a huge sigh of relief

If you haven't heard, Jill Carroll was released today. Carroll, a 28-year old freelance journalist who had been held hostage in Iraq for three months. As I've written here in the past, I actually have a distant personal connection with Carroll—she worked at the UMASS student paper with my co-worker Brett, and they knew each other pretty well.

Instead of using this as another opportunity to criticize the war or its management, because I'm in a celebratory mood I’ll take the low road and wonder: what do you say to an acquaintance who was recently released from captivity? I’d think it’s only polite to recognize this somehow, maybe by sending a card. Unfortunately, the local Hallmark store probably doesn’t have a “Released From Captivity in Iraq” section, but if they did, here’s an idea for a card:

“Knock knock!”
“Who’s there?”
“Boo.”
“Boo who?”
“Don’t cry! You were released from captivity in Iraq!”

(I guess that one would go in the “Released From Captivity in Iraq—Humor” sub-category.)

I’m also wondering what her next big family party will be like; there will almost certainly be that one distant relative who, after a few beers, will ask, “Hey, you’re still working for that paper, right? How’s that going?” She would, of course, probably do the right thing and point out that she hasn’t been at that job since she was held captive in Iraq, but if it were me, I’d nod and say, “Well, you know, could be better. Work is work.” On the upside, at least that would be a change of pace from having to have the same conversation about the experience with an acquaintance for the hundredth time, because we all know what that’s like.