Hurricane

(Barbara Ann Part III is coming soon.)

I am now watching the Gulf Coast Concert--just heard a plea for money from Jennifer Anniston, a gospel song from Alicia Keys, and an old favorite of mine--"Born on the Bayou," written I believe by John Fogerty, but sung on TV at the moment by Foo Fighters. Now I'm watching Mariah Carey, who I think has a good voice but is easily the trashiest and most repulsive superstar I know.

Overall, it's a pretty good concert show. I think celebrities are full of shit, of course--but they are doing something, and I assume they're all giving a shitload of money to the Red Cross or what have you. What seems blatantly self-serving, though, is the way they're answering phones, as if they're graciously giving their time or something, giving a little nod to their public, and we're supposed to think they're not only stars but also great people.

Pul-eeze. They might be giving their money and time, but those glamour gods on the damn telephones remind me of Oprah goddamn Winfrey, who spends so much of her time flattering celebrities by doing these shows on their good deeds (her hurricane coverage was no exception). I find it sickening.

But this hurricane is a fucking gut-wrenching catastrophe--and I frankly hold all those stupid Bush-voting motherfuckers responsible for the help and aid that all those Gulf Coast residents were denied. What--you guys thought HE was a leader? What on EARTH ever gave you that idea? Do you read? Do you pay attention to his speaking? Are you intellectually and psychologically stunted? What's your deal?

The husband and I talked about his going down to the Gulf Coast for 9 days, the minimum I believe the Red Cross requires after you go through some training. If I weren't two months from giving birth, I think we both would go over Thanksgiving or winter break or something. But the pregnancy complicates things, of course. And in some ways this troubles me. In some ways I think the fact that we're not going--especially not him; at this size and with this energy level, I wouldn't really be that much help--is sort of selfish.

So if he went, he'd be gone probably 2 weeks or more. Yeah, I'm preg--but chances are the baby will go to term; I really doubt that I'd give birth while he was away. Yeah, something could happen to him--but I the chances of that even less than chances of my going into labor without him. Yeah, I need support because I'm going to have a baby. But what--I can't be without him for two fucking weeks while he goes to the site of a natural disaster and helps out who knows how many people for a reason that--sorry, everyone--is larger in scope than me and my pregnancy? Is this disaster larger than my pregnancy, which feels so often like not exactly the most important thing in the world, but the only thing in the world?

In truth--the truth I can detect, anyway--there are all kinds of things in this world larger in scope and greater in importance than me and my baby. Phrasing it like that: me and my baby instead of me and my pregnancy gives me some chills, makes me wonder if I'm missing some crucial cliche here, such as, nothing is more important than my child, than taking care of my child, or something. But yikes. That's not really true, is it? There are things that are a helluva lot more important than me and my life--enormous moral and physical loss, abuse of power, exploitation of the vulnerable, love for fellow humans. And my pregnancy and my life are inseperable, although pregnancy and birth and all that goes with it are very much out of my control. Pregnancy is internal because it's in my body and external because it has nothing to do with me. I am--women are--in many ways vessels. This observation isn't meant to be demeaning or dismal or negative. It's quite simply a fact.

So maybe this is why I feel a little funny about not physically doing anything for these victims of both circumstance and a government at every level who tells them to eat shit. Right now, I am honestly this vessel that I don't really understand. I think I feel this keenly, this eerie distance from myself--my body and mind--since I'm carrying a life around, and this distance is so apparent to me that I wonder why the husband can't just take off for awhile if it's for a good reason.

But of course he's not going anywhere right now. It's not as if he asked me and I said no--I think we both know it's something we just can't do at the moment. Got a baby on the way, you know. This appears to be quite a trump card. It doesn't matter what I think is more important, and it doesn't matter what he thinks is more important. Pokie is coming, and it's clear that she needs us already. But is this fair, when so much is going on in the world that needs us, too? Is this what parenting means? Is this what you're supposed to do?