Hope amidst the heartbreak:

After being barraged by stories of bombings in Sharm Al-Sheikh (one of which went off right next to the Hotel I stayed in last year) and the famine in Niger that the world is ignoring, it is encouraging to see a story such as this one. Here's to hoping that there will be more.

Sleepy-bye

Starting tonight, I will be getting no less than seven hours of sleep a night. I have been sleepwalking through a large portion of the summer, and it is disorienting and unhealthy. After a weekend of getting healthy amounts of sleep, I can now say that I am committed to this new goal. Wish me luck.

Utter ignorance

This is a fairly ridiculous editorial from a man who is one of the most widely respected "experts" on global politics today. The content of the editorial is typical: all of the world's problems are due to some flaw or shortcoming in the Muslim world today, and apparently 1 billion members of the world's population are simply not performing up to Friedman's standards.
As a quick reaction to the editorial: Friedman, give me a break. Every single religion has gone through evolutions and continues to do so. They have the same problem in India with Hinduism, in Sri Lanka with Buddhism. It's just that it doesn't effect the U.S., Canada, or Western Europe, so of course these problems don't exist.
And, once again I reiterate, MUSLIMS ARE NOT THE ONLY PEOPLE IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD WHO HAVE EVER COMMITTED TERRORISM OR SUICIDE BOMBINGS. People act like what happened in London last week was the first time the city was ever targeted by terrorism, apparently forgetting about that little group known as the IRA. And do we remember the early nineties, when the Prime Minister of the world's largest democracy, India, was assasinated by a Hindu suicide bomber?
No, of course not. Mr. Friedman, get a grip.

A plea for true resolve

This has been a great week. It's hard to make a comment like this when your week includes pondering the fate of your missing checkbook/social security card, getting an average of 5 hours of sleep a night, the tragedy in London and the fears of what further tragedies will be deemed "necessary" in response, and seeing the sleazy nature of my gender, uh, up close and personal.
I would like to offer my thoughts on the word "resolve". After all, it's a word we've thrown around a lot this week, and it needs to be truly pondered before it becomes as hollow and meaningless as the word "freedom".
Resolve is often used in a way that makes it interchangeable with words such as perseverence, endurance, and steadfastness. I think that there is a big difference. If one looks at those three words that I just mentioned, they refer to withstanding some sort of extended conflict or challenge. Resolve is usually used to refer to the end of a conflict; it is similar to "resolution" after all.
So the way I see it, the true meaning of the word resolve, in the noun form that we've heard it thrown around in this week, is the state of resolution of some sort of conflict or challenge. That can be any conflict, internal, external, whatever.
This is so important, because I think that the deepest internal conflict is figuring out who we are, as members of the human race and how we fit in with other members of the human race. Every one of us is connected, every one of us is necessary for that vast quilt that we call humanity, for a purpose that affirms and yet ultimately transcends humanity to a much higher level. It is a challenge to believe this, in the face of everything that we are forced to confront every day. But resolve means that we stand by the resolution of that conflict in our mind, and we believe that there is nothing immovable that separates us from our true selves, and from others. It is when we don't see this that we become terrified, isolated, confused and hateful, because we know something is wrong, we see the conflict, and we don't see the ultimate resolution to that conflict as existing. So we put up our walls and we strap on our blinders. We fight our wars, holy, just, or necessary as we see fit. And like a person who sacrifices their legs for the sake of their car, we surrender our souls for the sake of our lives.
Or not even our lives, but their lives, their power, that of our lives. It is those of us who fight the mundane and everyday struggles that suffer in today's world. For as fragile and fleeting as life is, it is too precious of a gift to be taken away in the pursuit of power, something so fleeting and meaningless even within the scope of a lifetime. Yes, we want things like "democracy in the Middle East," and "Islamic states," or maybe just "an end to terror and WMDs" or "the end of the U.S./Israeli presence in the Middle East". We also want it to not rain today, we want things to cost less, we want our secret love interests to see how wonderful we are, and we want jobs that pay us enough money to take the family to Cape Cod, Mass or Alexandria, Egypt for the weekend. But until we know why we want those things, then we are enslaved by them. We are captives to their fulfillment or denial, and our very being is molded accordingly. These things are important, but they should never be allowed to guide our souls.
So I ask that we find true "resolve." I ask that we have faith that this inherent conflict of our human race already has been resolved, in a way much outside the boundaries of space and time. Then we will be free, of our anxieties, of our wars against terrorism, of our wars of liberation, of our holy wars and our spreading of democracy. We will be able to navigate those every day dramas and know why we do it. And our lives, whether fleeting and tragic, long and uneventful, pained and inspired, will transport us to places that hover above the edge of our imaginations.
"Have no fear for atomic energy, 'cause none of them can stop the time."

Smog-covered lenses

First off, props to Live 8. Honestly. I know there were very few artists there who were actually from African countries (which there is no excuse for, given the sheer amount of musical talent on that continent), and it also may have again hopelessly objectified the people of almost an entire continent. But as Professor Colman McCarthy once said, you have to take people from where they are, and the organizers of this thing were obviously head and shoulders above most, given the sheer amount of awareness that the concerts raised.
One section of the article quotes President Bush acknowledging his unpopularity in Europe, saying "I know my decisions aren't popular, but I have to make the decisions I think are right, and lead." I found myself pondering it for a while. Anyone who knows me even a little knows that I don't exactly think that the policies and ideologies of the President are "right," nor are they a sign of good leadership. But yet, we all make decisions that we think are right and that others disagree with. How are we to know whether they are truly right? Does El Presidente' truly believe that his decisions are right?
Ok, so I might be making a big mistake in over-analyzing a select sample of the usual spew that flows out of a world leader's mouth. But I do think it's important to ponder these things. Even though I wrote President Bush off as a credible leader a long time ago, I still think that such a thing can exist on a national or international level. The key thing to remember is that leaders only have power because they are given power (obvious for an ostensibly democratic country, but true of any leader, even a dictator), and they are expected to use that power to pursue higher ends, rather than just clutching to power like it's a dog-eared copy of Hustler. Many people, including myself, would argue that President Bush is doing exactly that. But just for the sake of argument, let's suppose for a minute that the President was someone who actually pursued principles. In that context, how would we react to that comment that defends policies that seem so obviously wrong?
Now that I've thought about it more while writing this, there are a dozen good responses for the President's comments on Kyoto and what not, even if we assume that he is basically principled and well-intentioned. But it's still a larger question worth pondering, because no matter how much we demonize him, Bush is, as he so often reminds us, "one of us regular folk." How many situations arise during the day where we think we act on principle, when in reality we're just having another Presidential moment?
Then again, I'm being too harsh. After all, he took a bold step and declared that global warming is indeed caused by human activity. So we know that he is capable of acknowledging objective reality, albeit belatedly...
Forget it. I'm going to bed, and dreaming of sugar-plum fairies caked in soot.

And then a hero comes along!

Picture the scene: on the Orange line of the Metro after the Independence Day celebrations down on the Mall. (Way too much capitalization in that last sentence, hmmph.) I get onto the Metro car with Tiffany, or rather, we pack ourselves in, because people are stuffed into the subway as tightly as...(insert witty simile here). Anyway, we soon discovered that it was a major ordeal for people to actually get out of the Metro car when the train stopped at their destination, due to the crowds and the line of people surging to get into the Metro car BEFORE GIVING ANYONE A CHANCE TO GET OUT. Additionally, whoever was trying to get off the train at any given time also was in a race to get out before the no-bullshit train operator shut the doors much faster than necessary. So we are on the Orange line, and the train pulls into the Rosslyn station, where we were slated to get off. As I meekly try to smile and "excuse me" off the train, the conductor/operator/whatever lady informs us over the loudspeaker that we "all need to move faster, because I'm going to be shutting the doors in a few seconds," which everyone in our Metro car responded to with an emphatic "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!", a cry which, despite the volume and spirited participation, probably went unheard by the conductor. I'm still calm at this point, because I figure we can just get off at the next stop and take the train back in the other direction. The people behind me were not as relaxed, and even now I'm not sure if I actually ran off or was propelled off...either way, after popping out of the car I turn to see Tiffany squeezing her way out, only to find the doors sliding toward her! So I lunged forward, grabbed her by both arms, and in a display of sheer determination rarely put forth by my 5'7 120 lb frame, whisked her away from the jaws of the closing doors! (Relatively unimportant detail: the doors opened again before closing all the way, and then opened again three more times. Stop doting on this and keep reading of my feats.) After fighting our way through crowds and dormant escalators, we reached street level and celebrated our narrow escape by waiting for a Rosslyn-Georgetown shuttle that never came, presumably because the promised schedule of a shuttle every 10 minutes is, in the words of Adam, "lies, all lies."
In short, a day of parades, endless walking, great fireworks, and countless beatings from Wael ended with my Herculanean rescue of Tiffany from public transportation, which was celebrated over slices of toast smothered in cream cheese and jam at Adam's house. Land of the free indeed.