1. Starting Posture
A confluence of influences has finally tipped the scale in favor of starting a blog. I've been wanting to start one for months to explain to my friends why I have decided to move to Ukraine to help in whatever way I can. But how to begin. Where to begin. My dad spending his whole career in the defense industry during the Cold War? His being absent so much of my youth because the submarines he worked on demanded so much from him? My elation at the dissolution of the USSR in 1991? My growing alarm in the months preceding Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine? The horror, the absolute horror of the atrocities perpetrated by the retreating Russian soldiers in Bucha. They even booby-trapped kids' toys. That's when I decided I wanted to clear landmines in Ukraine, even though I don't have any background in that and no military experience at all. I just feel strongly that I need to continue my father's work. I have friends in Europe, including Ukraine, and my friends