Sunday, September 11, 2011

Sitting with anger

I did my meditation late today, since the morning was full of work. I wish I could take the weekend off, but not this one. I had a great meeting yesterday with a paper conservator who has done excellent research on hanji, so we geeked out for hours about that, all wrapped up with being Korean, being women, and so on. So much came out of that, ideas for the near and far future, but mostly I feel the work I have to do is that much more pressing.

But while sitting, I realized I was angry. All of the memorial stuff going on today and how much it has been ramped up in the days, weeks, months leading up to it. Of course it is important to memorialize and remember the innocent dead. But from that has been created a whole new species of the living dead. I am still ashamed of this country's response and am amazed to think that people would be okay with the post office being shut down but not a fraction of the defense budget. The post office!! It is NOT OKAY to even consider saying goodbye to it! Not to mention how many letters I sent to Afghanistan. It is NOT OKAY to keep sending people there the way we are, and have been.

I know how I "should" be feeling and how grateful I "should" be for many things, including my life. But how I really feel is angry. And that's fine, because it will pass.

2 comments:

mjc said...

THE best thing I have read today re: the memorials (also all the comments; it sparks intensive debates that are needed):

http://therumpus.net/2011/09/the-decade-of-magical-thinking/

Velma Bolyard said...

i went to read melissa's recommendation. so good. and the final sentence is profound.
anger, aimee. it's appropriate.