Sgt. Copeland of 1st Cavalry US Army comforts an Iraqi man whose brother and father were killed by a suicide bomber

BORKGREN: Notes from my Baghdad Journal

It's an ordinary hot morning in Baghdad. In a moment, a man driving the peeling brown pickup is going to blow himself up in front of the Green Zone.

I am delighting in the details of simple brown pigeon as it swoops down to a muddy waterhole and flashes its bright blue iridescent wings my direction when the ground rumbles under me.

Moments later I stand stunned near the remains of the burning truck while medics carry dead bodies to ambulances.