Bin Laden is Dead.

RING RING! My phone rings at 10:45pm. It's not my husband. Even though he's gone. I know better thank to hope for a phone call from him. It's my mother. 


"Turn on the tv." she says in a meloncoly voice. The last time someone told me to do that was my cousin George, and it was when they captured Saddam. A day, a time that lives forever in my memory and the memory of my family.


I turn on my tv, and flip between CNN and Fox News. I hear the announcement. 


"Osama Bin Laden is Dead!"


My eyes fill with tears and I weep uncontrollably. I weep for every deployment that has taken my husband from me. My tears fall for all of the worry, fear, and pain I've felt for nearly a decade. I cry for the families who've lost and sacrificed so much because of this piece of human garbage who had so much hate for people he's never met. Another devil is dead.


The death of the man who thrust our country into a decade of war, and is responsible for the death of thousands of men and women both civilian and soldier, is personal to me. It is personal to every single person who lost someone on 9/11, and every single military family that serves this country. Because of the radical ideology of one man, millions have sacrificed so much. I cry because I feel as though every moment that I do not spend with my husband has been for a reason. All of the sleepless nights, the holidays and birthdays spent alone have not been for nothing. They have not been for an unseen, unwon goal. In an odd way I feel as though a debt has been paid to me, to my husband, and to my family. A debt has been paid to every citizen of our nation tonight.


Does the death of Bin Laden mean that the radical Muslims will stop killing? No. But (overly optimistically) I hope that maybe this will be like the cutting the head off the snake. Perhaps this is the beginning of the end of an era of terror for our nation. Perhaps this is the beginning of the end of a life where I fear that my children will grow up with out their father. Our persistence has paid off in this case. Our soldiers who have died on God forsaken soil have not gone in vain. Their quest can in one sense be considered completed. I blame Bin Laden for this. For ALL of it. And tonight I'm glad he's dead.