blaugra

Questions

We recruit people to kill or be killed, defending our freedoms. When they're injured or discharged, why are so many in need of care? Not just care for a lost limb, which in itself is horrific, but also mental conditions. How about hunger, homelessness, joblessness? How can a soldier go from fighting for a great world power to unemployed and homeless? What's happening there? 

So lots of them are really successful with their transition back to civilian life, and not without some battles to handle physical or mental changes. But lots of them aren't.

Why do we let men and women who were trained to fight for us fall through the cracks while we (I) focus on sunshine and cookouts?

I know it's Memorial Day, to remember the fallen. But I'm also thinking of the stumbling and hoping they have hope.

 

My friend is dying and...

...and I'm angry.

I'm not angry at the cancer that has been eating her insides for the past couple of years while she's tried chemo cocktail after cocktail to try to prolong her life.

My anger right now is directed at her.

I have had hope since the beginning of her cancer "adventure," I have hoped alongside her, we have all sat around and hoped.

Hope sucks.

On her last day in the hospital, on the day she was being moved to hospice, I cried. I thanked her for everything, awkwardly, and I hugged her.

I thought that might be our goodbye.

But I am visiting her almost every day in hospice. I'm mad at her for leaving. I need her as a friend, the world needs her to keep doing her good work, her family needs her. How can she leave us?  I'm not crying for her.

Also, I feel awkward in hospice.  Do I let her get her rest, or tire her out with stories that I hope entertain her?  What does she need to rest up for?  Are we quiet or do we act normal to make her feel like she's not in a place where people go to die?

How does this play out?

I read a pamphlet about watching someone die slowly and it made me a little less perturbed but not much.

I'll tell you what, she sure is handling this with a lot more grace and dignity than I am.  Because I leave hospice and I'm foot-stomping, fast-driving pissed off.

Hunger.

I received an appeal in the mail from a food bank.

I actually opened it and read it and it pissed me off. 

Children who get most of their nutritious meals from their schools are cut off during the summer months. So there's a program called summer backpack buddies that will pack up snack foods for kids so they don't starve during the summer.

I knew about the weekend backpack buddies program, where kids are given bags of food for two days because they don't get fed well or at all at home on the weekends, but the need in the summer months didn't occur to me until I read the mailing.

First, I got pissed because I'm skeptical and cynical. Parents who don't feed their kids? If I were a parent, I'd be sure to feed my kid first. If you can't afford to feed your kids, then stop having them. That brings up a whole other bag of issues about education and birth control and social inequality. OK. Breathe. Anger subsided.

Then it came back! Damnit! I got pissed because so many families are working poor and just can't afford to put more than junk food on the table, so they have to rely upon food banks. Even then, they usually get a bag of groceries a month, nothing to sneeze at if you have nothing, but if you've seen what people get from a food bank you may not be that impressed.  Once in a while, a food bank might have fresh produce and if you're a client that's the day you want to be there, clamoring for a few fresh apples.

And I've let food spoil in the fridge and had to discard it, throwing money away. 

Then I got pissed at myself and threw away the mailing.

I don't want to think about the little kids who need bags of food for themselves on the weekends and in the summertime because their parents can't afford to or just don't feed them well. I don't want to imagine the children's older siblings or parents stealing their backpack food. I don't want to think about children who live in my neighborhood going hungry on the weekends. I just don't.

How 9/11 Made Me Stronger

I was 34 and working as a middle manager at a really cool publishing company. I'd loved working there for over a decade but my job was starting to get on my last nerve. Too many reorganizations during those last couple of years wore me down. Yet I had finally gotten to a place where I really, really loved my job. But of course that didn't last. With more changes I became disappointed. The place had started to feel like the movie Office Space. I was starting to act like Lundberg.

In August of 2001, I took a really fun girls' trip to California. That was the last time I would ever travel without feeling totally stressed out.

Bring Down the Headcount

At 8:30 AM on 9/11/01, I went to a meeting in our Human Resources department with other managers. Our charge was to bring down the headcount of a few departments.  So we sat around the table talking about each person on our lists.

My immediate boss, who I adored, walked in a little late. She said, "Sorry I'm late, but I just heard on the news, a plane hit the World Trade Center."  A few of us asked "What size plane?" because a few years back a small plane had hit one of the buildings so we assumed it was another little one with little consequence. She said, "I don't know."  The H.R. director kept us on task.

Close the Door

Then, an assistant opened the door to the room to notify us that another plane had hit the second tower of the WTC. With the meeting room's door open, we heard the rising chatter out in the maze of cubicles. She was told to close the door and we were asked to focus again on our layoff lists. I started to get nervous. Our New York office called into the meeting, and we asked him how things were going, and he said, "Everything is fine...now, how's it going with the layoffs?" 

Yeah, that would never happen now. We'd all check our texts and Twitter to get the real scoop instantly. Also, if this happened now, I wouldn't stay in that room.

The VP of HR came in around 10:00 after we had submitted our list of layoffs. He briefed us on what was going on in the world, and said we'd best be hustling back to our departments.

Losing Control

Some of the higher-level managers were being hard-nosed, urging people to keep working, yet slowly realizing that they were losing control. The staff pretended to work while checking in on their loved ones. I talked to a few team members who were so upset because they couldn't locate, for example, a brother who worked at the Pentagon.

I had to connect with what was happening, so I went to the conference room where the TV was on, and I watched one tower collapse, live. I couldn't even grasp the human tragedy. I said, "Is this real?"

On one side of me, someone said, "We're going to war."  on the other side, someone yelled, "I HAVE A MEETING IN HERE THAT WILL START IN 5 MINUTES SO YOU HAVE TO CLEAR THE ROOM AND TURN OFF THE TV."

Like nothing was more important than a fucking meeting about finances at that very moment.

Everyone has a story

I don't remember much more about the immediate aftermath, beyond the media saturation and hundreds of obituaries and American flags and U2's All That You Can't Leave Behind. 

In subsequent weeks something clicked. I realized that I was on running on a treadmill in a job where I allowed myself to work too stressfully, and that I had no idea what was outside my own front door. Life was short and could be taken at any moment. My job position was changed and I hated it.  I had been transferred to a new boss. I figured I would be next on the layoff list and I didn't think I'd be able to handle that kind of rejection.

I was clashing with a new bitchy co-worker in the office next door to mine and we'd have arguments after the rest of the staff left for the night. We slammed our doors after talking to each other. Real mature.

Bitches and blowjobs

During one of our arguments she stopped me and said, "You know what? You don't belong here. You should go work for a non-profit." 

Bitch was right. What happened in the aftermath of 9/11 made me realize that I needed to be connected to a mission and I needed to see in front of my face how lives could be changed. Mostly I needed to change my own life. I needed to slow it down. I needed to know what was going on in the world and not be in a closed meeting, ever again.

That bitchy broad and I resigned within two weeks of each other. I was not invited to her going-away party. My going-away party was WAY more AWESOME than I heard hers was. Mine involved blowjob shots and a karaoke after-party.

Balls!

I dove  into a non-managerial position at a non-profit arts organization, for a small fraction of the compensation I had been earning. I was so proud of myself, and convinced I could do it and live on less (even though Salty D. disagreed with me.) At that time in my life, my job defined me. I felt better defined. I was ballsy and fearless and did things I never thought I would do. It was my first big career change.

I mean, eventually, that new job turned to shit because everything will come to suck in time. And working at a little non-profit vs. a bigger for-profit doesn't really matter to me now.  Also, I should clarify that working for a non-profit definitely does not slow you down.  But during 2002 it was like a new dawn breaking. I felt nourished. I had a fighting spirit. I grew closer to my family. I suddenly cared about protecting my freedom.

So what's your deal?

My story is unremarkable, but it's my story. What's yours? Comment or post a link to your blog post in the comments.

End of longest blog post ever.

Next in this series:  How 9/11 Made Me Weaker.  Lest you think I'm lauding the catalyst of September 11.

Somebody get me a Bomb Pop.

  

I quickly snapped this pic at Fort McHenry in Baltimore on Memorial Day while walking through the entrace to the preserved fort. It was a brilliant, hot day.

When D. asked the hotel front desk clerk how to get to Fort McHenry, she said, "I don't even know what Fort McHenry is. Isn't that the tunnel?"  Her co-worker said, "No, Fort McHenry is where that national anthem thing was written. You know, what we're famous for?"

In the Fort's visitor center, the story of the battle and the 1812 war and Francis Scott Key's inspiration for the song was all laid out in a really good multi-media exhibit which culminated in a video projected on a screen that, at the end, rose to reveal a breathtaking view through the huge glass window looking up directly at the replica of the Star-Spangled Banner waving over the historic Fort, while the anthem was playing. 

And I lost it.

A decade or so ago I would have called this display kinda schmaltzy. But, as I've gotten older, displays of national pride really stab me in the heart. It's a very emotional response. Even at sporting events I get misty-eyed during the national anthem. If there's a military flyover, forget it. I'm done.

The whole bit about the flag still being there after all the destruction and danger and through all the fear, and being a symbol of everything good about this country, knocks me on my ass.

I think about the iconic pictures of raising the flag (at Iwo Jima, or on the pile that was the World Trade Center) and amazing performances of the anthem, like Hendrix at Woodstock.  But mostly I think about the people who have not shown fear, who have fought hard-won wars. I think about my ancestors in the Revolutionary War, on up to the young wounded soldiers coming home from Afghanistan.  Often I feel like a coward because I've never fought that hard for anything that means so much.

All of this is almost bigger than I can grasp.

It's so easy to be cynical. It's hard to be true to the red, white and blue, especially today. I get that. But here's me now, a bleeding-heart flag-loving proud and thankful American.

Bear in the City

 

You've seen this commercial, right? The first time I saw it, I cried. Boo hoo, we're killing the polar bears!

Seriously, tears.

Then I envisioned a different ending for the commercial, one where the formidable bear, who by this time is starving and dehydrated from his trip, rips the guy in half with his giant paws and then bites off his head.

But it worked. It was the first I'd heard of this car. Then I thought, who wants to drive a LEAF?

The Washington Post agrees with me.

"Wyclef Jean's Yele Haiti Foundation Under Fiscal Scrutiny"

"Hugh Locke, president of Yele Haiti, said the charity does what others can't, because Jean gives it unusual access to the country's slums. He said the group hopes to spend a higher percentage of its budget on services as it gains experience. "I think people should be very comfortable that any money given to Yele Haiti is going 100 percent to emergency relief." " (Washington Post 1/16)

That said, the fact that a new charity has to "gain experience" in this huge, unwieldy disaster, does not instill confidence.  And yet we should be "very comfortable ..."

Yele is being SO aggressive and getting SUCH good results from fundraising, and utilizing Jean's fame and connection to the real Haiti that perhaps they should grant some of the millions raised to other groups that have the experience to work in this situation, instead of learning as they go. They need to tell us why we should be comfortable with what they're doing on the ground. Are they working in conjunction with the Red Cross or another agency?  I hope the agencies get it together. A unified effort, overseen by....?

Salty D. just popped into the office to tell me he watched Ben Stein on "some tv channel" (so yeah thanks I can't find it to link to.)  Ben stressed that regardless of how corrupt the Haitian government is, Haiti is one of the poorest nations on earth, and the victims of this disaster are human beings and Haiti deserves all of our support.

I'm trying not to watch too much video. It's more important to act than to watch.

But I quickly read this and, it's just unfathomable.

Do you trust Wyclef Jean?

The Smoking Gun has posted this and then an update about the Wyclef Jean Foundation, d/b/a Yele Foundation. 

Wyclef has been cleaning the dead from the streets of Port au Prince and giving real time accounts of events in Haiti, on Twitter you're just hammered with his updates that are retweeted like crazy: 

PPL OF HAITI NEED YOUR SUPPORT PLEASE TEXT YELE TO 501 NOW AND $5 WILL GO TOWARD EARTHQUAKE RELIEF. 200,000+ HAVE DIED WE NEED U

Presumably the money would be used to purchase supplies and labor and run programs to help Haiti recover.

I don't doubt for a second that Wyclef is doing right by his country, that his family is purely committed, that his heart is breaking and needs all the strength and resources he can muster. But do you trust that your money will be handled with care?  Don't just say "Well, it's only five bucks, the cost of a venti latte." They aim to raise $20 million through this campaign, and with a $1 million donation from the Jolie-Pitts and possibly $3 million from Tiger Woods, and the upcoming telethons and celeb hype, they're sure to surpass $20 million.

The Smoking Gun's report, a perspective with which I don't entirely agree, reminds me

#sadness #death #compassion #anger #twitter

On Monday afternoon, I saw this tweet:

"Please pray like never before, my 2 yr old fell in the pool" written by "military_mom" and retweeted by a "dear friend."

Holy shit!  What did that mean, I thought?  Did the 2 yr old just fall in the pool? Did he fall in the pool earlier that day and hurt himself? Did he drown?  Tragically, sadly, the boy drowned.  The mom later posted a couple of photos of her "million-dollar baby" and there were countless tweets back to her of prayers, condolences and RIPs.

This was awful. I felt like I witnessed the accident myself.  I certainly witnessed the outpouring of emotion, in spurts of 140 characters or less. Not once did I doubt that this woman had lost a child.

Bah... whatever

What I love about Christmastime is the brightness in the air as we "welcome" winter, the serenity of the cool night air, the potential for a really big snowstorm to shut down the city, the smell of woodsmoke from open fires (not from house fires caused by dried out lit up xmas tress), A Charlie Brown Christmas, Christmas cookies and drinks, kids running around with joy but not screaming too loudly.

Each year the joys get eclipsed more and more for me.  For you? 

Life in December, even for me, without kids and without major decorating, feels overwhelming. A trip to Bed Bath and Beyond this past weekend sent me to the great beyond with its tall displays of overly odorous candles and endless supplies of turkey basters and Keurig coffeemakers.  Everywhere you look, it's GREAT GIFT IDEA! GREAT GIFT IDEA!  I suddenly wanted a designer Snuggie and added it to the mental list I still make for Santa every year in my head.

Now it's time for the onslaught of "year-end meetings" for work, and then family obligations since I celebrate two holidays in December, and really these wouldn't be bad at all if it weren't for the PANIC around me. And I'm really, really bad with buying presents. My gifts are either lame, or like my mother's: theme gifts. I'm much better giving random gifts at random times of the year. Snuggies and Chia Pets for everyone!

I think it's also escalated for me because I live in CHRISTMAS CITY USA. There are 5 action-packed weeks of all-Christmas, all the time events, all around me. Almost all involving canned music and bright lights.  At least I no longer work at the theatre where we had Christmas show...EVERY DAY OR NIGHT FOR THREE WEEKS.

The saddest commercial-christmas thing I saw, at WalMart (serves me right!) is a pre-packaged artificial Charlie Brown Christmas Tree. Come on. Charles Shultz is rolling in his grave.  You're supposed to find a tree like that by trolling through the xmas tree lots!  Fake trees should be perfect or fancy or tacky. That really hum-bugged me. Bah! It misses the whole point of the Peanuts philosophy!!

Still, I like to do things for other people who are in need of comfort and joy during the holidays.  People who miss their families or who care more about the original meaning of Christmas than I.

One thing I'm going to do - because I don't know anyone in the armed forces but this is always a hard time especially for injured soldiers, is send a Christmas card (I don't really do those anymore either but I will for them):

A Recovering American Soldier

c/o Walter Reed Army Medical Center

No, no, no - don't do that. A real friend told me to do that and I trusted her. Instead - and you probably already know this because I'm slow - send mail to the Holiday Mail for Heroes program and follow the explicit directions.  I did. 

 
It's almost enough to melt any cynical heart.