Many times over the past few days I've started to blog about the war in Iraq. I've agonized over my thoughts, which have gone from ambivalence to "shock and awe". I've now progressed to sickness, as in I'm sick of hearing about it. It's not that I'm disinterested in what's going on, it's just that the constant bombardment of information, or lack thereof, has added a level of stress in my life that I wasn't aware of until yesterday. Deanne and I had a party last night and discussed this morning whether or not we enjoyed ourselves. I did enjoy being surrounded by friends and I mean surrounded, at one point there were 15 people crammed in the living room watching KU Basketball and later The Bourne Identity. If you're not familiar with our living room, that was pretty tight quarters. I was uncomfortable, not physically, but emotionally. Several times during the basketball game, Dan Rather interrupted with news from the war. Each time, the normal roar of party conversation was silenced as we listened intently for new morsels of information. Soon after, the conversation would return to thoughts on basketball, beer and music. Problem was, I had a very hard time enjoying any of the fellowship. I had this nagging level of stress about the war. There was this thing out there that we were all doing our best to ignore, but it was still there. The proverbial elephant in the living room.

Chris Jehle spoke a couple of weeks ago about how he used to be a pretty joyful guy, but in the face of so much pain, hatred and emptiness in the inner city, the joy seemed to be sucked out of his life. I understand a little of what he meant. Constant news of the war has seemed to suck the joy out of my life and, from what I can tell, a lot of people around me. It just doesn't feel right enjoying things like a KU basketball victory. It's more like a momentary distraction from the news of the world.

I'm going to do my best to distract myself this week. Some might call it shallow. Some might call it denial. I call it a prescription for preventing an ulcer. So, I'm not going to blog about the war. I'm going to keep on trying to live my life with the awareness that the only thing I can do is pray. Pray for strength to live a life filled with peace, love, joy and compassion. I pray the same for all of you.