My goodness, 11am already? How the morning flies by when you�re interviewing people. Last night I watched the movie, Billy Elliot. GREAT movie. I want to own it. Rent it, watch it, love it. Anyway, I�m exhausted today. Guess I�m finally feeling the residuals of a night partying with the girls. But it�s okay, I�m fine, I�m young and resilient and the weekend is only a day and a half away.

This morning, I read an article about the Dutch man, Perry Wacker, who was sentenced to 14 years for the death of 58 Chinese immigrants. FIFTY EIGHT. That�s not even a year each. He was smuggling them into England in the back of some truck on a ferry. On a hot day, he not only left those people in the back of the truck, but closed the tiny vent from which they had to breathe. There were 2 survivors. The 2 lucky men said they spent the day kicking at the inside of the walls while those around them suffocated to death. �Horrible� is a word that doesn�t begin to describe this situation. These people paid tens of thousands of dollars to be smuggled into a new country, claiming to seek asylum. Just to be murdered by a thoughtless man, money in pocket, who apparently had no special concern for human life. And he ONLY got 14 years. Which means, he�ll probably be out long before that. It�s disgusting.

I am for the death penalty. I usually don�t believe in the concept of rehabilitation. But, in this case, I find myself swaying to a more lenient opinion than usual. He didn�t set out to murder all those people, at least I hope not. It was carelessness, and if the man has any semblance of a conscious, then his remorse will be punishment enough, along with the time spent in jail. But despite my agreement with the decision, I am completely torn up about the whole situation for many reasons. Do me a favor, will you? Pray for the families of those poor people.

Whoa, that was heavy. I�ll lighten you up for a moment, or at least I�ll attempt to, I never did take note of the appropriation of lighthearted personal sharing directly following such heavy, worldly concern. But I�m a rebel and a pioneer, and I have no rules. The other day I was driving home from work and the oddest thing happened. Flipping through the radio stations (with a rusted off hangar for an antennae), I paused on a hard-rock station as I returned my hand to the wheel to make a lane change. Death Metal, you know the kind, man WAY too close to the mike, can�t make out what he�s saying, loud music and a gravelly RAWR-GAAKAWOOORRRR noise, which is his voice, screaming over the music. I didn�t turn the channel. Rather, I became entranced for a moment. Then, to my surprise, and what seemed like beyond my control, I started declaring things, out loud, and I mean LOUD.

Driving down the freeway, Death Metal blasting on the radio, and me loudly and clearly stating things like, �Do what you want and if people don�t like it, they can complain! If they don�t have the courage to complain, that�s there problem!� (which was a quote I read earlier in the day. And other things, like, �I will succeed in life. In order to that, I will first succeed right here, right now!� Several other things shot out of my mouth, and after 10 minutes, when the trance sort of snapped, I laughed my ass off. Must have looked odd to those in traffic around me, but I didn�t care too much, just found it funny. I had become a death-metal-affirmation-dork, a DMAD, if you will. But you know what? I felt so wonderful afterwards. As if, in those few minutes, I had made important decisions that would greatly effect my life. And in a way, I did exactly that. It feels amazing to be in control. I feel empowered by the simple act of declaring things aloud, by telling myself and hearing myself say that it�s okay to do what I want, be who I want to be, and that I truly don�t give a flying fuck about what anyone else thinks about it. If we don�t have ourselves in this world, we don�t have anything.

I don�t like to pretend. But sometimes, I honestly can�t tell the difference. I�ll tell ya, knowing the difference between real and fake (at least what it means to you) is very important. At least that way, I know where I�m coming from. And maybe, sometime soon, I�ll be able to figure out where I�m going. But right now, all I�m concerned with is where I am. And it�s all good.

-Barbarella

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