it's been really interesting to personally deal, and watch/help others to deal with this whole thing. not 10 minutes ago a woman exiting the architecture building stopped 3 of us(us meaning transient tulane students) and started to discuss her personal story of how her son's best friend was to be a freshman at tulane this fall...having been forced back into his parent's home and then deciding what to do from there about his college career. she said that he was very depressed and stressed out about the whole situation. her story kind of surprised me...although it shouldn't have. it was a perspective of the situation that hadn't occured to me and i remember my ELATION at 18 to be moving out of my parents' home and beginning my life as an adult(ha ha ha)....but still.
for the others in our group of 6-10 students we all pretty much know each other's situations: what year of school, family locations and if they lived near the worst of it, if you knew people that were caught for some period of time afterward, how you got out, what you may or maynot have lost, etc....
the perspective that my friends and i, and many others have of this whole ordeal is so strange and alien to me. i find that the people that i meet try very hard NOT to ask myself or the other students about our "stories"(they ask if we need anything, and are glad to have us)... for fear of propriety i can only assume...even my good friend micheal apologized for asking via email since i hadn't gotten a chance to check in with everyone to let them know i was alright. it's not insulting, or an overly personal question to ask, and even though i've been asked a thousand times, i don't mind talking about it because i know that i'm not one of the worst off in the whole thing...it almost makes me feel a little better to ease peoples' minds that yeah, i'm doing okay. i take it as a simple and sincere sign of friendship..."are you doing okay?" "do you need anything?"
i take that back...i did meet one guy's cousin at a local bar and he was very very drunk(and i'm saying this assuming that he had a higher iq than what he displayed on that evening...) ask us this question: so you guys have all of your stuff back in new orleans, and you pretty much have nothing and are homeless right now....so what's that like??
my answer: well, it kind of sucks right now.
later this same cousin asked one of my friends (who is a foreign exchange student from pakistan) this question: "so what is it like being from central asia?"--at least he got the continent right....
my friend's response: "i don't think i can answer that right now because i've had a couple of drinks..."(enter change of subject here....)
am i depressed like the above displaced freshman? sometimes...but not too much anymore. i try not to watch the news or read articles about katrina too much recently because i'm almost afraid i'll get pulled into another 6 hr tv session, switching obsessively back and forth between msn, cnn, and bbc. i've tried to do the "count your blessings" thing, and it hasn't been too hard as of recently. it's actually easier to notice the little kindnesses when you are really down and out...you don't take as much for granted i think. have i cried about it? yeah, a little bit on a couple of occaisions, but not too often. i'm okay.
am i sleeping well? no, not really...i was already an insomniac and this has made it worse...i'm at around 4 hours a night and around a pack and a half a day on cigarettes...not good.
am i eating well? not really recent situations make it hard to have an appetite, but will come back soon...
otherwise, i guess i'm okay.
posted by ekeith @ 4:29 PM
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