This Mother's Day, I offer these lines from "The Mother," by May Herschel-Clarke:

...She lives as though for ever in your sight,
Loving the things you loved, with heart aglow
For country, honour, truth, traditions high,
--Proud that you paid their price. (And if some night
Her heart should break--well, lad, you will not know.)

Tonight two more broken-hearted mothers mourn their sons -- Pfc. Aaron J. Ward, 19, of San Jacinto, Calif. and Spc. Alex D. Gonzalez, 21, of Mission, Texas. Please join me in remembering their lives and service.

I have nothing but tears tonight. Three more service members -- Sgt. Merlin German, 22 of Manhattan, N.Y.; Staff Sgt. Clay A. Craig, 22, of Mesquite, Texas; and Staff Sgt. Bryan E. Bolander, 26, of Bakersfield, Calif. -- are lost to us and to all who knew and loved them.

Merlin German suffered burns over 97 percent of his body and was not expected to live. He underwent well over 100 operations, and healed enough not only to re-learn how to walk but also to dance with his mother.

Clay Craig would have been home in a few months.

Bryan Bolander would have been married on June 6 and his would-be best man will now be his pallbearer instead.

Please take a few minutes to get to know these men and to help us mourn their loss.

With sadness, I bring you the news that we have lost another soldier, 26-year-old U.S. Army Spc. David P. McCormick, who died in Baghdad of wounds he received when his forward operating base was hit by a rocket attack.

I wish I could tell you about his bravery, kindness and hopes. But there is so little out there written about him; it seems unfair that a life given in service should go nearly unremarked. Please join me tonight in recognizing the loss sustained by his family, friends and colleagues and in honoring the memory Spc. McCormick.

In the late 1980s, GM launched the "Not Your Father's Oldmobile" campaign in an effort to revive interest in the brand. The Olds is now defunct, but the tagline lives on in various forms, pushing the idea that old is bad, new is better and that the previous generations are hopelessly square.

At the same time, though, PBS launched a series of reality programs that documented modern families' attempts to live as their forbears might have -- in a frontier house, or in the 1900 house.And you know what? It's hard! Those old folks lived differently than we do and had to invent their own solutions to their particular problems. Perhaps there's a lesson here about learning from the old ways.

So I was looking through the library stacks the other day when a man walked around the corner, took one look at my partially bared breast and ran the other way, much as I imagine John Ashcroft did the first time he spotted the Spirit of Justice sporting high beams. And why, you ask, was I showing so much skin?

I wasn't. I was nursing my baby in her sling and trying to get something done at the same time, just as I am right now. Baby Monkeybiz is a grazer, nursing a little here and a little there and not always when it's convenient for me. (I am told that efficiency is the enemy of children and I sometimes wonder if it isn't the other way around.) Her chubby cheeks are a testament to her eating habits and, reluctantly, I've just started her on solid food with a few spoonfuls of homemade applesauce.

But I digress.

According to the New York Times, the face of survivalism is "that of a shaggy loner in camouflage, holed up in a cabin in the wilderness and surrounded by cases of canned goods and ammunition."

Thank goodness, then, that Alex Williams, writing for the newspaper's Fashion & Style section, has found that doomsday is for well-groomed middle-class folk too! Out with Mountain House dried food and in with seed, fertilizer and wine. Survivalism isn't just for apocalyptic paranoids anymore. It's gone middle-class.

That's a relief, because I look like hell in camo.

I’m writing this as a break from cleaning out my attic. I don’t mean tidying. I mean full-on pull everything out, open boxes, make decisions about what to keep and what to discard, much like what’s happening in voting booths across the nation. (No, this is not a candidate diary, I'm preparing for a move!)

As I’ve aged, I’ve become much more ruthless about what I carry with me. My criteria: an object must be useful, beautiful or have sentimental value in order for it to justify the space it takes up. Most days that’s a workable system and I’m good about throwing things into boxes for the local thrift shop.

And yet...

I have a confession. When I am about 93 percent done with a given project, I have the urge to just put the damned thing down and start something else.

All I can do is bring you the news. I can’t seem to stop crying.

Two more soldiers – 22-year-old Spc. Kevin S. Mowl of Pittsford, N.Y. and 19-year-old Spc. Micheal E. Phillips of Ardmore, Okla. -- have died of their wounds, suffered when they hit IEDs in Iraq.

The news follows. Please think of their family and friends who miss them so much tonight.

Two more names. Two more widows. And dozens of broken hearts.

Please join me tonight in remembering two young soldiers -- Spc. Chad D. Groepper, 21, of Kingsley, Iowa and Spc. Luke S. Runyan, 21, of Spring Grove, Pa. -- friends and brothers in arms who died so far from home and who are so very much missed.

The news follows.

I wish I weren’t writing this, but I have to.

We’ve lost five more soldiers -- Spc. Michael T. Manibog, 31, of Alameda, Calif.; Sgt. Timothy P. Martin, 27, of Pixley, Calif.; Staff Sgt. Jerald A. Whisenhunt, 32, of Orrick, Mo.; Sgt. Gary D. Willett, 34, of Alamogordo, N.M.; and Pfc. Jack T. Sweet, 19, of Alexandria Bay, N.Y. -- to IEDs in Iraq.

Sweet died Feb. 8 in Jawwalah, according to the Department of Defense; Manibog, Martin, Whisenhunt and Willett died the same day in the Sunni Triangle's Taji, northwest of Baghdad.

There are no words I can give you to bring them back, no phrases that will much comfort the family and friends who miss them so much. But I have to try to tell you a little bit about them so you know how much we have all lost.

A fourth-generation military man who wanted to join the Army even as a toddler. A humble member of the Navy’s elite. And a SEAL whose heart was as large as his drive to serve.

Tonight we mourn the passing of Spc. Christopher J. West, 26, of Arlington, Texas; Chief Petty Officer Michael E. Koch, 29, of State College, Pa.; and Chief Petty Officer Nathan H. Hardy, 29, of Durham, N.H.. These Bronze Star winners leave a legacy of service to their nation. They also leave behind friends and loved ones who miss them very, very much, and who will grieve over their losses for years to come.

My heart goes out especially tonight to 7-month-old Parker Hardy, who will only know his father through pictures and the stories that others tell. Stories cannot replace a father... but may they provide comfort and the knowledge of how much this young daddy doted on his boy. I hope that Parker inherits his father’s goodness. And his smile.

Please get to know a little bit about these fine, fallen men in tonight’s edition of "I Got the News Today" and weep for how much our nation has lost with their deaths.

For a military unit to lose one member is awful. To lose five at once is almost unthinkable. But last Monday it happened, as five soldiers from Fort Carson, Colo. -- Sgt. James E. Craig, 26, of Hollywood, S.C.; Staff Sgt. Gary W. Jeffries, 37, of Roscoe, Texas; Spc. Evan A. Marshall, 21, of Athens, Ga.; Pfc. Brandon A. Meyer, 20, of Orange, Calif.; Pvt. Joshua A. R. Young, 21, of Riddle, Ore. -- were killed by a roadside bomb while on patrol in southeastern Mosul.

These men lived, worked, ate, joked and were homesick together. They probably traded stories about their families and ribbed each other about favorite sports teams; they relied on each other when things got serious. They were brothers in arms, now as united in death as they were in life. Tonight as we remember them and those broken hearts they leave behind, please also think of their colleagues and a unit that will never be whole in the same way.

When I was young, I had parents who liked to take day trips and consequently I saw a lot of Pennsylvania from the back seat. I remember homes sided with green serpentine stone and the boxy solidity of Sears homes, American Foursquares and elms lining the streets. We often traveled to Lancaster County, where I watched mule teams pulling plows over Amish fields. I still remember eating the most amazing chicken soup (during a statewide avian flu outbreak), and recall the good Mennonite ladies that served it. Oh, and the peanut butter pudding from Shady Maple! The fields and skies in winter, the colors of an Andrew Wyeth painting, and the hawks atop bare trees. And the horse auction somewhere in the country, where I was told not to stare at the Amish in attendance.

I thought about all these things last week while I was at the 92nd Pennsylvania Farm Show (where an Amish man pushing a stroller took a good long look at me, carrying Baby Monkeybiz in her sling). Come on in and take a peek at a little bit of America.

No parent should have to bury a child. Yet the parents of six more soldiers -- Spc. Todd E. Davis, 22, of Raymore, Mo.; Staff Sgt. Jonathan K. Dozier, 30, of Rutherford, Tenn.; Staff Sgt. Sean M. Gaul, 29, of Reno, Nev.; Sgt. Zachary W. McBride, 20, of Bend, Ore.; Sgt. 1st Class Matthew I. Pionk, 30, of Superior, Wis.; and Sgt. Christopher A. Sanders, 22, of Roswell, N.M. -- must do just that.

Their sons died Jan. 9 in Sinsil, Iraq, "of wounds suffered when an improvised explosive device detonated during combat operations," according to the Department of Defense. Stars and Stripes explains that "a booby-trapped home ringed with bombs exploded, killing the six soldiers and injuring four others. An Iraqi translator also was killed. The Washington Post reported that the house had a ‘for sale’ sign on it." They were all members of the 3rd Squadron, 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment, 1st Armored Division, Vilseck, Germany.

Six more are gone, leaving behind hundreds of people who knew and loved them, and who now mourn them. We remember these sons here tonight.

I don’t want to bring you this news. But I have to.

Is it bad?

Yes, it’s bad.

Four more men have died in Iraq, the first casualties of war in 2008: Staff Sgt. Ryan D. Maseth, 24, of Pittsburgh, Pa.; Pfc. Joshua R. Anderson, 24, of Jordan, Minn.; Cpt. Thomas J. Casey, 32, of Albuquerque, N.M.; and Maj. Andrew J. Olmsted, 37, of Colorado Springs, Colo. They were fathers, sons and soldiers, guys who once played varsity football, rode motorcycles, blogged and, long ago, played with G.I. Joe action figures. Their stories have broken my heart like they’ll break yours.

Please join me in remembering their lives which, like candles, burned brightly and lighted the way for others.

They were sons, daughters, mothers, fathers, friends and colleagues –- and on this New Year’s Eve, we remember those service members who have died this year as a result of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. This remembrance, from the "I Got the News Today" (IGTNT) team, is more than a list. It’s a chronicle of lives and dreams cut short, and a glimpse into the grief that their survivors live with every day.

We’ve chosen "We Remember Them," by Rabbis Sylvan Kamens and Jack Riemer, to help us commemorate the lives lost this year. Please click on the hyperlinked dates to read the stories behind the names; I know I’m not the only one to cry while writing them. Or while reading them.

Our heartfelt condolences go out to all those who knew and loved the fallen, and who miss them so much.

May 2008 bring fewer names and more peace.

Please also visit  Part 2 of this diary.

Death from "injuries suffered from a non-combat related incident" can cover a lot of ground, but tonight the phrase seems inadequate to describe what happened to 22-year-old Army Sgt. Kyle Dayton, of El Dorado Hills, Calif.:

(H)is grandmother told News10 that Dayton died when he was checking on a dead body in a vehicle. Eleanor Miller of El Dorado Hills said the body was "booby trapped" and exploded, killing her grandson instantly. His commander suffered severe burns in the incident.

Sgt. Dayton died Dec. 3 in Ashwah, Iraq without ever having seen his 3-month-old son, Sean.

Please join me this evening in remembering him.