(no subject)
tmht, darklyght, and drunah at the Flying Fish in the River Market
This morning on the way into work, I saw my refugee friends off. Denise, Terry, Romeo, and Ophelia are on their way to San Diego by way of Austin, El Paso, and Phoenix. Charron, Sumo, and Molly are on their way to Florida by way of North Carolina. All of them were very considerate house guests, and all things considered, were pretty good company. We frequently remarked that it would have been more ideal to meet for the first time under different circumstances, but I was just glad to have a place for them to go. I have a sinking feeling that my trip to visit them in October may not happen now, but we shall see.
I know it is kind of cliché to say, but this experience really helped put a lot of things into perspective for me. As someone who is admittedly quite self-centered, I was surrounded on all sides by real toil and strife, and it made the problems that I have had seem much less significant by comparison. At this point, I realize that I don't have shit to complain about. My life right now is really not that bad.
The other thing that was most interesting was the circumstances under which we all met. Certainly far from ideal, but definitely interesting. Quite often, I felt guilty about the fact that I had the ringside seat to watch them deal with their not insignificant emotional duress. This is a private issue that should be handled between family and close friends, and I'm not really either one...kind of puts you in a rough spot. I do feel as though I got a really good glimpse at who they all really are by sheer virtue of the amount of pure duress that they were all under, but if I had my druthers about me, I would have preferred to catch them when spirits are higher. I applaud each of them for still having a sense of humor under these rather unfortunate circumstances, but if I were a betting man, I'd say that they are all a lot more fun when they have less on their mind.
It was interesting to see how they reacted to their dealings with the locals, and for some reason, they seemed to have a real dipshit magnetism. Here are some actual quotes that they heard from retail employees in central arkansas:
"You lost your house, huh? I remember when we got a real heavy rain here."
"You lost your house? That's terrible. We lost 5 stores down there."
One of the things that I learned from having a high-strung girlfriend (as well as many years in teaching and retail) is that it's best not to open your mouth unless you know it's going to help. I apologized on behalf of the dipshits that they encountered, and offered my apologies on behalf of the locals.
I actually have a number of other thoughts right now, but it's going to take some time to process all of the things that I have experienced over the last few days. And right now, the things that I think don't seem to be all that important. Rescuers are shoving dead bodies aside to get to people who have been on their rooftops for 2 or 3 days now, and the national guard is too busy rescuing people to deal with looters. And all the king's horses and all the king's men can't seem to get much done about the levees right now.
Not to mention that our president had to cut his vacation short.