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I don't like fish. I know eating fish is supposed to be healthy and prevent cancer, but if it's not fried shrimp I'd rather it be the dinner that got away.

Nevertheless, like spinach and liver, it tries hard to make a regular guest appearance on my dinner plate.

My wife knows I'll eat it if she cooks it, but she also knows that fish dinners at this chaplain's house have a mysterious way of coincidentally being interrupted by the beeping of my pager. My days as an Air Force chaplain were no different.

Late one Saturday afternoon, my wife signaled me to cease my yard work by waving my pager over her head. I let the mower die and read the page.

"Mortuary Affairs Office," I told her.

"Let me guess, I won't be cooking fish tonight?" she said.

"Don't slice the lemon just yet."

After a quick shower, I threw on my uniform and was on my way to meet with a death notification team. Composed of a lawyer, a chaplain, a medic, and a commander, the team seems more like the beginning of a Bob Hope joke. "There was a doctor, a lawyer and a priest driving down the street …."

Only this was a jokeless script that read something like this:

"Are you Mrs. John E. Jones?"

"Yes."

"Is your husband Captain John E. Jones?"

"Yes."

"Ma'am, we regret to inform you that your husband Captain John E. Jones, SSN 555-55-5555, was killed."

Of course it's rare we ever get that far without a lot of sobbing and screams of denial, but we stay with the script until it's delivered.

As many times as we deliver the news, we always read from the script. It's the only way to get through without cracking. The goal is to be compassionate, but professional.

As our team formed at the Mortuary Affairs Office, we began practicing the script. Following that, we watched a refresher video on how to make the notification and mapped out a route.

Finally, after checking and rechecking our facts, we drove off in a dark blue Dodge sedan that took us into the heart of base housing.

Uniforms in base housing on a weekend are a rare event. Young families are usually out playing catch, washing cars, or hosting garage sales. This afternoon was no different, but it was about to become permanently different for one resident.

The sudden appearance of uniforms in the cul-de-sac made us look like a small parade formation. We were a living, breathing cliché. It was all too predictable.

As we stepped out of our car, a little boy met us at the curb. He was just in time to point out his mother who was coming out of the garage wiping motor oil off her hands.

"Can I help you?" she asked.

Suddenly she inhaled our presence.

"What's this about?"

"May we talk inside?" the commander asked.

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