Stumbled upon this one the way home last night.

With a head full of novocaine, and it being cold and rainy, it was one depressing surprise I could have done without. It was haunting seeing all those boots on the lawn of Civic Center. Man, I despise Bush.

Empty boots signify war's human costs

The cold rain fell Monday on 2,744 pairs of empty boots. Lined up at Civic Center like crosses at Normandy, each represents a life lost in the war in Iraq.

Lance Cpl. Jose S. Marin-Dominguez Jr., 22, Kansas. Capt. Anthony R. Garcia, 48, Texas. Specialist Katrina Lani Bell-Johnson, 32, South Carolina.

Karen Meredith has seen the exhibit six times. It never gets easier.

The boots worn by her son, 1st Lt. Kenneth Michael Ballard, 26, of California, are there. She looks at them and remembers the sweet smell of the baby she once held in her arms.

"For me it's overwhelming every time," she said.

When the exhibit began in January 2004, there were 504 pairs of boots.

Only 504.

Marq Anderson, national tour manager for "Eyes Wide Open," said the project was begun soon after President Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech on May 1, 2003, when U.S. casualties in the war numbered 139. "We decided we needed to do something to point out the human cost of the war," he
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said.

Visitors to the original display in Chicago found it so moving that the American Friends Service Committee decided to take it on the road. It's been to more than 80 cities and it keeps getting bigger.

Part of the reason the sight of the boots is so affective is that most Americans have been spared images of this war. Pictures of soldiers returning in coffins are forbidden. News coverage from the battlefields has waned. There's no draft to heighten the immediacy of the war for average folks, so it's easy to forget.