On a Friday about two months ago, I went in to a local tax preparation office to make an appointment to get our taxes done. Inside the office, I was greeted by what seemed like a nice woman. She told me she had an opening for the following Saturday morning. She asked me some tax-related questions for her appointment book and then asked me if I had any questions.
I mentioned to her, matter-of-factly, that my husband was deployed, and asked her what else, besides the Power-Of-Attorney my husband signed, did I need to brink in order to file without him being present? That’s all I asked, and I did not provide specifics as to where or what my husband was doing. Evidently, that was all the information she needed...
My philosophy of late has been to vocally express my absolute hatred of the war and my disgust at the pro-war nuts. No one is spared, even friends and relatives. People NEED to hear from those of us who really are sacrificing, and if I don’t do it, who will??? I am not a cruel person by nature, but this issue really gets up my nose and I’ll bare my teeth in a flash.
So back to my story of the week:
She didn’t even answer my question before immediately going into ass-kissing mode. She crawled right up my butt with the first words that gushed out of her mouth, "Oh, I appreciate so much the sacrifices that you are..." and at that point, because I don’t appreciate (what I perceive to be) hollow expressions of gratitude, and I knew where this conversation would go based on previous experience. I held up my hand and told her to "Stop, just stop." She replied that she "was just trying to show her appreciation."
And then, since I didn’t ask to be thanked, nor did I even give off a whiff of wanting gratitude, and because I was now ticked off, I decided to let her have it: I told her that "It’s offensive to be thanked for something neither my husband or I believe in." and then, because I could tell she was shocked, I decided to go in for the kill and further stated "this country is not worth the sacrifices we’ve been asked to make, and you shouldn’t be thanking us, you should be apologizing to us for letting this happen." At this point, the woman needed to pick her lower jaw off the floor.
Have I mentioned I live in Texas? In the city that calls itself "Military City?" Most days the metro area looks like an American flag threw up on it. It hit me that I was probably dealing with a person who is not able to separate the troops from the war. And I knew (more on this later)...
I know what she was expecting from me, the long suffering wife of the deployed; she was expecting me to be gracious, smile, nod, and thank her for her thanking me. Bah, I’m a real bitch when it comes to this sort of thing and I really don’t care about hurting people’s feelings, because when it comes right down to it, no one’s feelings as they relate to all-things Iraq, are hurt more than a military family’s (with exception of the entire population of Iraq). My feelings are deeply hurt, and I don’t know if anyone can say anything to make me feel better.
When I finished speaking, and after a shocked pause, she then tried to smooth things over by telling me what she meant. I ignored her and changed the subject back to the reason I was there in the first place; which was to get our taxes done. That’s it, that’s all I wanted. She finally realized I wasn’t going to talk to her about patriotism, the war, or anything related to the military so she finally gave up. She asked me for my name and wrote it down in her appointment book for the next day. I left the office, still mad.
So back to the part about "knowing" I wrote about three paragraphs up; it clicked in my head that she more than likely was a war supporter. I have a real problem with my money going to people and businesses that do not support the same ideals that my husband and I do.
The next morning, I slept in. I didn’t call to cancel the appointment (which is not like me at all.) I didn’t show. Not one dime of my husband’s tax-free blood money deployment pay will go to support people or businesses who profess to support the troops but clearly do not.
I'm so hurt. I'm hurt that this diary series exists. I'm hurt that the only surge we're seeing is a surge in names on the casualty list.
And I can't even imagine the levels of hurt, pain, anger, and grief that the families of
Jason Schumann:
"He was an extremely talented young man."
Ryan Collins:
"He wanted to make a difference,"
Justin Wisniewski:
'He had a knack for making everyone else around him happy,'
Ryan Baum:
"He was just so excited to be a dad,"
Victor Fontanilla:
"Although Mr. Fontanilla will be interred in California, his love for his home island never wavered,"
Coty Phelps:
Spc. Coty J. Phelps, 20, died Thursday when a roadside bomb exploded near his vehicle in Iskandariya, Iraq. Phelps was born in Lake Havasu City in June 1986.
and Benjamin Desilets:
``He was just a dynamic kid. He was a very handsome boy and he was just as pretty on the inside,''
are experiencing right now.
According to the Iraq Coalition Casualty Count the number of names released by the DoD is now 3425 and there are 6 more names of the deceased awaiting notification of the next of kin before being publicly released. The total is now three thousand, four hundred and thirty-one US Servicemen and women.
All of the U.S. fatalities can be seen here or here. They all had loved ones, families and friends. The DoD news releases are here.
I Got the News Today is a diary series intended to honor, respect and remind. This series is maintained by i dunno, with the help of Sandy on Signal, monkeybiz, noweasels and myself.
Click here for the previous diary in this series or click the IGTNT tag.