Devastation

I'm silenced by what I'm watching on the news. I don't have the mental space to process it all. I've stopped reading the articles and watching the clips. I don't want to know.

I feel so removed from Japan right now... like the Pacific Ocean is a yawning chasm a million light years wide and a universe deep. Helplessly watching the disaster unfold from this distance reveals my powerlessness. My arms feel short. Any effort I could take would be in vain. There's nothing for it but to wait and watch.

But there's agony in this... like being draped with a thick winter coat in the middle of a hot humid summer. Like being trapped in a sauna when your head starts spinning and your ears are ringing. It's suffocating and stifling. I feel like I can't breathe. It's so uncomfortable and I can't get out from under it.

I feel like things have changed since yesterday, the earth has shifted literally and yet my life, my surroundings, my house, car, school, the city I live in... it's all the same. There's nothing physically representing this shift other than pictures, clips and articles. It's two dimensional media representing a 3D tragedy; two dimensional media attempting to represent my home.

I imagine what it was like to have the earth shake violently under my feet. And in my imagination things lurk in dark corners; the what-if's surface and stalk around my mind like a lion in a cage. What if my family wasn't safe? What if they were at the beach when the wave hit? What if their houses had fallen on them? What if I was there and I was trapped? What if my nieces and nephews were roaming the streets without their parents or lost under a fallen building. I can't bear the thought.

This line of thinking isn't healthy. It does nothing but add to my state of quiet anxiousness which in turn adds to my feeling of helplessness. The cycle does nothing but empower itself. I'm going to stop now.