Letter From the Unknown Soldier

Dear Orange Countian:

I hope this letter finds you in good health. Me, I'm sitting in this desert camp, eating cold chow out of a hot can, having no sex, with no communication with the outside world other than this inbred-looking newspaperman who claims to be the most-read columnist in your neck of the woods. And I thought life here sucked harder than a toothless Moroccan hooker!

Anyways, the brass keeps saying relax and how we're gonna crush Saddam, how we have nothing to worry about because it's not like there's a Southeast Asian jungle around for miles. But it's hard to get gung-ho when the latest weather forecast here calls for HELL'S FIERY INFERNO! If I'm chafing this bad now, wait until I have to slip into that rubber safety suit and gas mask. Just drink plenty of water, you're saying. HELLO! I'M IN A FUCKING DESERT, PEOPLE! Thanks to daily sandstorms and their 80 mph gusts, the skin on my forearms has been sandblasted off like the original paint on a '73 Impala, visibility's as clear as the Bush doctrine, and I've got sand granules in places a Cirque du Soleil contortionist couldn't reach. Swear to God, I'm pissing like an hourglass!

Yes, I have seen the future, and my future in this man's army is in hellholes like Iraq; Afghanistan; the Philippines; South Korea; Colombia; and Biloxi, Mississippi. Screw being all you can be, killing more before 6 a.m. than most people do all day, and having enough money for a college whose classes are being cut amid the Bush economy. I should have listened to my mom and joined the Texas Air Reserves.

This Dildo fellow you shipped over just showed us video of a Support Our Troops rally you all just held. Nice. But if you'd really like to support this particular troop, bring me home—right now!—and not in a body bag.

Peace be with me,
The Unknown Soldier
(as told to Matt Coker)

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