I wrote this yesterday and fell asleep before posting it:

For myriad reasons, I've been especially weepy-feeling today; there was the nasty spill I took walking back to Darren's house last night that has left me with a rather large bruise on each knee, a bruise on my left kneecap, and a splotchy purple region on my upper thigh from where the various peaks and valleys of the mountainous terrain that is a New Orleans "sidewalk" met my falling leg. Then there's something that happened yesterday that should probably be embarrasing, maybe even mortifying, but being who I am I refused to succumb to the pointless emotion of embarrassment. There's when I just dropped my soda while walking back to our table at the bar where we watched the Steelers romp all over Denver, as if my fingers decided at that very moment to boycott my dictatorship over their daily actions.

In any case, driving home tonight from the Bourbon House, a famous New Orleans French Quarter restuarant where a group of us took a potential new hire to dinner, I took Canal street with the thought that I was already on the east side of town and it'd be easier than going back to I-10. The magnitude of impact Katrina has wreaked on the residents of Lakeview and Midcity - not to mention the even more devastated ninth ward - finally dawned on me as I realized just how many lights are still gone from windows that are still streaked with the grime 7 feet of water leaves behind. Aside from the vegetative debris that has, for the most part, been removed, the area looks EXACTLY the same as it did four months ago.

Every squalid, dark building I passed suddenly meant something to me: each building represented at least one individual's life that has been forever altered, one human face that isn't able to soak in life, life's sun from their favorite window here. And I realized that everywhere, EVERYWHERE in the world, EVERYONE has something to be sad about, their own personal tragedy to discover and then spend the better part of the rest of their lives living to cope, overcome, and smile. In its normal, cyclic internal dialog, my mind thought about how this is how people can care enough to affect change - that each person has some personal drive for some personal cause that is impetus enough for them to make a difference.

This I Believe, that everyone has their own personal tragedy and when it's your own, it's the most important, pressing, challenging experience. I may not face the tragedies of hunger, family absence, or drug abuse, but I've come to accept that my own struggles are MINE, for me to figure out, revel in, and learn from; I can't feel guilty for sharing my minor, petty, average problems for fear that they shouldn't matter to my friends; my friends care because they're MINE (the problems, not the friends), not because they're drastic or terrifying or unique.

Tonight

It's not fair for you to flirt with me if you know that you don't like me.

IA, thanks for trusting me to talk. You always continue to amaze me :)

M, I've never stopped thinking of you as a friend. Everyay. Ouyay areyaya orfay everyay appedwray inyay anymay ofyay ymay ondfay estyay emay oryay iesyay. Are you still in FL?