got gnome-session working in gnome 2.0 finally. it was some stupid threading stuff - sigh.
nat has some pretty dramatic accounts of yesterday and today, and i feel compelled (not in reaction to his stuff - but in an effort to preserve some of the things i'm feeling for a later day when i'll read this) to document some of my thoughts. or maybe someone will read this and offer me a book deal. but probably not, since it's pretty boring. so i reccommend that you stop here, unless you are really bored. i will be the first to admit to its gaping lack of content.
so anyway, yesterday morning i was awoken by my phone ringing - it was my mother making sure i was ok. apparently my sister was worried since the flights originated in boston, and they don't share the certainty i have that nothing tragic will ever happen to me. in retrospect, it seems pretty odd how i reacted, especially when contrasted with nat's story. i might have stayed in bed a bit longer, then took a shower, then plopped down to play some GT3. joe had been listening to the radio and told me some more details, but i guess i basically just accepted it really easily, not shocked at all. i did think it weird, but expected things to get back to normal after a brief period of panic, mourning, and prevention.
around 11:30 or noonish i then went to work, and there were a bunch of closed stores. our office building was closed, but they eventually let me in after a bit. i went in, and tried to work, but everyone talking about stuff on irc and reading stuff on cnn made me unable to concentrate on work. i must have only gotten through like 5 emails (if that) before i left work headed to the park.
restrospectively, i felt similar to earlier this year when there was the "huge" snow "storm" and i walked home and rode my bike back. it was a feeling of being disconnected to the rest of the world - as if what happened there couldn't really change my life.
i walked to copley square (where today the fbi raided a hotel or something) because that's where the john hancock tower is, and i figured there would be police and stuff all around. this wasn't the case, but there were security people at the door of most of the buildings i walked past. i walked around the building, looking up trying to imagine a plane flying into it (i hadn't seen any of the videos, or tv yet). the building reflected the clear blue sky (free of vapour trails) in the beautiful way it always does. as a walked on the front side, there were 5 or 6 people lowering the flag in the front to half mast (i wished i had a camera).
there were some news vans around, but nothing really interesting to see, so i went to the park. in a way i wanted to find chaos - people panicking and fearing, so that i could defy it. this is not unlike when i cross arlington street at its intersection with newbury. there is a crosswalk, but no lights or stop signs, and people are always standing there waiting to cross. i like to boldly step out into the street, with my large headphones on, appearing to be totally unaware of the oncoming traffic. this works to my advantage, as the drivers usually back down very easily. it usually produces a nice adrenalin rush, though.
anyway, i walked to the park but things were pretty calm. there were people sunbathing and sleeping and reading on the grass, whilst others fed the geese, ducks, and pigeons. i went and sat in one grassy spot, and finished reading choke. at one point, i heard some sirens so took my headphones off and looked around, and heard the sound of fighter jets. there were people looking to the sky, and i looked around for a minute or two and couldn't see any. a few minutes later, i saw (i think) an f-15 fly overhead. the plane rolled until its wings were vertical, then turned to the left. the apparent
[ overheard at algiers as i switched cds: "party of five totally sold out when..." fortunately "everything is wrong" drowned out the important part of this statement. ]
anyway i eventually got home, and did some laundry and got some food at a nearby pizza place. i also had some really good ice cream.
i felt like an empty shell - almost totally devoid of rational emotions as to what happened. for some reason, i cannot feel grief at the news of death of people. i really don't know why this is. it makes me feel like a bad person, because even right now i feel in awe of the power possessed by the few who could cause so much panic and chaos for so many. and maybe contempt for those who felt safe in their american shell. i remember thinking last thursday, when i flew to red hat, how lax security was since nothing had happened in quite a while. thinking back on that, i feel a bit spooked out.
regardless, i can't feel the grief that i know nat, joe, and my mother can feel at news of the day's events. there were a bunch of people at the cave, but joining them would just cause them to get upset at me. it's the same as this summer when i found out that one of my friends from high school's mother had died - "oh," is all i can say. i dread the day i have to go to a funeral, because i will feel like a bad person because i can't even hide the fact that i don't feel all that sad at the news of someone dying. maybe it's because nobody close to me has ever died. and sitting here writing this, i can imagine you reading this, thinking what a horrible person i am.
so at some point i must have been totally desensitized to death. i think about things that have happened, such as atomic bombs, the plague, the holocost, i can't help but feel that death is just something that happens to people, and i feel that i can accept that and that it is not a tragic thing for someone to die - it is, to put it romantically, their destiny. i guess the moral here is that it's much better (or productive, even) to cherish the ones you love whilst you are both alive, than for either of you to grieve after the other has died. but, like i said, nobody close to me has ever died. as horrible as it may sound, in a way i envy the people involved in the tragedy - either the people in the planes or buildings waiting for their inevitable death, or the people who have lost loved ones, because they are feeling emotions that i can't.
"i have a kind of sick desperation about me," isn't the right phrase, but it's the first that comes to mind.
so i've been dealing with these emotions - the fear that i am a "bad" person, and also feeling bad that i am thinking about myself and these things while there are others who are really suffering, and wondering how to deal with them. since i couldn't go to the cave, i decided i'd visit algiers so that i could see a friendly face or two. since i finished choke, i needed a new book to read so grabbed naked from joe's room. i don't remember which cd i listened to on the t, but reading and listening to music keeps my brain diverted enough to forget being upset, and lets me be more happy. which is a weird thing, and i can't explain it, but in the past two weeks or so some of the most happy moments have come while reading books. it's too bad i i didn't discover this until now, and i hope that my knowledge of it won't decrease its effect.
anyway, mckinley, danila, and i ended up at charlie's, which was pretty surreal. the juke box was off, and all the tvs were tuned to the news. it was pretty quiet, and everybody was pretty much perplexed at what to think of the day's events. or maybe it was just me projecting my feelings onto everyone (i doubt this though).
someone at work earlier was saying how they couldn't believe that there were people in the middle east celebrating the attacks. i can only think of the mccarthy trials, the japanese detention camps here during wwii, slavery, the witch hunts... the us isn't hasn't been the totally good entity that people pretend it is. there is a growing (and accepted) racism in america today against arabs, and it is scary to witness it. the news of arabs being stoned in new york for no real reason is, to me, more tragic than innocent people losing their lives. but i guess i am just cynical that way.
today, nat was talking about how the gov't is lying about air force 1 being a target, and upset (i think) that the gov't would be lying about this. i was surprised at this, since i always assumed the gov't would lie about everything. but i guess i am just cynical that way.
and even bush saying how this is a fight between good and evil. how anyone can see this so one-sidedly is beyond me. the people behind this are people as much as anyone else - they think they are right as much as much as "we" consider ourselves right. they consider god on their side as much as we on ours. and realizing this, i feel like less of a horrible person.
so i guess i agree with moby - everything is wrong.
but maybe i'm just cynical that way.
anyway, time for charlie's.