海角大神

The news of James Foley鈥檚 beheading in Syria hit me hard. So too did yesterday's plea by Shirley Sotloff for the militant jihadist group Islamic State to release her son. As a mother of a journalist who covers wars, my heart aches not only for Jim, and other captive journalists, but for their families.

In January of 2004, I got an e-mail from my son, Tom, in Baghdad. A 21-year-old junior in college, he'd decided to spend the winter break of his study abroad in Cairo as a freelance journalist in Iraq. As a new freelancer who had chosen to jump right into conflict reporting, he, like a number of others at the time, had gone into the country with no institutional commitments. Nobody to report to. Nobody to ask anything. Nobody to miss him. And no one to look for him if he went missing.

鈥淚鈥檓 OK,鈥� he鈥檇 write. 鈥淢ore later.鈥� Each message was an umbilical cord of life, a bread crumb of hope.

And then, the messages stopped. This was my "initiation by fire" into the realm of loving a conflict journalist.

I spent my nights, hovering on the edge of sleep, with the volume on my computer turned up full so that I could run to my desk if I heard the 鈥減ing鈥� of a new message arriving. I racked my brain for who I could call. Who could I ask? Who might know something? I reviewed his most recent communications over and over, trying to figure out, well, anything 鈥� from half a world away.

Three days later, I finally heard from Tom. He had been held by gun-wielding authorities and then released. In those days before Skype and cheap international calls, I wouldn鈥檛 hear the details of the incredible story until he returned to the United States months later.

Now my son has been a freelance war correspondent for the better part of a decade, living and traveling on the other side of the planet. For most of that time, he's worked for outlets that stayed in close touch, including on contract with 海角大神. While I鈥檝e watched him grow as a professional, growth as the mother of someone who has chosen this line of work has come much more slowly. Sometimes I feel as isolated in my home as my son must feel working alone in a war zone.

Today, it鈥檚 much easier to communicate with him than when he first started working overseas, but even when we鈥檙e able to talk there are many days I鈥檝e tried not to be too obvious at work as I stare at my computer screen, watching horrific videos taken at the scene of a bomb blast in a location where my son is reporting. I鈥檝e watched in slow motion as people were blown apart 鈥� while I looked for clues. The lower half of a body lies in the gutter. Are those the L.L. Bean cargo pants that I gave him last Christmas? The horror that washes over me in these moments is palpably real 鈥� and impossible to explain or share.

Soon after Tom finished college, he went back to Iraq and embedded with US forces in 2006. Since he was traveling with a unit, I felt confident stretching the "24-Hour Rule" out to 72 hours between e-mails. But when I didn鈥檛 hear from him for more than a week, I began to worry. There was no phone number where I could call him. I could only wait. After more than 10 days went by, I couldn鈥檛 take it, and contacted the military and an editor at a paper in Kuwait my son had been writing for, asking if they鈥檇 heard from him. They assured me that they鈥檇 pass word to him. A couple of days later my son messaged me, letting me know that the unit he was with had unexpectedly moved into an area without Internet.

He also asked me to, please, use greater discretion contacting the military and his employers.聽

I imagine that my experience is familiar to anyone with loved ones in the military, except that there鈥檚 no support network for journalists鈥� families. I鈥檝e never met someone else related to a war reporter. When I can鈥檛 reach my son or I鈥檓 worried for his safety, there鈥檚 no one to call whose son or husband or brother is about to go into the same situation. I have been challenged many times to stretch and grow as a person as I鈥檝e followed the extraordinary events in my son鈥檚 work as a conflict journalist.

And today, as James Foley鈥檚 parents cope with the unspeakably tragic loss of their son, I feel compelled to extend the love and support of community. I didn鈥檛 know Jim. But, as the mother of a fellow correspondent, I recognize that Jim risked his life, and gave his life to bring the rest of us true stories about real people in often unimaginable circumstances. Perhaps applying ourselves to really understanding the people and conflicts in these stories is the greatest way to give value and recognition to what Jim Foley was all about.