Death is Nothing Near, Nothing Here

It's a lovely morning, as almost all mornings are, or should be.

There's a little-known fact about me, that as much as I love and enjoy mornings, I am most anxious in the morning. Only those who live with me/have lived with me can attest. And now you, but maybe you should wait until we experience a morning together.

I wake up early, to shrug off the anxiety. I smoke approximately three cigarettes every morning, and drink three cups of coffee (give or take...mostly give). I read for a good hour or two. Then, typically, I shower and doll up for the day, and sometimes do dishes (when the clock permits).

I don't think this will be my always in the morning routine, but it's become this through summer and fall. I don't know what I'll do in the winter. I go ahead to smoke, and watch the day begin. I guess I'll really and truly have to be healthy, and exercise in the winter, to enjoy the great outdoors and still be warm.

I'm reading Strength in What Remains by Tracy Kidder. I hate to admit this, but I'm a little disappointed, in part because of the expectations I placed on the book (not the book, nor the author's fault). First, I thought Tracy was a girl. He is not. (And Tracy, I love the happenstance or deliberate circumstance when boys are named "girl's" names, and vice versa. So power to you.) It disappoints me that he's not a girl because I was looking forward to reading a woman's perspective on the events surrounding the Rwandan Genocide.

The writing is good, pure, straight non-fiction. It reminds me, in some ways, of Junger, though Junger has more bite.

The second great expectation I had for this book (a secret, now to be revealed!) is that this book would peak my interest again in topics of mass death, rape, and social awareness and zeal to bring awareness to these remote places of the human condition. However, it has not done this for me, most likely through no entire fault of its own. I feel really nothing. I'm almost finished with the book, and the nothingness is growing.

It's always awful to read about horrendous events and feel... nothing. It's alarming, in a subtly poisonous way. The Hutus and the Tutsis could easily be the Republicans and the Democrats, I try to tell myself, go for empathy, go for emotion. And yes, if things had happened differently, that could be. Why not? But I still feel nothing.

And so, I'll pause reading this for a bit. It's never good when you feel nothing about genocide.

It's fascinating, repulsively so, which genocides we choose to remember. The most memorable genocide. The basis is which countries were we most taught on the map. Burundi is the focus of Kidder's book.

"What the hell is Burundi? A bunt cake?"
"No, it's a small country neighboring Rwanda."
"Oh, yes, Rwanda...the Rwandan Genocide."
"Yes, but there was also a genocide in Burundi, that infiltrated back and forth from Rwanda."
"So I could still consider it the Rwandan Genocide then, right? It just rolls off the tongue better than the Burundian Genocide."

When I was on the meds, I felt numb, there towards the end of summer. I had moments I could remember when I wanted to feel emotion, but did not. That's when the true frustration began with taking the meds. I began to feel not fully human.

I guess, with meds and without, we still have times when we feel not fully human. When we feel nothing at all.