It's not a cry you can hear at night, it's not somebody who's seen the light...

I don't know.

I posted a thingy on Tumblr last night which was metaphorical of how I'm feeling inside, even though I was talking about something else. It's here in case you feel like reading it. Behold how goddamn deep I am, you guys, omg.

I just feel really fragile. I managed to actually write something I didn't hate. In fact, I really love it. And that made me want to watch Michael Collins so I could Irish!historygasm. Yeah. If you're feeling fragile, watching Michael Collins WILL make you sob for two hours straight. Just, you know, FYI. But GOD that movie. I love it. It is so well done. And it amuses me to see Jonathan Rhys Meyers in one of his first film roles. Where he gets to use his actual accent!

I'm just worn out. And people keep asking me questions I have no way of answering and it pisses me off when it shouldn't. But I don't know when my course will start again and I don't know when my placement will start again and I don't know when real life will resume. We only just got water on at full strength and considering the way it's been going on and off for days at a time, who knows if it will stay that way. Some of the city is still without power and water at ALL, let alone the people who lost homes and families and lives. So yeah, I don't know when classes will resume again.

Stop asking.

My beautiful cathedral. That makes me want to sob. Of course, worse is the death toll and the trapped people and the horrible injuries and devastation and and and. I was just watching through the city this morning on my way to my first day of placement thinking "wow, so much scaffolding. This poor city." But you know what? The scaffolding was better.

We were all downstairs having lunch when it happened. It was five minutes until my first team meeting and then the entire building shook more strongly than anything I have ever felt and there was screaming and crashing and the lights went out and the lady next to me gripped my arm like a vice. And I sat there through it all, as calm as anything. When it stopped, we all exited the building (fumbling in the dark, but thank goodness we weren't upstairs) and when people asked me if I was okay, I said I was fine. I was surrounded by counsellors and social workers and I think I was the calmest one there and I don't know why. I went very focused. Get phone. Call Leah and Alison. Get home.

And then I looked to my left at the city center I was a five minute walk from. And I couldn't see it. The dust from collapsed buildings had obscured it completely. And I only kept from panicking that Ness and Jen were in there (they are okay, btw) because I was focused. Get phone. Call Ali and Leah. Get home. Got a text from Alison saying she was okay. Good.

My supervisor gave me a ride (bless her forever) and I finally called Leah. Talked her through an aftershock (to which my supervisor said 'GOOD!') as the car I was in shook like a mofo and people on the streets outside screamed and screamed. We drove past unspeakable damage and horror and I got home and my house is still standing. It's a mess, but still standing. And my vision blurred and I couldn't breathe and I sort of had a mini-panic attack. But I'm okay now. We have a broken pipe, but really? Lucky. So lucky. My kitty is sticking right by my side, but that's okay by me. Having a purring kitty curled up against your chest makes it a little better.

Have heard from all my friends. They're all safe. And my Tim Minchin CD came. The earth is still shaking all the time all the time and no dinner with Amanda Palmer (thankfully she hadn't flown in yet, but Jason Webley is in town and with Hera). But my girls are with me.

I used to spend my life in my high school theatre. There were days I could be at school from 8 in the morning until 9-10 at night. I didn't drive until I was 21 because instead of taking driver's ed, I was doing everything I possibly could in that theatre. I ate, slept and breathed that place.

When I was in my final year of high school and I was on my way to rehearsal when I saw a little girl in the hallway behind the theatre, crying. She was about eight and I went over to her to ask what was wrong. She said her mother was supposed to pick her up a half an hour before that (why she was being picked up at a high school when she was 8, I still do not know) and she was scared that her mother had been in a car accident. I asked if her mother had a cell phone and she nodded, so I led the poor girl through to the speech office so she could try calling her mother.

When there was no answer, and the girl started crying again, I told her we should go out to where she was supposed to be picked up and I would wait with her.

I ended up waiting with her for nearly 45 minutes. I kept her calmer than she probably would have been by talking about stupid things and telling her ridiculous stories about myself and my very strange friends. Her mother eventually came by and the girl hugged me and they went on their way. I have no idea why the mother was late, or what happened, but I never saw the girl again and I don't remember her name.

What I do remember, was that I was late to my rehearsal. I knew I would be, and since one of the advantages of my crazy brain is that it traps things inside its cage of memory, I had the entire play memorized already so I figured it would be okay. The director wasn't pleased however, and he informed me of this. I told him I had been waiting with a scared, little girl, and he asked me why that was my responsibility.

You know...if that's how you think, then I guess it wasn't. My responsibility was to my cast mates and my director and despite the fact that I was never late before and always went above and beyond to help and be do whatever I could to move the production forward, I was still late this time and that had inconvenienced people. I still feel like the right thing to do was to stay with the poor girl. What about my responsibility to help out another human being; to care for someone who was scared and alone? If I had been that scared little girl, I would hope someone would have extended the same kindness to me. I just apologized and we got on with it, but I never really forgot that.

I'm not someone who can pass people by. Which is why I am the one who ends up sitting with the homeless person on the street who passed out and hit their head on the pavement so hard they are bleeding into their eyes, while they wait (for over an hour) for the ambulance to come. The amount of people who walked by that day, averting their eyes so they didn't have to see, makes me feel ashamed. I don't ever want to be that kind of person. It's why I'm doing what I'm doing, despite the fact that I am not okay. The helping people is as natural as breathing. It's not going out of my way, because helping people is my way. It's everything else that's the problem. Forcing myself to leave my home, when it's the only place that I feel safe. Forcing myself to talk to people, even though I'm terrified of it. All that functioning as if I don't panic about every little thing, that's the hard part. It makes me feel like I have no right to act like I could actually help. I feel barely human. Sometimes I feel like giving up. But I won't. I can't. I'm taking responsibility. I just wish it wasn't so hard.

I am having the hardest time speaking tonight. I am stuttering and stumbling over my words all over the place. And while this isn't unusual for me in smaller doses, it won't stop and I feel like I am trying to talk with marbles in my mouth and I can't make myself understood unless I speak in 3-word sentences and I just want to cry. It's really frustrating and it's making me grumpy (though I am managing not to act like a bitch, go me!) and FFFFFFFF whyyyyyy

I talk a lot. I like talking. STOP BETRAYING ME, TONGUE. If it were daytime I would sing a bunch because it's never a problem when I'm singing. but it's late and I can't because I'm a high-pitched, loudymcloud when I sing. So I'll sit here and bitch on LJ and be frustrated and weepy woe woe woe woe is me.

...I hope I don't have a stroke... (I think it's more likely just the messed up sleep that's doing it.)