We Sail With a Corpse in the Cargo*
or, Compartmentalization

1. shopping at Odel, posh Colombo department store, with Mom and Steph; meanwhile my friends work 20-hour days to make shit happen
2. headlines on Yahoo!News: "tsunami disaster death toll mounting"/"is George Clooney still hot?"
3. my mother is here for a week more vs. I just got offered the in-charge job of managing the unaffiliated foreign volunteers who flew in to help
4. I get more angsty and depressed when reading my email than when walking around the city

I have this feeling like I must, must, must dedicate my life to disaster relief, now and forever--this tragedy makes me see how much time I (we?) spend living comfortably apart from the pain and suffering of others in the world. This is sort of the biggest Case-In-Point/wake-up call of my life. I also feel like I can never leave Sri Lanka again; like no one will understand how this feels and I will spend the rest of my life telling these stories until they are rote and worn thin and I hate myself for cheapening experience via retelling.

Am thinking to write a play, or something, because that would speak for itself and perhaps I could stop speaking about it.

... This is really, really difficult. I could use a phone call.

*Ibsen.