coldhearted scientist وداد

I

As of this writing, Daniel Ortega, not a ‘leftist’ but a chameleon, is winning the presidential election in Nicaragua. My candidate, Edmundo Jarquín, is in fourth place, and Edén Pastora, not just a ‘former Contra rebel’ as the delusional CBS news proclaims, but also, in his complicated life, a former Comandante Cero, is coming in last. We, of course, vote tomorrow. I will be voting against the American Prison Planet now in late stages of gestation. I have been telling my friends for some time that we are moving toward martial law. If you doubt me, read Heart’s post, which has hard news on this matter.

II

One of my students informed me of a new disorder, Postcolonial Stress Disorder. The identification of this disorder would help to explain why, for instance, recently oppressed peoples are still “so sensitive,” and why they are not always able to simply get on with it, and get to work. If you examine the archives of the G Bitch Spot, and their links, you will learn a great deal about Post Katrina Stress Disorder. We were discussing it at work today. Many people are still unnerved. They cannot just ‘get over it’ and ‘move on’ because they are still living in their FEMA trailers, still threading themselves through the multiple needles’ eyes of government bureaucracy, still facing the scene in which they experienced multiple horrors, daily. On the way home I remembered that I have it too.

I was demented yesterday afternoon. It had to do with my family and the storms. I will not discuss the Katrina related behavior of my own local family except to say that it included an M.D., who was horrified at the possibility that s/he might have to do “emergency work.” And this M.D. is a born again Christian who has been known to lecture the rest of us on morality. And to criticize a member of my own family, and praise instead the behavior of some friends, especially when they are not close friends, is disloyal. And I am disloyal, and a heathen. I am moving right on ahead.

III

In the first few days after Katrina, communications within New Orleans were very difficult. My college friend Carolina, with whom I have not been in touch since, located me to call and say that her younger sister Raquel was now a doctor at Tulane. Raquel had not evacuated, but had remained at her post to do emergency work. She was married to a police officer whose partner had been unable to withstand the things he had witnessed, and had committed suicide, and her husband was very depressed, but he was continuing to work.

They had heard through the vague and unreliable means available at the time, that they were now to be transferred to the country, in Raquel’s case to a certain medical center which appeared to be in my town. It was impossible to contact this medical center by telephone since, as was usually the case at that time, all circuits were busy. Carolina was calling to ask, did this medical center really exist, was it open and functioning, and did I know whether it was in fact one of the places to which Tulane doctors were being transferred? Because Raquel was ready to hitch a ride, but she wanted to do her best to hit the right place. And I knew the answer to these questions, which was yes, and the town was full to the gills but Raquel could stay with me. And Carolina said this is such a relief, thank you. And I said, any time.

IV

Here, we continue to deal with Katrina and Rita aftermath. Given all that I have heard and seen, and all that I continue to hear and see, I have not yet found a way to make excuses for the behavior of my local family. Unable to conjugate charity for them and charity for everyone else, myself included, I find myself feeling demented. I remember being terribly concerned for them, and horrified by them all at once. And as I say, I realize it is disloyal of me to be horrified at bad behavior coming from them. And I am wracked with guilt over having noticed it.

The excuses family members outside Louisiana made for these people were that they were under terrible stress, and that being a doctor is a very important job. These excuses do not wash with me:  we were all in the hurricanes, we were all under terrible stress, and more than a few of us have very important jobs. It was hard, for instance, to go down for my volunteer shift at the shelter, and have the Red Cross people look at me hopefully, “Are you a doctor?”–and to say no, when I had one at home, who did not deign to come.

I should have preferred my own family, no matter what they did, and I should have made excuses for them, as the rest of the family did.  Since I cannot find a way to do so, I feel demented.  I think that if my family was rude and mean to me, it must be because I deserve it. If I had more money, a more prestigious job, maybe they would respect me. If I could find a way to sacrifice myself more perfectly, they might at least be polite.

This reasoning is grotesquely twisted. Most days, I have to remind myself: it was their choice to be this way, and they were embarrassingly, disgustingly self-serving during the hurricanes. I gave them everything I had except the work space I needed to keep doing my own job. It is their choice to dislike me for not having relinquished yet more. I do not have to make excuses for them even if the rest of the family does. If the rest of the family thinks I am too hard on them, and believes that they are great exotic storm sufferers, that is their choice–they do not live here.  If I am unable to believe that line, it is a sign of integrity, not of meanness.

To consider Carolina and Raquel, brings perspective. Thinking of them, I find that my bones fit together, and I seem to grow tall again. Vote tomorrow — bbbote, as Vallejo might have written — for candidates whose actions fit, but then exceed their words in kindness. Vote for candidates like Carolina and Raquel.

Axé.