Don't fret my pets. This won't be an insensitive low blow like Gilbert "Trying to Stay Relevant" Gottfried's Tweets, "Japan is really advanced. They don't go to the beach, the beach comes to them" or "I just split up with my girlfriend but, like the Japanese say, 'They'll be another one floating by any minute now."
Or Glenn Beck saying it's God's work and a message was sent by way of the natural disaster. Let me send you a message by way of my extended middle finger Mister Beck.
Or 50 Cent Tweeting, "Wave will hit 8 am them crazy white boys gonna try to go surfing" and "Look this is very serious people I had to evacuate all my hoe's from LA, Hawaii and Japan. I had to do it. lol"
The biggest shame -- besides their cruel remarks (or lazy remarks, also known as look-at-me look-at-me Tweets) -- is these "celebrities" don't use their status to raise money or supplies for the victims and the devastated landscape. Thousands of dead bodies are washing up on shore. There is an application -- Japanese Quake People Finder -- where people can search for loved ones, dead or alive, and you use your celebrity to make ignorant remarks and increase America's desensitization to horrific events. Beyond lame -- even lamer when you apologize afterwards. Yeah, sure, you apologize after newscasters and journalists across the world rip you a new one. Day late, dollar short.
Anyway, when I learned of the disaster I felt -- besides shock and sorrow -- my life slow as if someone or something pressed pause on a magical VCR in the sky, attempting to center my thoughts around such a unfathomable event. You can work yourself dizzy -- yard work, cleaning your house or apartment or wherever you call home, putting in hard days at your job so you can be a weekend warrior! Gotta make dat money! Running errands, saving moolah to buy a new car or have a baby, all with goals in mind to perfect your little life, your little corner of the world. All thoughts focused on your life and inner circle of friends and family.
Think about your day. What happened? What did you worry about? Were you late for work? Did something bad happen where you responded, "just my luck!" Did you have major road rage? Were you rude to someone? Do you have regrets? Did you cheat on your diet or, even worse, your spouse?
Think about all this. Would any of this matter if a hurricane came and washed everything away? Or a tsunami or other natural disaster? A giant tidal wave washes away everything in your snow globe of a world and you are left, hopefully, with your life. You don't recognize the landscape or where your house or car or whatever was, it's replaced with debris and chaos. Without this recognition, you feel empty, you feel lost.
I looked at my childhood home today and wondered how I would feel if the property was unrecognizable. Would all my memories disappear too? Would I feel disconnected? I have a hard time wrapping my mind around this one.
It reminds me of the "Clan of the Cave Bear" book series (which is a great series filled with drama, hot love and history). In this historical series of books based on the theory of major interaction between Neanderthals and first early modern humans, the characters are concerned with survival. Hunting and gathering enough food to feed their family and tribe, working together to live through cold winters and animal attacks. It is universally believed humans advanced extremely far from this meager beginning. Most of us have shelter against the cold with heat and thick walls, we drive cars, we buy food from the grocery store with currency, etc. but Mother Nature still is far bigger, better and badder than us all. A natural disaster can wash away our entire lives and there's nothing we can do except try to predict the date and time and have an escape route.
This also reminds me of a recent Oprah episode I found when channel surfing. I don't usually watch the Big O, mostly because she has an over-inflated ego the size of her fat ass, but her topic was something not often explored with a naked lens: nuns. The Dominican Sisters of Mary were featured in this episode but, more interesting, was the episode's main subject matter of women joining the nunnery. Girls as young as 16 were giving their lives to Christ. They must leave their families and become fully dedicated, including leaving all technology and their previous lives behind -- cell phones, Facebook, e-mail, smartphones, clothing, shoes, makeup, jewelry. They have their nun outfit to wear everyday. It takes a year of study and sacrifice before they have their big ceremony -- marrying Jesus Christ.
It reminds me of the saying, you are supposed to love God more than everything including your loved ones. As a society, we are centered on our family and material possessions and rely heavily on other people and things to make our world go round: fossil fuels, farmers, etc. Could we give it all up if we had to? Whether you believe in God or not, a tsunami could come and wash away your whole life, everything you've worked for and stressed over and fought for and you will be left with only your life. Would that be enough? All of your life is destroyed in a tsunami, everything. Would you still be you if everything you base your life on, everything you rely on is gone? What makes you, you?
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