Four Years...

In one way, four years can seem an eternity. It took four years for me to go from fourth to eighth grade. And four more years to complete high school. Four years, in the future then, seemed long and distant.

Yet, four years can be short. Four years ago, I was a teacher. Four years ago, B, R and I were drinking bourbon and soda interpreting the news as a team. Together we were able to decipher Chinese enough to understand how far America had advanced in its march to Baghdad and how many U.S. lives it cost.

Learning that U.S. blood had been spilt defending the nation from Weapons of Mass Destruction, we would toast to the men and women who had sacrificed everything for us. Slightly drunk, we would stagger off in search of fried rice and water dumplings.

I would come back to my room, check the Internet, pour another drink and read happy to know that victory was certain.

Now, a short four years later, I have been cheated and deceived. Deceived into supporting a war against a country that wished us ill, but had no way of hurting us, and cheated of the lives of brave men and women who did everything to save me-someone they never met.

For some these four years must have dragged. Men and women separated time and again from their family to go on yearlong tours in the dessert.

In four years, I have a master’s, built a career and started my life. In four years, others keep returning to Middle East nightmare with no end in sight.