Dear Mom

I really miss having someone rooting for me. Most of the time I really can't do it for myself. Somehow I find this extremely selfish.

Most of these days I don't feel 22, I feel 100.

I feel like a machine, producing. I also feel like one of thousands of sheep, herded.

I am wondering when I will stop waking up and going to sleep thinking about things I am sick of thinking about.

I realized that 10 minutes changes everything. Especially 10 minutes you think you might have had. Or 10 minutes you can never have.

I am really, really homesick for a home that doesn't exist anymore.

Obama's short announcement on Bin Laden's death was appropriate-short, grave, patriotic...but NOT celebratory. I find myself deeply disillusioned and disturbed by all the footage on TV of people cheering "USA! USA!" and throwing around beach balls (?!) and apparently also high-fiving each other (NYT front page right now). When I first figured out what had happened, my gut reaction was NOT happy celebration. Yes I understand what this event means symbolically for the United States and no I do not undermine all the different "victories" that it represents. But watching people's reactions is sickeningly reminding me of the footage there was on TV back in 9/11 of people cheering on the exploded twin towers. So is this what humanity's literally come to? Cheering on death as victory? Sadly, it makes us no better than them.