left my garbage in la mirada
so here I am in washington d.c., surrounded by people with prosthetic legs, arms, stumps. some people just have bandages. some people are still sleeping after three weeks. my brother has eight-inch incisions on his crown. but he is smiling, moving around, talking, thanking people. he is better than the picture i had created in my imagination. he showed us his purple heart, and we brought him books and cds from the red cross. he doesn't have clothes, id tags, or anything from his life before last week. but he walked today. he is better looking than i remember.
walter reed army hospital is enormous. enormous like the Enterprise. i got a lot of exercise looking for the neuroscience ward.
it is very hard to find a place to smoke on the compound. it is a "non-smoking facility" and there are people in uniform wandering everywhere. smokers in wheelchairs congregate in a few back corners. almost everyone here that isn't sick or injured is worried about someone who is. sons, daughters, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers.
i was sitting by the coi pond today, alone in the humidity. a woman in her greens, walking with a cane, stopped and said to me, "Are you okay?" i am sure i am better than almost every other civilian here. Erin, whose husband was in my brother's unit, is not planning to go home until the father of her three children wakes up from his coma. She has been here almost a month.
i almost feel like i'm in another country. it is definitely another world. there are no frills and few facades. i don't think anyone has the space.
posted by Juliana @ 2:19 AM
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