Well my bitching at Sherman about his “I’ll leave when I find a place” stance seems to have had an effect. He will be paying rent through the end of August. So I need a roomie for the first of September? Any takers?
Categories
Month: June 2004
Categories
A Small Good
“The ladies papers are in order.”
The well-educated British voice brought me out of my daze. A hand extended from behind me with a fist full of money. Before me a soldier, wearing fatigues too large for him and holding an assault rifle, looked down at the money.
A moment before that soldier had tossed my papers to another man sitting at a table next to him and said in a thickly accented English, “your papers are not in order. Step over there.” He pointed the muzzle of his AK-47 to a small whitish building a few meters away. Three more men in fatigue’s stood or squatted, smoking, with rifles in hand. The three smiled and laughed when they saw their companion point.
“Take my hand.” The British accent came again. The wad of pounds pushed into the soldier’s hand. Not waiting for a reply he began to walk.
So I walked hand-in-hand across the border with the British man. Fleeing the days old bloody civil war.
I looked back to see the five soldier’s standing together yelling. The long line of refugees waiting to cross the border looking on. “Don’t look back,” my savior said squeezing my hand. I looked forward again, across the few meters of dead zone to another border check point. The guards there looked on. What a strange pair we must have made, a young blond American woman in cut-offs and a tee-shirt carrying an old duffel bag, and a British business man in a black suit with his briefcase, holding hands.
“Are you going to the airport,” he asked, nodding to this new country’s soldier’s as we passed through the checkpoint.
“Yes, uh…” was all I could manage
Never releasing my hand, my British savior guided me among the rows of buses and cars waiting to pick up refugees and ex-patriots fleeing the violence. “My company sent a driver,” he explained.
A few moments later we stood next to a green Land Rover. The driver tossed his cigarette into the dust and squeezed his eyebrows together as he opened the back door. The driver looked questioningly from me to the businessman as my savior took my duffel bag and handed it to him. “We’re going to the airport first,” the businessman said climbing into the back seat next to me, “then to the offices.”
Imagine standing in a crowded commuter train station at rush hour waiting for your train. Looking around you see an unusually high number of people on the platform wearing headphones. Lost in their own world. Nothing unusual about people listening to music on their commute, but there are so many of them today. Then, at precisely 6:58pm they all start to dance. At this point you would probably begin to question your sanity but it’s not a joke and it is real [ news.independent.co.uk ].
Categories
can’t go home again.
I went to C’ville for my sisters graduation. I was down there for three days and I don’t know anyone there anymore. I know of one person who lives there, I’ve only met them once but due to the lovely power of the Internet (and them having a website) I can stalk them online. I tried to make contact with them to have something to do on Saturday night. Nothing came of it. But on Saturday afternoon while I was out with my mother I bumped into two people from my past.
It’s been years since I even saw them. They were, quite possibly, my two best friends at the end of high school. After high school some stuff happened and I ended up loosing contact with all my high school friends. Bad blood. And these two—their love and my friendship—was at the heart of the conflict.
I stopped and said hello to them. I got the cold shoulder from one. He talked but never looked at me after I said hello. We only talked for a few minutes. They have two kids now and they did not even introduce me to them. I would like to talk to them, to find out what happened, what I did that started the bad blood. I’ve always wanted to find out.
We all had to get going, but as I turned to leave he said they should get my number. So she took it down. I asked what they were going to do for the night and she said she was going to head down to the club. I said to give me a call and I’d join them. I did not take their number because I’m not sure if they really want to hear from me, so I decided to await their call.
The phone never rang.
This afternoon on my way back to the District I stopped along 29 North and walked through the headstones till I came to Joe’s grave [ confusion.cc ]. There is a little square of granite, flush to the ground that has his name on it. I did not really stop to think why I was there. I didn’t stay long. But it was a beautiful evening, the sun going down, the birds singing. Peace. Rest in Peace.
Seeing them, and the disappointment of not getting the call caused me to do a lot of thinking. A lot of memories returned to the forefront of my thoughts. Memories not forgotten but put away long ago. I have a lot of questions that I would have liked to get answered. Let the water flow under the bridge and put right whatever I can that is still wrong. But the ball is in their court.
They know my number. The choice is theirs.
Most people get their news from TV. Problem is that in the past few years the regression from the idea of reporting the news back to the yellow journalism ideals of making up the news has greatly accelerated. Fox News had lead the blind charge (though all the other news networks have followed) and today the ‘news’ is just another battle ground between conservative bigots and bleeding heart liberals. It’s gotten so bad that you can’t even form an idea of what really happened in any event by watching both sides. Read this [ foxnews.com ] from The O’Reilly factor yesterday and you can see how inflammatory reporting has become. Even though O’Reilly’s comments where given as his and not the networks there was no attempt to have a counter argument from someone who disagrees—no “fair an balanced” reporting.