Memorial Can't Keep Pace With War Dead (Santa Barbara memorial)

[sabra]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-beach-war-memorial,1,2790854.story?coll=sns-ap-nation-headlines

Memorial Can't Keep Pace With War Dead

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. -- The toll of war is measured here on an acre of Pacific sand, where each Sunday volunteers array handmade wooden crosses in regimental columns to honor U.S. service members lost in Iraq.

The white crosses -- each with a small American flag at its base, some decorated with photographs of the fallen -- recall the gravestones of Arlington National Cemetery in a place usually reserved for sunbathers and tourists.

Now, as the nation approaches the grim milestone of 3,000 war fatalities, the seaside memorial in one of California's most popular coastal destinations has reached a crossroads of its own. The group of veterans that organizes the weekly tribute has decided to stop adding crosses because it is struggling to keep pace with the tally of death.

"It's getting out of hand," said Stephen Sherrill, who builds and paints each cross in his garage. "I wish I could keep going, but I'd need a lot more help."

[Tuesday_Morning]

1. Arlington Miami too

http://youtube.com/watch?v=vR5hYBzXzTc

[stillcool]

2. It's gotten way out of hand...

sometimes I can not believe we are STILL here...it's like we're in a time warp..where the same day keeps repeating over and over. Or, we've gone over the edge but can not land, suspended in space.

[aaronbees]

3. I've felt that way too about a time warp...

As if life is in some sort of stasis or on hold -- been feeling that way six years but most powerfully when I read news from Iraq hammering us each day.

Every day nearly the same headline of Death: 50 civilians killed, car bombs, 2 U.S. soldiers killed. And repeat the loop ad infinitum; change the numbers and faces around a little bit but it's all the same -- a willful march over the cliff.

I sometimes think of the film "My Dinner With Andre," where one of the characters is discussing malevolent times ahead, and he describes an arts colony of some sort (been a while since I've seen the film so memory on it is imperfect) that wants to set up these points of light and learning around so people won't forget and knowledge will be stored for the future, preserved through times of tyranny.

Some days I feel that's what we have to do ... in addition to doing our best to stop this madness.

[stillcool]

5. exactly..

we all have to be Anne Frank's.

[Hekate]

4. KnR for my friends Steve, Dottie, Lane, Ron, Nancy, Pat, Bob, Dan...

... who labor so hard and with such heart to make those crosses, name them, and plant them every Sunday.

On Stearns Wharf, one of the busiest tourist thoroughfares in Santa Barbara Arlington West is a true traffic-stopper. People are aghast when they realize what Lane calls "the true cost of war." The friends and family of the fallen who visit already know.

Hekate

[saigon68]

6. Wait until there are 5 or 10 THOUSAND to put up