By the way, once I do return, I will probably be using this blog as a forum to announce that I will be a candidate for the Libertarian Presidential nomination in 2008.
This might be my last post for a while. For reasons that are nobody's business but my own, I may not be able to update this blog for a while. I can't say for sure just yet. However, that does not mean that I am abandoning this blog. I will return to it and continue updating it with my usual collection of thoughts and egocentric observations as soon as possible. However, I can't give an exact date on when that will be. However, before I bid a temporary farewell, I want to address three people -- AJF, Shannon, and Priestess -- who may be reading these words right now.
In reverse order--
Priestess, you are truly one of the most talented people I have ever had the pleasure to communicate with. Don't ever forget or doubt that.
Shannon, I hope that your current silence on the blog front will be as temporary as mine. You posess far too intelligent and witty a voice not to use it.
And lastly, AJF -- what can I say? There's a lot I wish I had said to you over the past couple of years but I didn't. So, I'll just say it now and I know this is terribly self-centered and narcisstic on my part but, in the end, you know that's the type of person I am. I loved you, I love you, and I always will love you. I didn't love you because you were perfect or because you were available or because you told me that I was capable of wonderful things. I loved you because you were (and are) AJF and, for me, that transcends politics and it transcends arts and it transcends everything else that people seem to base relationships on. I'm not saying this in an attempt to change the past or to shape the future. Things are what they are and we've all made the choices that we've made. I'm saying this because the fact of the matter is that I continue to love you. I wish you all the best in the future and I do sincerely believe that you'll be very happy in your current situation but, truth be told, you would have eventually been happier with me. Or perhaps not, who can say? Truth of the matter is, you don't have the right temperment to be a Libertarian and I sure as Hell will never be a Marxist but then again, all of this political rhetoric that we've engaged in, it's all bullshit in the end, isn't it? It's a convenient way to deal with our own insecurities; covering them up with ideology. Once you've rejected religion, what other choice do you have? And again, it's all bullshit because I love you regardless of how you vote.
As for me, I've always lived life as a series of cycles. Every four or five years or so, it's time to abandon everything and start a new cycle from scratch and that's what I'm about to do. I don't know where it's going to take me but that's the whole point. All I know is that I'll be writing about it. Currently, I have completed probably about a fourth of
Oswald Acted Alone, my follow up to
It's Impossible To Start A Fire, and I am also still working on my novel
In God's Country. Regardless of what else may be going on in my life, I will be sure to use this blog as the first place to announce their eventual completion.
Until I return, God bless and be safe.
Rich Lowry is one of my favorite commentators and, as usual, he has written a column that expresses my feelings on New Orleans far more eloquently and intelligently than I could hope to do.
Click here to read it.
For the past week, my thoughts -- and the thoughts of most of the country -- have centered on the aftermath of Katrina and what (premature though the conclusion may be) appears to be the death of New Orleans.
And as I sit here at my computer, I really don't know what to say. What can I -- or anyone -- say about this latest disaster? It's easy for me to say that things are going to get better because I live in Dallas, Texas. We don't get hurricanes or earthquakes or volcanic eruptions here in Dallas. The most we ever have to worry about is the occasional tornado. I do have family in Louisiana but not in New Orleans. I've lost nothing so who the Hell am I to tell people who have that things are going to get better?
Do I tell you that my prayers are with you? What good are tonight's prayers going to do for people who -- as I type this -- have nowhere to go? Are my prayers going to bring any comfort or rescue to those still trapped in New Orleans?
Do I mention that I've given money to the Red Cross or that, earlier today, I talked my store manager into donating a couple of pallettes of drinking water to Katrina's victims? All of my good intentions aren't going to bring back all that's been lost.
There is nothing I can say about Katrina. Looking at the devastation on the news (while sitting so safely in my home), I can't help but think about those first 24 hours after the World Trade Center was attacked when no one could truly say they knew what the future held for us as a nation. It's overwhelming and it leaves me feeling ashamed for every time I've bitched about petty problems.
The difference between Katrina and 9-11 is that, in the aftermath of 9-11, we had a common enemy. We knew who was responsible and we united in our hatred of the terrorists, our thirst to see them pay for the destruction they had let loose and the lives they had ended. But with Katrina, we don't have any terrorists to bomb in retaliation. Katrina was an act of God and how do you declare war on God? As a result, it seems that people are turning on each other. If 9-11 brought out the best of America (and, no, don't waste my time with any of that "America is an Imperialist Nation" bullshit -- if you think the 9-11 attacks can be justified on the basis of some economic/political theory, then you've got problems that go far beyond ideology), it seems that Katrina may be bringing out the worst.
I think that's the most frustrating thing about Katrina. There's no reason or logic behind it. We knew why the World Trade Center was attacked on Sept. 11th. But Katrina simply happened because it did. There's no reason or deeper meaning behind it. If anything, Katrina was just a random fluke; a random fluke that has destroyed far more than any random fluke ever should.
There are some, I'm sure, who will try to find some deeper meaning behind Katrina's destruction. Some people of a certain religious leaning will claim that Katrina is a devine punishment on a nation that has moved away from God. And to them, I would ask why it is that religious fundamentalists always seem to stop reading the Bible about halfway through the Old Testament.
And some people will claim that Katrina is nature's punishment. We didn't sign the latest global warming treaty and now we're paying the reaper. And to them, I would remind them that the Earth has no idea which treaty has or has not been ratified. These environmentalists seem to have replaced the fundamentalist concept of a vengeful God with Mother Nature on her period.
And some people will do the same thing they did after 9-11 and claim that, regardless of why it happened, America is getting what it deserves for being a capitalist, imperialist nation with a Republican-dominated government. And to them, I would say "Go fuck yourself, you self-righteous piece of shit." The whole idea that the suffering of thousands of innocent people can be justified on the basis of any sort of sociological/political/economic theory just leaves me wondering why it is that those who claim to be working for humanity almost always seem to be the most inhuman of us all.
(And, sorry my fellow anti-war bloggers, but even if we'd never invaded Iraq, Katrina would have remained the same disaster that it is today.)
And I still don't know what to say to the actual victims of Katrina.
For now, anyway, words are meaningless.
View my Guestbook
