Back in the USofA

For a long and wonderful weekend, I was in BlogHer land.  Women of all sizes, shapes and descriptions were everywhere I looked.  We were eager to exchange cards and twitter handles and compliments.  "It's YOU!!" rang out as bloggy friends were found IRL.... in real life.

It was safe and secure and brilliant and funny and everything that I wanted at every minute of every day.  Disappointments were few and far between and even they led to unexpected encounters filled with sheer delight.  The food was good, the wine was plentiful, and no one was a stranger for long.

Then I came home.

Travelling's hard enough without dragging swag through airports, changing planes and squishing myself into seats which keep getting smaller.  I'm little.  I don't know how the rest of the world survives the ordeal. 

I tried to swim out the kinks and the aches, and I was grateful for my pool even though my body was just as sore after I dried off.  I stubbed my toe and was reminded, once again, that jumping up and down on one shattered-but-healed-hip is an impossible task.  I didn't know which piece to hug first. 

I was tired but the Rover was landing and I wanted to stay up til 11:30 because that was when it was going to be on tv and while we were wondering whether the tweets from @MarsCuriosity were sent from earth to Mars and then back again to earth Big Cuter called and told us that he'd been misinformed and we'd missed the broadcast.  Did you feel tired after reading that sentence?  That's what my self felt like when he called at 11pm.

G'ma was (plastic pins & ball) bowling at the pod-castle on Thursday.  Apparently, walking, watching, and applauding are not skills which can be practised at the same time.  She fell into a chair and is now the proud bearer of purple bruises the likes of which I haven't seen since I looked at my own body after I was shot.  We spent the day at the doctor and the x-ray center.  By the third time she had to lower herself into the car her groans were audible.  There's nothing broken (we think) and the bruising is partially a result of the blood thinners she takes to reduce her risk of stroke but she's my mommy and she's achy and I'm sad.

Reporters have flown from Colorado to Wisconsin but the story is the same.  As TBG noted at lunch, the demographic which frightens him the most right now is young, white, men. 

And that has been the backdrop to my life since deplaning.  The phone rings hourly.  CBS, NBC, CNN - the news desks and the talk show hosts checking in separately. The Wall Street Journal, the Arizona Republic, the local television stations - everybody wants a comment on something that hasn't happened. 

Little Cuter talks about impotence in the face of all this tragedy and I think she's on to something. Perhaps the media is looking for an answer from an expert, or, as one crass caller put it, "we're looking to book one of Loughner's shooting victims to...." and that's all I heard because I had to move the phone away from my ear because her words were burning through my brain.

That's the first and the last time I'll use the shooter's name in The Burrow. 

Shooting?  Shooting is what they do at the Olympics.  This was carnage, bloodshed, a massacre.
I really try hard, every single day, to avoid feeling like a victim.

That caller got the brunt of it all.  "I make it a habit not to comment on gossip."

Is this really what we've come to?  Are we really a nation of vultures?  Is being first to the edge of the abyss really that important? 

Nothing has happened, people.  The process must unfold.  Believe me, the pain will be there tomorrow, just as it is here, today.  Once there is something to talk about, I'm happy to share my thoughts.  But please, don't ask me to speculate about something that is much too nuanced, must too personal, much too real to be guessed at.

If I can wait, so can you.