back to the real world

I fear my post titles are going to be a bit trite for awhile. Today was the first day I've had to breathe and take it all in since I've been back, so naturally I spent most of it catching up on Brothers and Sisters online while attempting to make sense of the suitcase explosion that is my room (or rather, my roomate's room, as this is now her apartment and she moved into my old room). I'm now a bit more "ordered" with a finite to-do list, a stack of bills and mail for which I need to request an address change and a nearly complete pile of laundry to get me through my last week in SoCal. It's as if nothing, and everything, has changed.

I went out last night with some girlfriends and it took me a full two drinks to remotely start to mellow out in the sea of bar hoppers I found myself in. Granted, it's never been my scene, but I've always been able to make it work for the sake of a few laughs, some silly pictures and a night out with the girls. Trouble is, it all seems so damn pointless right now. I don't want to begrudge people the right to a good time, but it's true that once your eyes are opened to certain things, you change in ways you can't always help, and apparently my fun factor has gone down. Pretending like the world's not out there, like life is at its best in the middle of a crowded bar, just isn't an option for me right now.

Today I broke into tears watching a scene on t.v. where a soldier tells another soldier that he's going back to Iraq, and the look on the face of the one who's safely home after three tours of duty said it all - a tragic look of sadness and near hopelessness. The guilt of what's going on in my own country and the lives of people my age who are on the line - I had this sudden ephiphany that it makes as little sense as the chaos I confronted in the lives of the kids I worked with while I was gone. Such different circumstances - one the product of diplomacy and international relations, the other the effects of an ill-managed health crisis and the after effects of colonial expansion. But tangible comparisons can be made, none moreso than the bigger picture connection that this is humanity at its worst. People having to give their lives for all the wrong reasons, and the majority of their peers, countrymen or fellow humans oblivious all the while.