So, I teach next door to a fantastic 27-year-old English teacher. We get along really well, and have become really good friends; we are definitely younger than the rest of the crowd on our house. the atlantic was born today, and i'll tell you how. the clouds above opened up and let it out. When I met her, I noticed all of the Marine Corps stuff plastered to her car, her desk; even the mug out of which she drinks the coffee I brew in the morning had an Eagle, Globe and Anchor on its circumference. Her boyfriend is a Marine, stationed in North Carolina at Camp Lejeune. i was standing on the surface of a perforated sphere when the water filled every hole, and thousands upon thousands made an ocean making islands where no islands should go. oh no. This particular Marine has been to Iraq, and their relationship endured that trip late in the school year, before I arrived. However, I didn't really know that the pictures of the two of them, the smiles and happiness, were long gone until she asked me if she could talk to me about it one day after classes. those people were overjoyed, they took to their boats. i thought it less like a lake, and more like a moat. Turns out, they were having problems that I had overcome with Shannon. Insecurity. Distance. Time. The unknown nature of love and their (our) relationship. Then I found out another kicker. He is meant to go to Iraq again in March. the rhythm of my footsteps crossing floodlands to your door have been silenced forever more. the distance is quite simply much too far for me to row, it seems farther than ever before. oh no. That crumbled from petty misunderstandings to fears of civilian life. Miscommunication about desires: children, life together, life after the Corps, happiness. Days when they wouldn't speak, conversations that would end in 'when you decide'. Her in tears after school, tears that tore me apart because they simply looked so painful. i need you so much closer. i need you so much closer. i need you so much closer. i need you so much closer. It's been a month since she finally told him that she couldn't take the way his indecision about their relationship tears her apart. She told him to call her when he finally decided how things would be between the two of them. Well, it has been that month, and she's starting to see that water flow under the bridge. She has been hanging out with a group of friends we now refer to as the 'Tuesday Club': a small group of people that hangs at a bar, has a few beers and a few laughs and forgets about work and troubles of life for a while. We've kind of helped her forget about her troubles, but they're still there, lingering deep. Deep down, she says, she's still torn, and I think, deep down, she's still heartbroken as though it all just happened. i need you so much closer. i need you so much closer. i need you so much closer. i need you so much closer. She actually told me, too, that she feels guilty for spending even more time with another guy, someone who teaches at the other end of our building. This guy seems to make her happy; she seems to enjoy his company. It doesn't make sense to me. Guilty, for Chrissakes. i need you so much closer. i need you so much closer. i need you so much closer. i need you so much closer. And as Congress and the President will inevitably fight over troop escalation and a way to win a war we shouldn't be fighting, I can't help but see that the true casualties of war should be counted at home as well as abroad. The casualties of war at home are relationships, hopes, futures. They are loves, feelings, families. Those graveyards are much larger than Arlington, much larger than the ones in our towns where dead soldiers happen to rest. so come on, come on. War doesn't just kill soldiers. so come on, come on. War doesn't just kill airmen, Marines, or sailors. so come on, come on. War kills a piece of all of us. so come on, come on. Even if those soldiers come home alive.