Letter to a young, sweet wife...

[Thatguitarman]

You know, yesterday, in my website update, I told everyone I received an email from a young wife... well, a nineteen year old widow... who's husband was recently killed in Iraq. She reached out to me because she saw that I was trying, in my small way, to put a human face on what's going on over there... while America is watching "The Swan" and "The Apprentice". I answered her this morning. (That's between me and Sarah.) But, it inspired me to write an open letter to all the Sarahs out there... to all the young wives and husbands and mothers and fathers who are suffering because of the misguided and insane conflict this administration has perpetrated on the world.

I'm singer/songwriter David Ippolito: "That Guitar Man from Central Park"

(Go ahead - Google it.)

Here's the letter:

***********

Dear Sarah,

It's David...

Sorry it took me so long to get back to you. This website gets buried in email. But, I read you letter and tears filled my eyes... again.

First, I'm soooo sorry for your pain. I'm a writer and a songwriter. So, I wish I had words for you... but, I don't. I could spend a lifetime trying to put that kind of sorrow into words. When the spirit moves me, I'll keep trying to find them.

I have a feeling... there are none.

But, thank you for reaching out and sharing that pain with me. It might be true that "shared joy", is joy-doubled... and "shared sorrow", is sorrow-lessened.

I hope so.

Anyway, sorrow and anger, while unavoidable in this lifetime, can go either way. Y'know? They can become a cancer that corrodes our very lives, or they can be motivators to help us see this life more clearly, and seek ways to accept our role in making life better... for ourselves and all around us.

I'm no saint... I'm no damned missionary... I'm not a politician, or political activist.

I'm just a singer/songwriter.

But, this war and this election have truly become a matter of conscience for me. Because, of young men like your husband and young women like yourself, because of my disdain for hypocrisy, deception and selfishness... I've been sucked into this. And, I'm up to my neck in it.

And, because it's in the job description.

I'm an American songwriter.

I want people to know, that the news media in this country as been sitting at the "cool kid's table" too long. They have no teeth, no interest in the Truth. They have no interested in informing people about men like your husband and they have no interested in telling the human story behind every horrible blurb about a car bomb or mortar attack. They are interested in ratings. They are interested in drama. They are interested in the next sensational image. But, not the human truth behind the next sound bite.

It's just wrong.

It's become indecent. Our country... the ideals it was founded on... the honor of the fine men and women who defend it... our very souls as human beings, deserve better.

Giving those who have died a nodding glance is as indecent and morally reprehensible as the idea of sending good, young American men and women to kill and die in a war that is historically ignorant, politically and economically motivated, fear-driven and un-American at it's core. 22 years old - 33 years old - 50 years old... 19 years old... all young lives... ALL shining kids inside... for what?

And, this man... George W. Bush... this spoiled, smirking man of wealth and privilege... this shallow and stupid man who used his wealthy father's influence to allow him to avoid serving as your husband did... this pompous, chest-inflated, arrogant phony who can only listen to the Rumsfelds (who's made a fortune in military technology companies) and Cheneys (who IS making a deferred fortune in Iraq with Halliburton) still speaks hollow words about valor and freedom and shared responsibility.

George W. Bush is a disgrace. I may be wrong, but I feel something may have gone horribly wrong with that individual's life here on earth. And we, as human beings should be helping men like him to see how much harm they have done... and, help them to be better men. ("You may say I'm a dreamer...")

But we, as human beings, as men and women of conscience, should also be ashamed if we remain silent.

AND, for cryin' out loud, we should NOT be voting for them, to keep them in positions where they can do more even harm and cause more death and misery on a global scale.

Things will get better.

Even when it feels like it, this is not the end of the world. We all go on. We smile. We sing. And, I will still write Love songs, and funny songs, and songs about just being alive.

Misery and JOY are not exclusive in this life... they often share the same stage at exactly the same moment. But, so do and awareness, compassion, responsibility, inspiration and action.

For now, I hope I can help, a little... and, then see what the rest of this life is about.

Please reach out as often as you feel like it.

David

[mzmolly]

1. Thank you for sharing David.

You are a kind soul.
:hug:

[Thatguitarman]

2. I'm nothin' special...

I'm not any kinder than any other man.

This is just THAT important.

[Booster]

3. Very well said....

and all so very true. Bless your heart and bless Sarah's heart. We will begin to heal after November and the healing will be like taking a breath of fresh air after being in a mine shaft for days. Keep up the good work - by the way, where's Joan Baez when we need her?

[Thatguitarman]

5. Baez... Dylan?

As an artist and a New Yorker, after that sham election in 2000, and after 9/11, and after the subsequent nightmare of this immoral Iraq war... I was waiting for the next young Joan Baez to come along... or, the next Bob Dylan, or the next Neil Young or... y'know. The next angry kid.

Didn't happen.

That's not an indictment of a generation... there are two main reasons for this, I figure.

One? Corporations have gobbled up the record business, and that's why it's been so targetted and sucky for the past 10 years. (So, even if the kids are writing this stuff, we ain't gonna hear it in the mainstream anyway.)

And two?

Not alot IS being written. Because they are a soundbite-MTV-FOX News-CNN generation, and what they are seeing is not making them angry enough, yet. (Also... there is no draft like there was in the 60s... so, it doesn't cost them enough... yet. There friends and lovers are not going to die enmass... yet.)

I've written songs called "Where's the Voice" and "Tired of Being Lied To" and "Common ground" and "Get Out Our House" and others... and, my latest album is simply about this:

I'm tired of taking it. I'm doing what the American musician is traditionally supposed to do. I'm SINGING TRUTH TO POWER, AND I HAVE DEDICATED MY MUSIC AND MY CAREER FOR THIS YEAR TO REMOVING BUSH AND THESE DANGEROUS PEOPLE FROM MY WHITE HOUSE.

It's worth it.

http://www.thatguitarman.com

- - David

[mandyky]

4. I will remember Sarah as I pull the lever in Nov. for Kerry

I still am not sure he is "all that", but he's gotta be a thousand times better than shrub.