By ROBERT FATURECHI Special to the Daily Press
Margaret Dorantes has a peace sticker pasted on her window, but it’s what’s inside her Santa Monica apartment that makes the strongest statement. The 75-year-old Santa Monica resident has plastered hundreds of newspaper clippings detailing the deaths of American soldiers in Iraq along her wall.
“I know I’ll keep it up until either the war ends or I die,”
Dorantes said.
Though Dorantes shies away from describing herself as antiwar, she says that each death in Iraq deeply affects her, especially since the faces of the fallen hang in her living room.
“Oh, it breaks my heart,” Dorantes said, staring at her makeshift memorial.
The Detroit native didn’t set out to make a statement.
After attending a “Dia de los Muertos” celebration on historic Olvera Street, Dorantes was inspired to create a living room shrine honoring loved ones who had passed away: her parents, her husband, even her dog.
But as the war in Iraq escalated and the number of dead American soldiers rose, the longtime Santa Monica resident felt compelled to pay tribute.
“I pray for them every night,” Dorantes said. “They’re almost like my sons. I’ve gotten to know every one of them more or less.”
Like many Americans, Dorantes feels uninformed about the war to the point that she can’t decide if she’s for it or against it. But she says it’s important for all Americans to pay attention to the rising casualty numbers.
“I can’t tell whether [the media is] telling me the truth or not because I’m not there,” Dorantes said. “But I know that our boys are there.”
So far responses to Dorantes’ memorial have been positive. Though she said some visitors ignore the mass of clippings, most are impressed and moved.
The Daily Press recently got a chance to sit down with Dorantes in her Santa Monica apartment.
You’ve lived in Santa Monica about 40 years. How do you like it?
“I love it, but it’s changing. I love Santa Monica because everything is close. I don’t drive so everything’s really convenient for me. I can walk or take the bus. And of course I love the ocean, the pier. And I like the all the freebies we get, you know, the free concerts, the free movies on the pier. I can go to the mall, the Promenade. The people are OK. I don’t have any problems with the people. I talk to everybody.”
Anything about Santa Monica that turns you off?
“The homeless situation’s gotten worse because when I first got here we didn’t have any homeless people, at least I was-n’t aware of them. But now it’s getting out of hand, just way out of proportion.”
Why’d you set up this memorial? “I wanted to do something for the soldiers, and I had four brothers who served during the Korean War and just recently I had my grandnephew that served in Iraq for about a year and he’s home now. And I have another cousin that was in the Marines in World War II. I know about soldiers, but I don’t know what they’ve gone through.”
How have people reacted to it? “People have come in and said, ‘What is that?’ Of course, when they just see it they don’t really know what it is. They don’t literally come over here and look. I wait for them to say something to me, but sometimes they don’t ask. They want to know what it is and I tell them. The reaction is, ‘It’s very nice, it’s very thoughtful of you.’”
Any negative reactions? “No. Either they say something and it’s nice or whatever, or they don’t say anything.”
Why are you so affected by the deaths in Iraq?
“I think it affected me more because my nephew went in and he was in Iraq. And then my girlfriend’s brother was in there, and I saw him come back, which was good. And I didn’t get to see my nephew come back, but he came back. The war, I don’t know, sometimes I think that it’s not right and sometimes I think, well, it’s got to be done. I hate that these guys have gone ahead of me and they’re so young. I look at their ages, and very few are 35 or 40 years old. They’re very young.”
What do you think about the Iraq war in general?
“I think it’s bad because so many soldiers are dying, so many young men dying. And those are the ones who are going to procreate, and if we don’t have the men we’re not going to see anybody come after us. There are not going to be any babies coming. Some of them do have children but that’s it, they’re gone. I don’t think anything’s good about the war, really. I mean, I think it’s bad, but like I say if it has to be fought, it has to be fought.”
Do you think it had to be fought? “I don’t know. I don’t really keep up with it. I really don’t. This war, Iraqi war, is not anything like World War II. Because I think we were more patriotic during World War II. I remember World War II. We were taught how to save our dimes, how to buy war bonds, and it was more patriotic. The music was better, everything. This more or less is just fighting.”
How were people more patriotic then? “When I was growing up, I think that we showed it more. We were fighting for the defense of our country. Even though I was only 11 or 12 years old. The schools got involved. I go down to the pier [to antiwar events], and these kids don’t know what’s going on. They make fun, some of them cheer. I think that maybe these young kids don’t know what’s going on, really. I think they don’t have time to think about anything other than themselves.”
Do you consider yourself anti-war? “Well, it all depends, if you have to go to war, you have to go to war. You hear so much about, ‘We should be there, we shouldn’t be there.’ It’s confusing, sometimes it’s very confusing.”
How do you see this war evolving in the next five years?
“I wish it would end. I don’t understand, I really don’t understand what it’s all about. If he went after them for the weapons and hasn’t found them maybe we shouldn’t have gone. But how’s he going to pull out all the troops at one time? He’s just gonna say, ‘Come on home,’ and that’s it? I think we’re stuck there and he’s going to have to find a way to eventually pull them all out.”
Do you feel like you know the soldiers on your wall?
“Like I say, I pray for them every night. I pray for the dead. I’m Catholic so we pray for the dead, we light candles. Just like for Sept. 11, I lit a candle for them. I look over their names, once in a while I go through the names, try to remember their names.”
Are you happy with the way Bush is handling with the war?
“How’s he handling it? I don’t know how he’s handling it. He tells you one thing, and he does another thing. Who knows if he’s telling the truth? I don’t know. I know one thing, that if he were my husband and he wasn’t telling the truth, I wouldn’t stay with him.”
If you talked to Bush, what would you say?
“Stop the war. Bring our troops home.”
And if you could tell the soldiers in Iraq something?
“That I’m praying for them, and I hope they come home safely, start their lives. They’re not going to be the same any-more. They’re going to have problems the rest of their lives. Especially the young ones. I mean, my God. My friend’s brother, he had to shoot somebody. He didn’t want to, but he had to. He’s not the same.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 19, 2005. Read the original PDF.