Workaday World XLI

I'm in the office today, packing up seven years of office sediment to ship to the Fast Company offices in New York. I've also been separating out personal items and books to ship home -- and then to be moved to Brooklyn when I relocate early next year. The range of emotions I'm feeling today as I pack and get organized is interesting. Seven years is a long time to work somewhere, much less to be in the same office building.

Now the wind is picking up outside as the sky darkens. Boston has yet to get the winter storm we've been warned about for the last few days, and I'm curious when the snow will start. Just before I left the house this morning, I got an email page that American forces had captured Saddam Hussein. Folks have already taken the TV from the office, so I missed Bush's address, but it struck me as I took the T into town that I wasn't really clear on why capturing Hussein was a goal.

Didn't the military action start because of Sept. 11, Osama Bin Laden, and Al Qaeda? Isn't this action in Iraq a convenient spillover to make good on what Bush's father started when he was president? I suppose it's a good thing Hussein has been caught, but it's difficult for me to feel an upswell of patriotism or support for this. I sense no victory. And it'll be interesting to see how Bush uses this as his re-election campaign gears up. Will this be positive propaganda that bolsters Bush's case for the presidency? Or will new news come out in the wash, recontextualizing the capture as the days progress?

OK, time to get back to packing. I'm almost done. Three more days in the office. Then, onward.