Am I really as neurotic as I feel?

So nothing huge to report.  Lunch was good.  He is a nice guy...just getting to know each other.  I had visions of setting him up with B if she ever moves down here.

Our vacation plans are all messed up and we will likely be doing something different, which is putting me through the stages of grief (I'm not joking...we've been planning this trip for a year and it's a month away and now it's not going to happen).  If you had 9 days to go somewhere, where would you go?  USA and Canada options will be considered.

Posted by: greeneyes at 12:51 | link | comments (6)

Thursday it is.  Y'all have to wait until then to hear the non-juicy details. 

Posted by: greeneyes at 18:44 | link | comments (2)

Thank you

Posted by: greeneyes at 10:46 | link | comments (4)

So rumor has it a boy likes me...and apparently has been wondering about me for quite some time...hmmm. 

Posted by: greeneyes at 16:37 | link | comments (6)

Half

I just realized this morning that yesterday was my half birthday.  Clearly this calls for a celebration of sorts, but I'm short on ideas.  Cupcakes that are just the tops, drinking out of my stemless martini glasses.  Suggestions?

Posted by: greeneyes at 09:05 | link | comments (6)

A dose of reality

We hear about it, say "Wow, that's horrible," pause for a brief moment, and continue on.  "So what are your plans for the weekend?"

I think it's a defense mechanism.  Some sort of innate survival technique...not necessarily something our ancestors thousands of years ago needed, but something we've developed over the last couple hundred years as a way to make it through the day, and the night, and into the next day.  Because if we don't have that mechanism, if we don't deal with it the way we have been dealing with it, I have a hard time envisioning a humanity that could survive.  And if humanity did survive, what sort of humanity would it be?  I can't help but think it would be one I would not necessarily want to be a part of.

As I started my drive home from work this afternoon, I turned the radio to NPR, as I often do.  Yesterday I learned about a 6-week course for members of the military who want to become (almost) forensic anthropologists to identify causes of death and body parts of those killed overseas.  A while back I heard an interview with an author who said that depression is a natural state of mind, and prescribing so many anti-depressants is actually doing a disservice to everybody because so much good can come from depressed minds, not to mention the fact that you can't fully appreciate the good times without suffering through the bad times (this is hugely oversimplified, but the author has an excellent point).

Today it was about the earthquake in China.  Every time I've heard about the earthquake, or the cyclone in Myanmar/Burma, I start to wonder what it's like over there, seeing buildings destroyed, dead bodies, rubble, the helpless and hopeless faces of the survivors.  And then my mind stops itself.  The defense mechanism kicks in.  I think about what needs to be done at work, the dishes at home, or the laundry, or which weekend I actually have free this summer, or some other relatively inane issue.  My mind doesn't want to or simply can't deal with a disaster of such proportions.  It wasn't designed that way.  None of our minds were, I'm sure.

But not this time.  Not with the story.  Melissa Block, one of the hosts of All Things Considered, was reporting from China.  She was with a couple who survived the earthquake.  The couple was searching for their little boy, who turns two in a few weeks, and her parents.  They were walking through the street with them, trying to get back to their building, when they find what used to be an apartment building.  The rescue workers dig through the pile of rubble until someone spots a hand sticking out.  A right hand, with a ring on a finger.  A neighbor.  Not even a slight chance of survival for the neighbor, but she still has hope that her son would be found alive.  The workers try to get some rescue dogs to sniff, but there are no dogs to be found.  They dig some more.  Until finally.

A worker comes out of the rubble and says a child was found.  Around the age of 2.  In the arms of an older man.  His grandfather.  His grandmother close behind, her hand still clinging to the grandfather's shirt.  Their family was found.

The wails of the couple didn't just break my heart.  They got into that part of mind that thinks about such things.  The huge disasters.  The thousands and thousands and thousands dead.  They got in and they let it loose.  How do they go on?  There is nothing left.  Nothing.  I wrestled with myself, trying to comprehend their situation.  No family.  No home.  No belongings.  No job.  Nothing.  Over three of my hometowns, wiped out.  How?  What do you do?  My mind wants answers.  None of this "have faith" stuff.  Real answers.  Concrete answers.  I'm a left-brainer.  Things need to be logical.  They need to make sense.  I need rationality.  How do you make sense out of losing everything?  Tell me.  How?

I was (and still am) stuck in a vortex of thought, trying to figure things out.  It's pointless, wasted effort, I know, but their cries got in.  I'm not connecting a face with this.  I'm connecting a sound.  A sound of parents realizing the worst possible consequence of the earthquake was true.  It's not a haunting sound, something that is played over and over in your head, but it is one that stays with you, simply because of the emotional response it elicited.  The sympathetic response of feeling someone's grief on the other side of the world.

The husband managed to say something to his wife between their cries as she collapsed in his arms.  He said, "I can't lose you too. Don't leave."

Maybe that's how.

Posted by: greeneyes at 18:55 | link | comments (4)

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there, and to those who are missing your moms, I send you lots of e-hugs. 

Posted by: greeneyes at 14:20 | link | comments (2)

Well, that's that.  On to the next one!

Posted by: greeneyes at 19:15 | link | comments (2)

Sigh.

Posted by: greeneyes at 15:16 | link | comments (3)