We may be there forever

(WP)

Five years is a long time.

The day the war started, I remember watching Operation Shock and Awe at my office. Then going home and making a mix CD that captured my feelings. I believe it included some jazzy cover of "Suicide is Painless," some U2, and the Smiths' "Please Let Me Get What I Want This Time."

I often feel as if we have all fallen asleep and woken up in some slightly-tweaked alternate reality--the type of thing that would be classified as "speculative fiction" because it is crazy but not quite crazy enough to be "science fiction." More like Philip Roth's The Plot Against America than something by Harry Turtledove. The feeling started on that truly weird night in November, 2000, and it is beginning to get old.