9:06 a.m. - 2004-06-28
the levite
Yesterday I finished the fifth Harry Potter book. Is it normal to feel really sad when finishing a 900 page book, the characters you have come to regard almost as siblings, and the author, you have fallen in love with? That sentence structure seems awkward...wrong even. 10 points from Gryffendor.
I think I finally know how to figure my life out, thanks to Jen Baird. Note to twenty-somethings: there ARE people who can help you figure out what to do with your life. Your directionlessness is not totally your fault. It's a generational thing, and there IS help out there. Repeat. There IS help out there. Proceed directly to the most mature and responsible 35 year old you know and love and signal them with the international sign for "I don't know what the hell I'm doing with my life." They will know what to do.
I killed a gigantic mos1quito hawk last night. I feel bad because Jen told me they are "good" bugs and actually eat mosquitos...but it was so large and in charge and creepy I just kind of freaked, drowning it in spider killer, a can of which I keep bedside, of course....you just never know.
Last night I was walking home from having dinner/finishing The Order of the Phoenix/talkign to Collin. I was traipsing semi-merrily through the post-pride parade trash and there was a LOT of it on Broadway...when I saw these big guys coming toward me...they were all riled up and had the air of "something has just gone down" to them...kind of angry, but pumped up....so I kept walking and noticed some blood on the ground....this is sounding really cheezy like I'm going to lead it up to something funny...warning, it's not funny. So I am kind of "alert" like keeping an eye out for I-don't-know-what. But there's a fair amount of people out and I don't really know what I'm looking for..I just kind of know something is not quite right. Well, I spot this very small asian man who was obviously gay....pretty young, too, crouching by the pay phone...his face was cut pretty bad and he had blood all over his shirt and he was crying....basically, he had almost certainly got the shit kicked out of him by those big guys. My mind was kind of racing because it's like when you think about coming across this sort of situation, it seems obvious that you should do somethign to help or bring justice or something.....but in reality, it is much more awkward and the possibilities of how/why this happened flood your mind, holding you back from getting involved. I slowed down, still walking, having no idea what to do....should I try to talk to him? SHould I call the police? What if those guys come back? Maybe he "deserved" it. Maybe he had 5 bigs friends involved and they're waiting around the corner to get those other guys. Maybe there is a language barrier and I won't be able to communicate with him. Maybe he'll freak out at me. I suddenly feel very vulnerable in flip flops and a skirt...I couldn't run very fast if I needed to....I pull out my cell phone and decide to hold it up questioningly, as he seems to be having trouble with the pay phone....but he barely glances at me and just starts crying uncontrollably. As I mentioend to COllin last night, I am not very good at comforting my friends when this sort of thing happens, let alone a small gay asian stranger, with whom I may or may not have a language barrier with. Part of me is afraid that whoever did that to him might come back and associate me with him. Part of me feels like I don't want to be bothered. Part of me desperately wants to help, but I don't know what to do. I could call the police, but this guy is almost certainly drunk, and will probably just be arrested, and that doesn't seem helpful. So, to make a very long story short, I just went home and felt bad. I thought about it the whole way there. This is so unlike me. I love to help out in emergencies. I wonder if this is a random incident during which I just felt unusually paralyzed by lack of clear direction or if the city has made me so cynical about this sort of thing (homelessness, people trying to scam you every day) that I am desensitized to even a situation where someone does clearly need help, and isn't holding up a pan handling sign? Did I just ignore the fact that I've heard about 15 sermons on The Good Samaritan? Crap. I'm the Levite, aren't I? Maybe if I'd had a donkey things would have gone down differently.... :)
