Haiti

I always feel terribly uncomfortable when catastrophe strikes parts of the world that I have no connection to. I've always feared that this is because I didn't want to interrupt my usual schedule to grieve for those affected. But after letting that initial resistance wear off, I just read a couple articles about the earthquake in Port-au-Prince--one was the Associated Press overview on the Yahoo! website, and the other was a blog post by someone who knows an American couple who run an orphanage in the capital. The orphanage has collapsed and the couple and the children are now living in the yard next to the ruins. She made pleas for people to contact the Senate to get the children to the United States, where they can be adopted and have clean water, which no one in Port-au-Prince has now.

And I think I realize, I don't feel uncomfortable because I don't want to be bothered. I feel uncomfortable because I feel so damned powerless to do anything about it. And I really don't like that feeling.