ONLY A PAUSE

Dear Spike:

Deep inside my soul, where my hope and faith in humanity exists unblemished by the common foulness of our reality, is where I’ll forever hold the story of what happened early this afternoon.

The Iraqi soccer team — a motley group of Sunni, Shia and Kurdish semipros known as the “Lions of Mesopotamia” — stunned a much more experienced South Korean side in the semifinals of the Asian Cup held in Malaysia, falling into a pile in the middle of the pitch under the flag of their wartorn nation.

Thousands of miles away in Baghdad, Basra, Najaf and Ramadi, their countrymen poured out of their homes. Iraqis have grown coldly used to eruptions in their streets, but not like this.

Not like this.

It was sheer joy. Jubilation and unity. Dancing. Singing. Crying.

•••

On Christmas Day of 1914, British and German soldiers fighting on the western front in World War 1 emerged from their foxholes during a short ceasefire. Someone produced a football. And as Limeys and Krauts are wont to do when they’re not fighting, a game began.

The “soccer truce” may have lasted as long as an hour.

And then the War to End All Wars began anew.

•••

Nearly a century later — in a nation carved from the wreckage of a war that only begat more wars — a new soccer truce brought pause to a bloody civil war.

But as it was in 1914, it was only a pause.

Within hours of the Iraqi victory, late this afternoon, two suicide bombers walked into separate crowds of revelers, killing 50 and wounding twice as many more.

•••

It’s an ugly game we play, this thing called war. By far it is the most loathsome side of our humanity.

Yet deep inside my soul, my hope and faith remain. And so, short-lived though they were, I choose to embrace the truces, not the wars. I choose to embrace the joy, not the hate.

I choose to embrace the beautiful game over its ugly rival.

As you discover our humanity, I hope you do too.

Love,
dad