hope
He Held Their Lives in His Tiny Hands – Los Angeles Times
Hopefully, more families will be reunited.
ETA: Even the homeless are trying to help the victims of Katrina. This boggles my mind, in a good way.
matching donations
Seppo’s company is matching 2:1. If you want me to donate on your behalf, let me know tonight and you can send me a check. I will cover your donation for now.
Trapped in an Arena of Suffering – Los Angeles Times
Trapped in an Arena of Suffering – Los Angeles Times
The story of the man who played the violin in the midst of the horror finally broke me down. It’s on the second page.
It’s really dire. The time to act is now. Send your donations now and probably again in a week or so. And volunteer if you can. Much kudos to the emergency medical workers and firefighters and police.
help
Atrios has links describing the horror of what is going on in the wake of the hurricane.
Seppo’s work has donation matching, so donate through him if you know him. Otherwise, donate directly through Red Cross or indirectly though Liberal Blogs for Hurricane Relief (this also goes to Red Cross but gets bundled up). I know what I wrote before, but get the hell off your asses if you haven’t donated yet and make a donation. Almost everyone I know that reads this blog is a yuppy, just like me. I KNOW you have disposeable income. Pony up and save some people’s lives. Do it NOW. There is absolutely NO excuse. Don’t be a selfish bastard. People are going without food and water. Old people and children, the least resilient of the population, are dying. People are sleeping in sitting water and among feces. They have a shortage of clean bandages and do not have running water to keep the sick under sanitary conditions. This is not ok.
Just this morning on the radio, I heard of a diabetic woman trying to get into a drugstore to try to get test strips. She was afraid that she would be arrested but went in after she was told she wouldn’t be arrested. I heard of a woman weeping uncontrollably as she scoured for baby supplies and food, terrified her kids were going to die. A man was interviewed while carrying out some soap and toothpaste and he reassured the reporters that he wasn’t taking anything to get drunk or high off on. It’s devastating that people are reduced to this, and because of the fact that there ARE reckless selfish looters taking material goods unrelated to survival, this man had to actively distinguish himself from them. (With so much sewage in the streets, soap is actually going to be pretty important to keep baterial illnesses at bay and to keep from spreading disease. Although without clean water, I don’t know what they are going to do.)
I have no tolerance for looters who are trying to get drugs or jewelry and shooting up people and fighting in the horror of what is going on. I cannot fathom what makes people do this when people are dying left and right. But I have absolutely no condemnation for people who are starving and thirsty who are trying to rescue whatever perishables from flooded and destroyed stores before everything rots, if it hasn’t already. It is clear that people have been left in dire straits for days, and first you have to live. I know that if I didn’t try to keep my family alive and fed through this type of situation, I would feel like a failure as a human being.
ETA: The stories pouring in are utterly terrifying and heartbreaking. I read about bartering for what bits of food and little water there is. At that point, I STILL don’t condone violence in ANY way, shape, or form, but if some people are desperately looting NOT for personal material gain, but with hopes that they can find something to barter with for food for themselves and family, shit, what the hell do I say to that? What kind of right do I have to condemn them? What would I do? Some of Lindsi’s friends are stuck there as well. I wish them well and quick rescue, as well as for everyone else.
ETA again: I keep going back and forth on this, but damn, the looting. I have to answer my own question and say that I would still not take anything that wasn’t food and perishable. If the item was going to be ruined in the next few days (and not because someone else is gonna take it anyway), then I would take it. If I’m trying to just keep myself alive, I would try to get food in whatever way possible that does not include hurting other people. I wouldn’t take things that the owners may be able to use for long-term recovery.
I think I didn’t adequately understand how terrible things were until yesterday. And it’s simply mind-numbing. Please contact your companies/employers and see if they have some sort of donation matching. People desperately need your help.
fumbling for answers
Not as good as fumbling for other things *cough* but not so bad, over all.
Seppo suggested that since I love singing so much even though I suck (he didn’t say the suck part, which was kind of him), maybe I would get a kick out of singing lessons. I think I might have to think about it. It is certainly intriguing.
I’ve been wondering why I have been less motivated at work lately, and have wondered if I was burning out or putting myself on a project that I won’t enjoy, but after extensive talks with Seppo, I think it’s just that I’m a little stuck now and feeling the bump in the road. I think once I get myself past this one bump, I’ll be totally rocking the project.
It’s good to get a clearer light on your path from talking to your beloved. 🙂 He’s pretty damn wonderful.
American Red Cross – Preparing for and Responding to Hurricane Katrina
American Red Cross – Preparing for and Responding to Hurricane Katrina
Make a donation if you can (and want to — heh). You can surely skip out on your overpriced coffee or morning donut for a few weeks, neh? (Well, you can keep your antioxidant-rich coffee. How about giving up smoking for a few weeks?) Or maybe that novel/movie/video game you were gonna get. That can probably wait. Uh… unless you were buying books in order to gear up for NaNoWriMo… but I’m sure you can find some free resources.
Eh, I was gonna make some haranguing remark to try to guilt trip you, but that’s crap. Either you wanna and this is just a reminder, or you don’t and will do something else with your time and resources. And that’s fine too. We all have our own thing. So let’s all hang our and sing in a human chain around this tree that we call earth. *shoots self*
music
I thought I had a lot of INXS and Depeche Mode music, but my iPod tells me otherwise. How sad. It might be time for an iTunes bender.
fingers crossed
Today, my sister and my brother-in-law are having their final immigration interview in Korea. Well, it’s 8/30/2005, but that’s already today because of the timezone business. And it’s also only really for the brother-in-law, since my sis and their two kids are all US citizens.
I hope it goes well! With any luck, my sis and fam will be in the US by Christmas.
tenacity and courage
I think that generally, people don’t quite understand what it means to be tenacious. I think a similar confusion exists with the meaning of courageous. Via A_B, I read an article about people who were not fleeing from Hurricane Katrina. Read this particularly frustrating blurb:
“My son’s having a fit,” the 56-year-old real estate agent said as she drove to Matassa’s Market for some last-minute provisions. “We’re kind of a different breed of people down here, people in the Quarter. Heck, if we can put up with Mardi Gras, we can put up with a hurricane.”
These few people seem to believe that they are displaying an admirable tenacity — standing their ground and refusing to give up. But it’s not tenacity. It’s just plain stupidity/stubbornness. And I don’t say that to insult people; I say that because I am frustrated and saddened at the fate these people are likely to face. It’s not like their reactions can change the path or outcome of the hurricane. I think they believe they are doing an admirable thing, and it just tears out my heart.
Please people, go somewhere you know you will stay alive. Think of your family and friends. Property is property — no amount of history and memories is worth your life, especially when losing said life will have no impact whatsoever on your property. There is no action they can take to save their houses, so they should act on the variable they DO have control over, which is saving themselves.
On a related thought, many people think being brave or courageous is the same as being fearless or unafraid. I strongly disagree. Being brave is knowing exactly how terrifying something will be and standing strong and taking action despite the almost-paralyzing fear. To be fearless is to be either stupid or apathetic to the consequences. I learned this from watching movies. 😉