Jujuism: The system of beliefs connected with jujus.

[merimask]

I think I need a majic talisman.  Nothing fancy, just something small I can wave at my problems.  Something I can fit in my pocket and hold when I'm havin' a rough day.  A shiny little coping mechanism that'll make me feel better.  I'm still not religious...I just need a little spiritual placebo in the form of some innocuous little bit of wood or stone that I can brandish from time to time.  Juju!  An interesting idea.  S'fun.

I have the coolest picture to share.  Really.  I'm sitting here looking at it.  Another dragon, inspired by these guys, among others.  It's pretty and I'd love to share it, but the scanner is of course on the fritz again.  Can't imagine why.   Everything's dead...even the icon on my desktop is gone.   Huh?  This computer is, ostensibly, supposed to be my means of maintaining a web business and yet it seems that the only person who gets to use it effectively is my husband.  Oh well.  At least he can still sign on to E-bay, that's the important factor here.  :-/

The plumbing thing went well...better than I expected anyway.  The whole day cost me less than 200 dollars and these days that's a good day.  *sigh*  So now we have no drips and a new outside spigot  and the sump is now legal in every imaginable way.  Good thing!  The inspector will be here first thing in the morning.  I'm 60 dollars and a certificate away from officially sanctioned plumbing responsibility.

I think the sump is the very last thing we have to take care of before we are officially able to close on this house.  Oh crap...let it be so.

So, tonight I was bombarded by my TV with images from Sept 11, 2001.  Can't believe it's been five years.  

I have to say that the flip attitude many people have about what happened that day kind of chaps my ass a little.  I still can't watch that footage without being moved.  I'm old, you know?  Older than I act/live/think/look, but still I'm old enough to remember very clearly sitting on my Dad's shoulders watching those towers being built.  It's one of my earliest memories.  I remember asking him why the building was rusty already (haha, the fire-retardant that the iron girders were painted with was a red-ochre hue and it looked like rust to me), I remember being very concerned about that.  I remember my Dad saying those buildings were going to be like the Egyptian pyramids...that they'd stand forever and future generations would wonder why they were built so high.

I also remember how Dad suffered when the Edward R Murrow building was bombed.  He was apalled and heartbroken...he even did a beautiful painting to exorcise his demons about it.  He hated the senseless destruction and the tragedy of it all, it made him question humanity.

Dad died of cancer in April of 2001.  He died sadly.  Cancer is a terrible, awful disease and I watched him die and it was just about the worst thing I ever had to bear witness to. 

Then 9-11 happened.  And to this day the thing that I am so ANGRY about is that when I watched those towers fall I was glad that my Dad was dead.  I was SO glad.  I was traumatized by his passing but I think it was some kind of cosmic mercy that he wasn't alive to see what was happening to those beautiful towers in his favorite city...his home.   

He loved New York City.  I was born there.  Our first home as a family was in Stuyvesant Town, which we loved.  We would go from one end of Manhatten to the other, the whole city was open to us.   More than anything, Dad loved the architecture of the city.  The spire of the Chrysler Building was just about the most beautiful thing in the world to him.   Even though at first he thought of the twin towers as big "boxes", once they were built he found them amazing, awe-inspiring.  The were massive in a way that was almost arrogant, and that made them beautiful.

Then those bastards knocked them down and made me happy my Dad was dead so he wouldn't have to witness the destruction.  I'll always be angry about that.  For me, it's personal.

Which is why I'm so pissed at this administration.  They used the tragedy of that day to foster a sense of fear and paranoia, and the did that (I am SURE about this) intentionally to further their purposes.  The had an agenda to go to war with Iraq even before 9-11.  I can't help but wonder how long it took (I doubt the fires were out in NYC) before Karl Rove began planning a media blitz linking Iraq with Al-Queda.  It's purely evil.  What this administration has done since those attacks on that day...well, it sickens me.  Twisting the nation's fear and sadness and sense of patriotism in order to get us all on board for a war that was unfounded and mis-represented...it's like looting the corpses of the people killed on that day.   It defiles their memory.

Anyway, I hate those terrorists for making me happy that my Dad was dead.  I wish our government had exterminated the crazy bastards, but unfortunately this administration was more interested in handing out contracts to Haliburton than finding justice for what happened to our most wonderful American city on that day.  So I guess I hate this administration just as much as I hate the terrorists.  And I'm still waiting for justice.  I hope I get to see a little of it on election day.  

Comments

[pzb.livejournal.com]

I saw a wonderful bumper sticker in town a couple weeks ago -

"Is it 2008 yet?"

Strangly, I had similiar thoughts the other day about my grandfather. He passed just two weeks before 9/11.

I don't have a whole lot of time at the moment before running off to work (and I wanted to make sure I commented this time, seeing as how I've forgotten to come back and comment the last few times ^^;) but I will say that I have to agree with your hatred of the administration. And how stupid some people are with regards to this whole damned thing. (There was a whole bit on Bill Maher the other night about how people are trying to view the destruction of the towers as an inside job....wtf?!?) My particular favorite was some moron who got on my case one day when I mentioned what I thought of this war and was accused of "Not supporting the troops." I quickly corrected the asswipe with "I support the troops....just not what they're being sent to die for."

Finishing up what dear old Daddy couldn't finish before his ass was booted out of office....or so it still seems to me....

Eh...so much for leaving on time. XD

[merimask.livejournal.com]

*hug* Sorry if I made you late for work...but you know I love reading your comments. :-)

Yeah, today was kind of rough for me. MSNBC re-broadcast the entire morning of 9/11 in real-time...it was the Today Show from 5 years ago and it was eerie watching it. I remember watching it on the day it happened with my heart pounding; the whole thing seemed so suureal. Now I have the perspective that 5 years affords and so I just cried. :-( Now it seems all too real, and the fact that for every person who died that day, there is now a corresponding dead serviceman who has died in Iraq...that seems doubly tragic.

[pzb.livejournal.com]

No no, it's fine. I made it with 4 minutes to spare. :D I just like to leave early.

Yeah, I've been avoiding the better majority of tv with regards to the towers. That whole day was horribly surreal as well, not to mention all fo the other underlying things that came with it for me. Jim and I had just started going out, I remember my roommate's mom waking us up with a barrage of phone calls, not to mention this was the day I wound up meeting Jim's sister, who two years later passed away from cervical cancer. There are so many things connected to this day, I'm glad it's almost over.

[moko-moko.livejournal.com]

The glib nature a lot of people are giving sure seems to be common nowadays, and it's not smashing in the least.

But in happier news, I'm glad to hear the house prep is going well! New faucets and waterworks are always worth it in the long run :) 'Cause if it's not...the inspector and Kiba are gonna have 'words.' Loud, growly words. KUKUKUKUKU

[merimask.livejournal.com]

Everything went well today...for a change. :-) All I have to do is write a big fat check and I'll have my new certificate tomorrow. *sigh* Character-building!

[empath-eia.livejournal.com]

I love you.

I need to say that more often.

[merimask.livejournal.com]

Aww... *hug* I love you too.

[rumdiculous.livejournal.com]

9/11 is so easy to remember. That horrid feeling of denial and shock. I stumbled out of bed to get ready for work, only when I walked into the living room I found dad glued to the set watching the smoke billow out of the first tower. As my brother walked in and asked what was going on, dad told him about the plane and I thought, "This can't be an accident..." I left the room before the next plane hit. Sitting beside dad, watching the debris and people fall out of the building, at that moment I didn't feel anything but confusion. I felt like a lost kid. As the firefighters poured in, I turned to dad and wondered aloud how long the buildings could hold up. When they did fall, I was sick. I went to work and stayed beside the radio all day long beside my boss and my mother. Customers came in and would stand beside us. No one wanted to say anything. The rest of the day is a gray blur of silence and shocked faces.

The next day I went to class at Virginia Western Community College. I did this more out of routine. There would be no classes that day. I sat in my English class while our teacher, a wonderful lady, asked us in a somber tone if anyone had relatives in NYC. She was from New York and despite being outraged, she was attentive and alert to every student there. We did have one student missing. She had family in the city and was trying to reach them. I remember sitting in that class and watching the blue sky. Later at home, dad and I stood outside and took a look at sky devoid of movement. That was so strange...

[merimask.livejournal.com]

We did something similar a few days after...I think it was the 13th or 14th and we just had to get away from the TV. So Greg and I went for a bike ride. The path was full of people, but everyone looked so sad and serious, and we all kept looking up at the sky. It was so clear and empty...but instead of being beautiful it just made us all sad, I think. Nothing felt okay for a long time.