Cover me with a rock

David is home. He left Afghanistan a few weeks ago and he is now passed out on the living room floor after taking the red eye flight from California to Florida. He just finished his second seven month deployment to the middle east. I look at his young face and wonder about the things he has seen with eyes that I wish could stay innocent to the horrendous things in this world. I avoid the news during deployments. I just don't want to know. I usually don't ask him questions about what he experienced over there. Today, I causally asked. I learned he lost three members of his group. I could see the wall come up to hide the pain. I quickly changed the subject. I want to crawl back under my rock. I try not to think of the mothers that don't have their sons returning home to give hugs and raid the refrigerator and sleep on the floor. I don't want to think about it because at this very moment, I have another son enroute to the same horrendous place this one just returned from. I want to stay under my rock.