Mood:
specialTopic: "Seven Samurai" (5)
A. K. Kurosawa penned an immortal tale which was transformed into English when Charles Bronson, Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, and a host of others became "The Magnificent Seven." Frodo is not of a mind this evening to dwell on the score that swells his chest and allows him to imagine what it must really be like to fight to preserve the life of the guy standing next to you, who is fighting to preserve your life. Perhaps it is the night, and the sound of fireworks, that exacerbate the numbers he absorbs as 2009 slips into ignominy.
Seven, added to three hundred and four doesn't really compute when the costs of war are tabulated in the mind of man or hobbit. We routinely count the number of soldiers who die for some reason somewhere, but it is very rare when "civilians" are added to the count, as they were this day. The "Station Chief" in Khost was a married woman. One of the Central Intelligence Agency employees reporting to her was a thirty-seven year-old father of four. A "suicide bomber' separated the families from their loved ones who also served, us.
Frodo, obliquely, wonders if Dick Cheney will ever know their names. What troubles him most of all is the fact that Frodo can't even remember the names of all the actors in "The Magnificent Seven." It was a very wise friend who once told Frodo that the most difficult job in the world would be that of the Director of Human Resources in the CIA. When Frodo queried for a response, he was told that the employees may be trained to imbibe and seduce as part of their assigned task overseas, but once they return to the "homeland," they are disciplined for maintaining the behavior for which they had been honored. How "hypocritical," thought Frodo, and nobody ever gets to know their names, unless Dick Cheney sees political advantage therein.
"Day is done, gone the Sun. . ." warbles Frodo to an empty sky, and the sound of fireworks in the distance.
