SYDNEY: Funny how our perspective varies based on what role we have.

TASHA: What do you mean?

SYDNEY: Two hundred and some years ago the British sent their young men across the ocean in perilous conditions to some god-forsaken country to fight rebels and insurgents who slaughtered them with gorilla warfare and ambushes.  But those terrorists we now call American heroes and the Brits oppressors. I wonder what label history will give the American invaders and the Iraqi loyalists two centuries from now?

TASHA: I can’t say I ever thought of it that way.  It was my job.  And don’t regret what I did over there.

SYDNEY: Nor should you.  My beef is with the ones who sent you.  How can our soldiers be on a peace-keeping mission when there is no peace there to begin with?

TASHA: (a little annoyed) I’m not going there Syd, and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t either.

SYDNEY:  Never think that war, no matter how justified, is not a crime.

TASHA:  Earnest Hemmingway.

SYDNEY:  (pleased that Tasha recognized the quote) Very good. 

They lie in silence for a minute or two.

SYDNEY: More importantly Tash, how do you feel now that you’re back?

TASHA: (hesitates briefly before answering) You know very few people ever ask that question.  It’s as if when you return you’re supposed to pick up exactly where you left off•as if everything is supposed to be the same.

SYDNEY: Like you are returning from vacation, not from war.

TASHA: Exactly.  But it’s not the same, Syd.  No one here really wants to know about war•the sounds, the smell, the death.  You want soldiers to return and act as if nothing changed.  That our lives•our perspectives•are exactly the same as when we left.  When you deal with that type of poverty, desperation and fear every single day; when you see friends and colleagues killed and wounded•some maimed for life•and know that you were just a few feet away from taking that same shrapnel or bullet•why them and not me?

SYDNEY: Do you feel lucky or guilty?

TASHA: A bit of both I suppose.

SYDNEY: Feel lucky, Tash.  Feeling guilty can be worse than dying•we all die eventually, living with guilt is a more severe punishment.