Lord, I am wordy this weekend

Partly because I feel I have broken through this dam of a block that has plagued me for years. Finishing a creative endeavor can do that. Also, I am killing time before I go volunteer tonight. I promise to catch up on my blog reading tomorrow, friends, because I've been watching the weather channel all day and can't do it anymore.

Most of you know where I'm from, and while I may not have stated it explicitly, why I moved away. I was one of those lucky bastards who got out because I had the means to leave, a place to go, and no desire to hang around and chance it. And like the rest of America, I watched the terrible damage that weather and governmental incompetance combined can wreak on the soul of a place and its population. I, like you, was horrified by what I saw. But that horror had its own flavor because I was watching my home. And the whole time I stared, crying or in mute deadened pathos, I was still aware that I was lucky. That, even if my own house had been destroyed, I was alive, my family was safe, we were together, and still found reason to laugh at times - that's just how we are.

'That did not happen to me', is what I think whenever someone attempts to wax poetic about my being from New Orleans. I was lucky. I was blessed. And yet. It did. Because of my blasted sense of connection to all humanity, whether through my Zen studies, or my inherent Christian sensibilities, or through my own special empathetic superpowers (Sponge Girl!), it did happen to me and I still feel it every day.

Today I watched cameras pan around in special Disaster!Pornish ways, focusing on blown windows and destroyed highrises and knocked over street signs and I thought, 'That did not happen to me.' And I am grateful.

Here's the secret no one will tell you. Those images you are seeing of damage and destruction? Not the least of it. The true heartache sets in when people go home and see if anything is still standing. When the homeless population doubles due to subsidized housing being demolished and rents tripling. When businesses have to close because their insurance won't cover all the lost property, or because they depend on a tourist trade that just isn't there, or because they can't staff it because so many cannot come home. The true heartbreak will occur when families cannot find their loved ones, or realize they lost someone to the storm.

Trauma is loosely defined as a sudden unexpected event which causes a negative emotional reaction, such as fear. Its effects can be felt for years after said event. The emotional reaction one feels can be triggered at any time, by anything. I know people in the New Orleans area who are still reeling, even if their homes have been rebuilt, and their favorite stores have reopened, and they manage to exist in their protective bubble of everything's all right now. They are still waiting for that trigger. They are changed. We are changed. I am changed.

That did not happen to me. And yet it did.

The Goddessdster Expresses a Need

Sometimes I'm not too sure what I'm doing here. By here, I don't mean this blog. I know exactly why I'm typing these words. But here, in the sense that I have no idea what the fucking point is.

Sometimes it makes perfect sense.

Sometimes I feel the pointlessness of it all as an exercise in creating meaning out of nothing. If I can say: I tried to learn as much as I could about the world and treated people decently, then I feel I've lived a good life. I truly do believe that smiling at one person each day is reason enough for a seemingly meaningless existence. Maybe my entire purpose is to be little more than a supporting character for the human race. That's not a knock. I think supporting characters sometimes have the most important roles. They provide the feedback, the reaction, the comic relief, so the main character can develop into a fully three-dimensional being.

Who is the main character? I guess if I were one of those unapologetic Jesus freaks (and that is not an insult, but in many ways an expression of envy - I wish I could believe so freely and unapologetically in something not empirically visible), I would say God is the main character of the Universe and we are all supporting characters. In many ways, I believe that to be true. And yet, as it applies to my small life, I think my supporting character role is reserved for he or she who needs me most. I live my life needing to be needed or I just don't understand what good I am.

How pathetic is that? Except I also believe there is no pathos in freely expressing how one feels.

Which brings me back to my opening statement. Why a blog, when I spent so long mocking others for doing exactly this? Am I finally giving in admitting my own hypocrisy? Probably, but I do that a lot. I am here for what I believe is the same reason you are here and so many others. Because if I don't figure out a way to express how I feel, I think I'll just go crazy.

Welcome to my world.