they’re going to cancel it. Thelion’s head would just dissolve—it’spapier-mâché,” he said loudly. “It’s justraining too hard.” He stared morosely outthe window.

My ears perked up. The Lion Dance! Itmust be Chinese New Year! My friendWendy Moy would bop me on the headfor forgetting again.

For years I’ve wanted to see the LionDance. Hundreds gather downtown towatch the spectacle of the men in the lion’shead and under the trailing yellow-silkbody dancing down the streets. Drummers,

stick bangers, bell ringers, and cymbalclangers walk beside them, making a hap-py, unwinterish noise. Yet I keep forget-ting—even though the troupe is from thekung fu class at Liam’s school, the AsianMartial Arts Studio.

Ach, and here I was, accidentally in theright place at the right time, only to befoiled by the weather.

As the man described how the rainwould also ruin the drums, I couldn’t helpit—I piped up.

“Any chance they’ll reschedule it?”“Maybe,” the man said, happy to talk

about it even to interrupting strangers.“They may go to all the restaurants tobless them. Maybe even here.”

Ach again! I downed my latte and ranto pick up Liam. We hurried back, orderedhis usual rice bowl, and waited.

Sure enough, a few minutes later Icould see the bright yellow lion cos-

tume and the percussionists out in thebuilding lobby. Drums started thumping,and the lion’s head appeared, its mouthand eyelids flapping with the beat. Ledby a tiny, round figure masked as a Bud-

dhist monk, the lion danced into thekitchen, behind the counter, and thenright on top of it.

All of a sudden, green lettuce leavesflew out of its mouth, landing on some ofthe customers near the back. This is theblessing of the lion. “Eating and dispers-ing of the greens symbolizes the distribu-tion of wealth and good fortune,” I learnedlater on the school’s website (a2amas.com/liondance).

I found the head fascinating and a bitscary, but my son’s face was lit up andsmiling. The lion jumped from the counterand zigged and zagged to the front of therestaurant, where it knocked off a bunch oflettuce hanging from the lights. Then thoseof us in the front were “blessed.” Cus-tomers clapped, and some grabbed cellphones to take photos and videos.

I looked again at my son, dressed in hisgi with his Irish name written across it,chopsticks in his hand, looking as blondand blue-eyed as any Swede, in this Asianbakery surrounded by people of many eth-nicities, all cheering on this Chinese tradi-tion. I took my own memory photo andthought, “Is this a great city, or what?”

—Sally Wright Day

My Town

After a Memorial Day cer-emony last year, Darcy Mon-ier decided she would do nomore media interviews.Then she reconsidered.

“I realized if I didn’t talk to the press,then he would be forgotten,” she says.

So here she is, wearing a U.S. Armysweatshirt and her son’s dog tags, sitting inthe dining room of her off-the-beaten-track home in Dexter Township, next to ahuge display of photos and clippings. Andonce again she is telling the story of howDonnie was mortally wounded in Iraq inAugust 2004.

The pictures and plaques and medals—and her memories and words—are all shehas left of her only son, who died after theHumvee he was riding was blown up byan “improvised explosive device” while hewas on patrol near the city of Balad.Twenty-year-old Donald McCune wasthrown from the vehicle by the blast andrushed to a military hospital in Germany,where he died the next day.

His mother is not bitter. She’s obvious-ly proud and dedicated to keeping hismemory alive. She has a ready smile and agentle demeanor. You can tell she’s prac-ticed at speaking to reporters by now, butshe’s also achingly genuine. Her wordsmirror the resolve of her son.

Born into a military family—his grand-fathers on both sides were soldiers, and sowere many other relatives—Donnie Mc-Cune split time between schools in Chel-sea and Fort Wayne, where his fatherlived, after his parents divorced. He alsoattended Ann Arbor Huron for a time, buthe enlisted before he finished high school,eventually getting his GED. He was soeager to fight in Iraq that he transferredfrom an Army National Guard trainingunit in suburban Detroit to a combat bat-talion in Washington State.

Monier says her son loved everythingabout the military, especially the travel andthe chance to make a difference in peo-ple’s lives. Her second husband, fromwhom she is now separated, is also in theservice and was coming home from a tourin Iraq as Donnie was entering the combatzone. Her husband may go back soon for asecond tour, and Monier’s resigned to that:“I have a military life, and there will al-ways be someone over there.”

The death of her son hasn’t dampenedher support for the U.S. mission there: “Istill one hundred percent support whatwe’re doing,” she says.

Deb Regal doesn’t. Her son Justin, atwenty-six-year-old marine, returned inFebruary from an eight-month tour in Iraq.His service hasn’t changed Regal’s firmopposition to Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The war is always dogging Regal. Shefeels it in her ever-present worry for herson’s safety, especially since he could beredeployed again before his hitch is overin June. She sees it in her work as publi-city director for Military Families SpeakOut, a national antiwar group. She sees itin the faces of her eighth-grade students atPathfinder School in Pinckney.

“I have never appreciated in my lifewhat it has meant to be on guard constant-ly,” she says slowly and carefully, “fearingfor a loved one who is in a dangerous andhostile situation and not being able to . . .get any reassurance that he was okay.”

While the families of soldiers feel thewar in Iraq in a deeply personal way, fewothers have been directly affected. As thecontroversial conflict enters its fourth year,it seems distant and irrelevant to many.And lots of people would prefer not to talkabout it. Yet under this complacency andsilence, deep divisions fester.

AA hheeaarrtt ffoorr ttrrooooppssOn Valentine’s Day in Bridgewater, mil-

itary people and local supporters crowd intothe Bridgewater Bank Tavern for a “Have aHeart for Our Troops” spaghetti dinnerfund-raiser. In the parking lot, one old carsports a bumper sticker that says, “WhenClinton lied, nobody died.” It’s parked nextto a van whose rear end variously proclaims“Semper Fi,” “U.S. Marine Corps,” “Sup-port Our Troops,” and “Proud American.”

At the door a marine in full dress uni-form greets people. In the packed house ofveterans, locals, and a few active-duty mil-itary personnel, there is no evidence ofanyone who might be attached to thatClinton bumper sticker. In fact, organizerJohn Kinzinger of Ann Arbor, head of thelocal chapter of Vietnam Veterans ofAmerica, says that anyone who’s againstthe war in Iraq “will be escorted out.”While proudly showing a display of pho-tos of various local “support the troops”rallies, Kinzinger says that of the localchapter’s 150 members, three might joinan antiwar protest.

In the room, the range of opinion runsfrom those who feel war protesters are un-informed and misguided to those who im-ply they are traitors.

Gunnery sergeant Troy Britton, a marineinstructor in the University of MichiganROTC program, is hanging near the barwith Eric Pierce, who is wearing fatiguesand hoping he will soon get over to thefront after nine years in the marines. Brittonserved in Iraq during the initial invasion byAmerican forces in 2003.

“There’s a high level of misperceptionof what’s going on in Iraq,” Britton says.He blames the American media for notdoing stories about schools being opened,infrastructure being built, cities beingmade safe from the insurgents, and good-

will being spread. “These people are liv-ing free now, where they weren’t before,”says Britton. He concedes that “every-one’s entitled to their own view,” but in-sists that those who oppose the war aremisinformed.

Others aren’t that forgiving. Bill Olters-dorf, a Korean War vet from HamburgTownship, says President Bush is com-pletely right in prosecuting the war: “InKorea we stood up to the communists. InIraq we’re standing up to the terrorists.”And Kinzinger, a retired Ford engineering

supervisor, says war protesters “give theenemy fodder. Every time there’s an anti-war action here on the streets, it helps theenemy.” The only legitimate way toprotest, he says, is at the ballot box.

As the afternoon progresses, there’s awarm buzz of camaraderie in the tavern,with kindred spirits sharing stories. “Every-one here is promilitary,” says marine com-mandant Tony Gillam proudly. Gillam, aVietnam vet, gestures around the room,pointing out men who have served in WorldWar II, Korea, Vietnam, and the first Gulf

THEWAR

ATHOME

SPRING 2006 14

Darcy Monier of Dexter Townshipholds the flag that was draped overthe coffin of her only son, DonnieMcCune. He was twenty years oldwhen mortally wounded in Iraq almosttwo years ago. Despite her loss, Monier supports the war “one hundred percent.”

Fissures over Iraq run deep.by Michael Betzold and Sally Wright Day

Deb Regal, publicity director ofMilitary Families Speak Out, says herson Justin, a twenty-six-year-oldmarine, supports her right to protestthe war. “He said, ‘It’s all for nothing if those of us in uniform are notdefending the ideals on which ourcountry was founded,’ ” Regal says.

Bill Oltersdorf of Hamburg Townshipbelieves president George W. Bush iscompletely right to prosecute the warin Iraq. A Korean War veteran,Oltersdorf likens this war againstterrorism to his war’s focus oncommunism.

PHOTOS GRIFFIN LINDSAY

NOTE: Michael Betzold wrote most of this story. I contributed half of the reporting.

War. “We could start a war right here,” hejokes.

The fund-raiser lasts nine hours and in-cludes raffles, speeches, entertainment,local celebrity guest servers includingWashtenaw County sheriff Dan Minzey,and a candlelight memorial closing cere-mony at which the names of all seventy-five Michigan war dead are reverently re-cited. About $9,000 will be raised—enough to ship nearly 200 care packagesto troops in Iraq.

“We can’t do enough stuff like this,”Kinzinger says, reciting the VVA chapter’smotto: “Never again shall a vet return hometo be made to feel alone and unappreciated.”

The VVA is only one of many organi-zations dedicated to supporting the troops.Local American Legion and VFW chap-ters, military moms, and even studentgroups also send letters and care packages,raise money, and offer other support.Many of the same groups donate suppliesto the VA hospital in Ann Arbor. WhenDonald McCune died, Darcy Monier says,Kinzinger and others played a major rolein organizing the moving, well-attendedfuneral in Chelsea.

Monier says no one has said one criti-cal word to her, and many people havecome forward to offer help and kind senti-ments. Others who have served in Iraq,and their families, say they’ve felt nobacklash from local communities—in fact,quite the opposite.

Lynn Kramer of Saline says everyonehas been supportive of her family and hersons, Keith and Kory, who have eachserved tours of duty in Iraq. Even oppo-nents of the war have been respectful:“They know they’re just doing their job.”

Keith Kramer, an army captain, is a1993 graduate of Saline High, and Kory,an army lieutenant, graduated in 2000.Both young men enrolled in ROTC atEastern Michigan University. Keith waswith the first U.S. troops to enter Iraq in2003. He returned this January from a sec-ond yearlong tour, and Kory came homefrom his first year in Iraq. Both are livingwith their families in Fort Stewart, Geor-gia. Keith’s wife is expecting twins, andKory and his wife have a little boy.

As the insurgency intensified last year,both young men were stationed in hotzones. Captain Keith Kramer was a com-pany commander who oversaw troops inthe heart of Samarra, an insurgent strong-hold. Kramer and his men didn’t fight largebattles; they operated in platoons, makingnighttime raids on homes of suspected in-surgents. The building they were quarteredin was hit several times by mortar attacks.

15 COMMUNITY OBSERVER

Top: John Kinzinger, who organized the “Have a Heart for Our Troops” spaghettidinner, says that any antiwar attendees would be escorted out of theBridgewater Bank Tavern, owned by Susan Maurer. With so many veterans atthe fund-raiser, Tony Gillam says, “we could start a war right here.”Bottom: Gunnery sergeant Troy Britton, ROTC instructor at the U-M, claims themainstream media are at fault for not publicizing the good things happening inIraq. Eric Pierce, a marine for nine years, hopes to be in Iraq soon.

THE WAR AT HOME

CONTINUED

PHOTOS GRIFFIN LINDSAY

Now back stateside, Keith Kramer iswarmed by overwhelming support fromAmerican civilians. He recalls how peoplein the Atlanta airport stood and applaudedas he and fellow soldiers came home. “Alot of people are critical of the war, butthey support us,” he says.

DDiisssseennssiioonn iinn tthheerraannkkss

Yet even within the military ranks,there are people who aren’t gung-ho aboutthis conflict.

Seeing his son go off to Iraq was “themost gut-wrenching experience of mylife,” says David Martinez of York Town-ship. “You don’t look forward to seeingyour kids go to war. War is not a prettything. I was a career military person fortwenty-two years, and if I could have gonein his place, I would have.”

Martinez vividly recalls his twelve-hour shifts as a navy corpsman airliftingwounded marines out of Vietnam groundcombat. Helicopters he was riding in wereshot down three times, and he says he sawmore maiming, death, and body parts inone year in Vietnam than in twenty yearsworking as a nurse in emergency rooms inMichigan.

“I don’t feel right about this war,” saysMartinez. “I think we should get ourtroops out of there so we don’t lose anymore of them.”

Sergeant Ken Parks doesn’t support thewar, either, but he’s eager to help his com-rades. Parks is fifty-five and served in theair force in Vietnam as a loadmaster ontransport planes; he never saw combat. Af-ter leaving the air force, Parks, who livesin Ypsilanti, joined the National Guard.

He volunteered to go to Iraq as “mylast big adventure” and arrived in 2003shortly after formal combat operationsended. He served for a year in the 156thSignal Battalion, setting up phone andcomputer communications. The first yearafter the invasion was relatively quiet, andParks never saw fighting.

He was disturbed, however, by revela-tions about torture in the Abu Ghraibprison; he believes strongly in fightinghonorably and treating prisoners fairly.His desire to serve “nobly” figures in hisplan for another tour of duty. “You couldbecome a beast” in war, Parks says. “But Idon’t want to be a killer. I want to followthe rules.”

He has another reason for wanting toreturn to Iraq: “Having a little danger, car-rying a weapon around—I get a little kickout of that.” Then he describes his desirefor another tour as “a good definition ofsin—fighting a war whose purpose youdon’t believe in just because you like be-ing a soldier.”

Parks says that he was dismayed whenhe returned from Vietnam at how prosper-ity continued on the home front, at howpeople were unaffected by the war, and athow shabbily veterans were treated. Hesays now civilians almost “go overboard”in being supportive of the troops. He be-lieves it’s because “the whole nation isstill reacting to Vietnam, and there’s acollective guilt about the way vets weretreated then.”

Gary Lillie of Scio Township is still re-acting to Vietnam too.

“Like a lot of Vietnam vets, for the first

two years of this war I can probably countthe number of nights’ sleep I had on onehand,” he says. “You can tell all the vetsby the bags under their eyes.”

Lillie, who runs his own real estatecompany, is a senior producer of VeteransRadio, a nationally syndicated talk showoriginating at WAAM in Ann Arbor. Hesays only history will judge whether thiswar is right or wrong, but his feelings onthe war are like razors’ edges.

“I’m not prowar,” he says. “I’m sup-portive of the troops. There’s nobodywho’s been to war who is prowar. . . . Youlive with your feet rotting off, and you’reso tired, and you don’t know how you cango on another day, another week, anothermonth, and you get scared to death. Andthen people say you’re prowar because wedon’t go protesting with them? We’re anti-protester, not prowar.”

SSttaannddiinngg uupp aannddsshhuuttttiinngg uupp

Cathy Muha feels she is being patrioticby protesting the war weekly in front ofthe Chelsea post office on Main Streetwith her comrades in CANOPAS, theChelsea Area Network of Peace Activists.The protesters have been at the post officeat noon every Sunday since before the warstarted.

“At first we had quite a few negativecomments yelled out of cars and rude ges-tures,” Muha says. “Now, it’s overwhelm-ingly positive. . . . We get honks andwaves and peace signs.”

Patrons of the Common Grill some-times come out and stand with the protest-ers for a little while, cups of cocoa in hand.“Many times people will come across thestreet to say, ‘Thank you for doing this—Idon’t really have the time to do this, sothank you for doing it,’ ” Muha says.

Muha’s husband, Michael, a Vietnamvet, is the membership chair for the Wash-tenaw County Veterans for Peace, a forty-member group. He says the war “reallydoesn’t affect most people” except thefamilies of active service members. “Therest of us, there really are no sacrificeswe’re making.”

The Chelsea activists are sometimesjoined by folks from the Manchester AreaPeople for Peace, including Eileen Parker.Parker’s group swims against the tide inManchester, a strong military town whoseVFW hall proudly displays a poster withphotos of about thirty locals who are in thearmed services now. “The American Le-gion is very strong in this town, and Idon’t see them changing,” says Parker.“They use fear” and the words “supportthe troops” against the peace activists, shesays: “You get a lot of knee-jerk patriot-ism over there, wrapping themselves inthe flag. It’s discouraging.”

Manchester VFW post commanderHarvey Dethloff is dismissive of the pro-testers: “The consensus of the veterans isthat they don’t know what they’re doing.Unless you’ve been there and done [com-bat], you don’t know.”

Dethloff says the war isn’t discussedmuch at Manchester VFW meetings, andthat holds for other local veterans organi-zations as well. Chuck Reed, commanderof the Chelsea VFW post, says, “There’snot a lot said during our meetings about the

SPRING 2006 16

war. The older guys just talk about theirwars.”

Oscar Hansen, chaplain and past com-mander of the Chelsea American Legion,says, “I think the war is really separatingour nation.” But he adds, “We don’t dis-cuss it at meetings. Why should we splitour organization on anything?”

At local churches, a similar fear of stir-ring up conflicts often keeps discussion ofthe war in Iraq to generalities.

“It’s a tender issue for a lot of congre-gations,” says Chuck Warpehoski, directorof the Interfaith Council for Peace andJustice, a forty-year-old ecumenical groupformed to oppose the war in Vietnam.

At St. Joseph Catholic Church in Dex-ter, Father Brendan Walsh says no one hasasked him for counsel about the war.

“I have on occasion preached at SundayMass about the violence of war, the loss oflife, the effects on families,” he says.“From the beginning of the war, we haveprayed for our soldiers and those who havebeen sent to serve and protect us.”

Rev. Russell Carnley, minister at SalineChurch of Christ, says, “It seems that themembers are in support of the war as anecessary action, though I’m sure allwould like to see it end.”

In Manchester, Rev. Kari Nicewander,senior minister at Bethel United Church ofChrist, takes a more activist stance: “Ithink, as Christians, we are called to advo-cate for peace—Jesus applied his messageto the social questions of his day, and I be-lieve we should, too.”

Nicewander says a few people haveasked for counseling regarding the warand the current political situation. She saysthey are “struggling with feelings of guilt,anger, and powerlessness.” She adds,“Right now, people are praying about it. Ialso think that many people are ignoring it,because they feel powerless to do anything

about it. Others are feeling depressed, buttrying to focus on other things.”

PPrrootteecctt tthhee ttrrooooppssOn the Chelsea peace group’s website

are three years’ worth of letters and essaysfrom local people with specific grievancesabout the war. Some are against the pro-testers. Most are against the war and de-cidedly supportive of the troops. Theirprotests—some reasoned, some passion-ate—range from complaints about peacesigns being stolen to diatribes about war’sfutility, from being misled about the rea-sons for this war to defending their rightand duty to protest against it.

“It is, in part, because of my deep con-cern for the troops—some of them fineyoung men and women I have known andwatched grow up in Chelsea who areproudly serving their country now—that Istand vigil,” wrote Elizabeth Hammer inJuly 2003.

“I believe that the troops have beenplaced in harm’s way for policies that havelittle to do with protecting the UnitedStates,” said Hammer, who is creditedwith creating the “Wall of Names” of allthose who have died in the Iraq War that’soccasionally displayed at local demonstra-tions. “Who among us would have sentour troops into battle,” Hammer argued,“if the facts which are now coming tolight—facts previously well known to highadministration officials—had been madepublic before the war?”

The most frequent and impassionedwriter is Arnold Stieber of Grass Lake, aVietnam veteran and member of Veteransfor Peace.

“I’m very tired of having the govern-ment use ‘patriotism’ and slogans as thetools to rally the masses to give up theirlives, mental health, and tax dollars forwars or conflicts that are designed to gen-erate huge profits for a select few,” Stieber

wrote in May 2003. “To take the higherground I recommend that we adopt ‘PRO-TECT OUR TROOPS’ as our slogan. Pro-tect them from greed, protect them from agovernment who forgets them after theyleave the military, protect them from themental pain of separation and fear, protectthem from the physical pain of combat,protect them from being used as a tool forglobal domination and oppression.”

Bob Krzewinski, coordinator of thecounty chapter of Veterans for Peace,wrote, “For those who become very upsetat seeing those speaking out for peace atMemorial Day or Veterans Day cere-monies, before you start condemning thatperson, keep in mind that person you aresingling out could very well be a veteranwho has seen the horrors of war and isjust trying to say, there has to be a betterway to resolve conflicts than fighting anddying.”

Mothers and meaningDeb Regal says her son defends her

right to express her views and participatein antiwar activities.

“He took an oath to defend the Consti-tution and to defend the rights of peoplelike me to have free speech,” she says.“He said, ‘Mom, I would expect nothingless from you.’ He said, ‘It’s all for noth-ing if those of us in uniform are not de-fending the ideals on which our countrywas founded.’ ”

Like many families, Regal’s is dividedover the war. She has five grown children,and all are outspoken in their variousviews on Iraq. She says Justin once said tohis older brother, a conservative Republi-can, “If you’re so for the war, I’ve got auniform downstairs. Why don’t you put iton and get out there?”

Regal is worried how the war may af-fect her son and others who serve.

“I hope that we realize that part of our

responsibility is not only to provide med-ical care for the returning veterans, but todeal with the long-term effects on theirfamilies and the larger society of beingpart of this war and being the aggressorsin this situation,” she says. “What has thatdone to them and to us?”

On Darcy Monier’s refrigerator is aposter of a rifle with a combat helmet atopthe barrel, the names of war dead, and themessage “Freedom is not free.” Sheknows. She’s paid the price.

“People who are against the war havethe right to say they’re against the war be-cause of people who have sacrificed inthe past,” she says quietly.

Monier mentions that the war’s tollgoes way beyond deaths to include thosethousands coming home wounded andmaimed, and those who escape physicaldamage yet still suffer with their familiesfrom the trauma of separation.

Monier says her son called two orthree times a week from Iraq but kept herin the dark about the details of his mili-tary life. “I knew he was driving a coloneland a sergeant major. I had no idea hewas doing patrols.” The first time shefound that out was when she got the noti-fication that so many military parentsdread.

Monier seems buoyed above thedepths of her grief as she talks about herson’s purpose. Only when she’s askedabout our government’s next steps in Iraqdoes she start to cry.

“It means a lot to me,” she sobs. “Hisdeath needs to mean something. If wedon’t finish what we started, his deathand all the other deaths mean nothing.

“But if we pull out and bring the troopshome, then what have we accomplished?We started this, and we need to finish it. Wecan’t just leave a country that’s in turmoil.”

The United States should hold thecourse, Monier believes, even though itmeans more sons and daughters, fathersand mothers, wives and husbands mighthave to die. “The numbers aren’t that bigcompared to other wars,” she says. “Forthe length of time we’ve been there wehave not lost that many soldiers. Myson’s one of those numbers, but therehave not been that many deaths.”

Deb Regal respectfully disagrees.“I cannot fathom why I would want to

inflict on anyone else the nightmare ofgetting a phone call in the middle of thenight saying my son was dead,” she says.

“Maybe what we did, the way we did it,when we did it, was all unwise,” Regalsays. “Some see any admission of any partof that as somehow negating or dishonor-ing” those who are serving. But “continu-ing to subject people to violence, to killingin the name of saving face is a very highcost for pride.”

At 9 p.m. on Valentine’s Day, thenames of the dead are spoken aloud atthe Bridgewater Bank Tavern. Thesounds of the names filter through thecracks of the tavern doors and into thecrisp black night. In our farms and townsthe meanings we attach to those names,and the sacrifices they represent, contin-ue to unify and divide us. n

Cathy Muha, peace sign hanging from her neck, and the Chelsea peace group have been protesting every Sunday at thepost office since before the war started. Protesters say passersby have recently been giving them more “thumbs up” signs.

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