Goodbye 2004.

I think I have started and deleted this post a million times. I've tried to figure out how to sum up this year and I come up with something funny or something and then I turn on the news. Then I come back and delete this.

To say that I find the whole Tsunami and it's aftermath, human, political etc, upsetting would be to understate. I guess the things that bother me the most in this world are those that happen to normal people just going about their shit, minding their own business. I mean, soldiers dying upset me, especially when I judge that they are engaged in something that makes no sense, but soldiers are painfully aware that they have entered into a contract of unlimited liability when they join up. Even car crashes and things like that bother me less for some reason.

Since we had Lucas I find images of dead or hurt children almost unbearable to watch. But I have always felt that at the very least those of us in the affluent West must bear witness, even vicariously through the TV. So I sit, with tears running down my face, watching hour after hour of people finding and burying their loved ones. And it burns. I've spent the week wishing I had lots and lots of money or that I had a skill that was needed in the disaster area. I have neither.

We've pretty much figured out our budget (tight as it is) so we can give a donation to Médecins Sans Frontières, in part because they are the SWAT team of aid and in part because there seems to be tons of stuff flowing into Sri Lanka and not as much into Indonesia, where MSF has a lot of assets. It will be so little a donation as to be foolish, but I suppose that in the weeks, months and years to come every little bit counts.

I'll post a seperate year end wrap up from home in a couple of hours, Lucas permitting (he has a fever).