This morning I bought a pair of the cutest pink lamps you ever saw, and two decanters for my bar (don't worry, Ted, they were $4.25 each on eBay) and this was all before I went to work. It was a very productive morning! At the office, more productiveness was going on when I ran across this Op Ed in the NY Times. It's written by a poet and musician who was born in Somalia and recently went back to visit the victims of the famine.
It's hard to read. When I got to the end I was sick, both at heart and physically. I thought I might vomit. I have two small children and the idea of having to watch them die for no good reason other than lack of food is more than I can bear. I am stricken by the fact that this is happening by the hundreds on the other side of the world. But I didn't throw up. And I didn't cry. And I didn't crawl into a hole and pull it over me to get away from a world that lets things like this happen. And I didn't go looking for pretty pictures on the internet to erase the images of tiny, wasted limbs and huge, hopeless eyes. Instead, I sat up, put on my big girl pants, got my shit together, did some research, and donated $305 dollars through various organizations. There are people, many of them children, dying of hunger in the Horn of Africa right now, and there is something I can do. There is something you can do, too.
It's hard to read. When I got to the end I was sick, both at heart and physically. I thought I might vomit. I have two small children and the idea of having to watch them die for no good reason other than lack of food is more than I can bear. I am stricken by the fact that this is happening by the hundreds on the other side of the world. But I didn't throw up. And I didn't cry. And I didn't crawl into a hole and pull it over me to get away from a world that lets things like this happen. And I didn't go looking for pretty pictures on the internet to erase the images of tiny, wasted limbs and huge, hopeless eyes. Instead, I sat up, put on my big girl pants, got my shit together, did some research, and donated $305 dollars through various organizations. There are people, many of them children, dying of hunger in the Horn of Africa right now, and there is something I can do. There is something you can do, too.
If you have had your fill of guilt-inducing soapbox ranting, don't worry - I'll be back later this afternoon with some pretty pictures of those lamps I mentioned earlier.
XOXOXO
ABC