Today's Doonesbury broke my heart.
I've been reading the comic for over 25 years. The characters are so familiar to me they're almost like friends.
BD cried in today's comic. He's been having a tough time since his injury in Iraq, and today broke down in therapy remembering when he got hurt.
BD didn't cry in Viet Nam. He didn't cry in the first Iraq War. He's crying now.
I have family members who are now retired from the military, but none currently in active duty. I don't personally know anyone who's fighting in this current war.
BD's experience hits home for me in ways that live-action reports and first-person accounts don't. Some people don't take comics seriously as literature, but that's what literature does - it translates experience for non-participants to understand.
Perhaps it's bad that I haven't cried with the soldiers and families who have lost so much in this criminally stupid war. Perhaps it's shallow that I'm more involved with a figure in a comic strip.
But I cried with BD today, and I bet others did too.