Every so often, I pull up a text file from my old Suite101 days, and look at it. I sigh, nod my head, and close it again. It reminds me WHY I am so bloody vehement against the company now, when I was so ‘for them’ back in the day.

I’d just become the manager of the Society & Culture community over there when I typed this into the file. It’s my favorite quote from “The Stand” by Stephen King. It’s in both versions, and it was even in the movie. Ray Walston will forever by the perfect Glen Bateman.

“Show me a man or a woman alone and I’ll show you a saint. Give me two and they’ll fall in love. Give me three and they’ll invent the charming thing we call ‘society’. Give me four and they’ll build a pyramid. Give me five and they’ll make one an outcast. Give me six and they’ll reinvent prejudice. Give me seven and in seven years they’ll reinvent warfare. Man may have been made in the image of God, but human society was made in the image of His opposite number, and is always trying to get back home.” – Glen Bateman, The Stand

Precisely what happened to Suite101. A community was created, prejudice amongst the classes became rampant (head office against management, head office against writers, writers against management). Last fall, the next step: warfare. Only in the post-nuclear blast, none of the writers were left…unless they crawled hand to foot and begged.

The head office people thought they were God, but most of the refugees of that time think of the opposite number when asked to recall those last few weeks.

Hey – I know there are more important things going on in the world. If I focus on the little remaining bitterness I have for Suite101 (and it rapidly disappears as the laughter replaces it) I won’t have to remember that people I love are fighting and will be fighting a war Canadians didn’t start. That Canadians have no business in.

Bah..I don’t know where I was going with this. I don’t know if BrightEyedInnocent and WateryGrave will be safe until the end of their tours, and I have a cousin leaving soon. For the first time in his entire career in the army, my family let me know ahead of time that he is going overseas. They’ve never told me before he leaves – they tell me when he’s done and home again.

It’s going to be a really long year. Be safe guys…