I'm losing my faith, but I'm not sure which faith I'm losing.

This war is not to my liking. The ironic part of me, the one that's oh-so-cool in its detachment from everything and its submersion in pop culture wants to say the reason is because there's no cool pictures of destruction to watch, like there were during the Persian Gulf War. This war isn't narrated by James Earl Jones. This war isn't like a videogame. People aren't being killed in college campus protests over this war. It's just not fun like war should be. I almost expect this war to have a corporate sponsor. Perhaps AOL Time Warner could do that for us. Give it some pizazz. Make us care. Shake us out of mourning and shock.

And meanwhile, no one wonders (or no one wonders loudly enough to my liking) why we barely know what's happening in our war.

I'm told to trust our government, but I've been unable to fully do that ... since forever. I grew up during Vietnam and Watergate. Faith and trust reposed in our government is something that's hard for me to give. I do give it, but more out of a sense of obligation most times than not. We do good work, sometimes.

And meanwhile, I wonder if my family, who are close friends with his dad's family, are corrupt and selfish like everyone else that seems to be associated with them. It's hard to reconcile. I know these people. I know my family.
Or do I?

I used to have faith in the media, at least when it came to watchdogging our political leaders, but the glee with which they have shredded many good people through their own sense of the melodramatic makes me wonder who's watching the watchmen.

And meanwhile, and meanwhile, I lament in a daylog that I don't know any older gay people, only to find several days later that there is/was an elder gay couple living in my area, people I could have talked to. And one of them shot the other last week. In the face. Multiple times.

I want to have faith in that wild frontier that is the Internet ... I've always loved swimming in its oceans of information, leaving me free to decide for myself is something is worth believing or not. And I don't want to think I'm some crackpot when I tell myself that I know, I know that there's things that are disappearing, pieces of information that used to be there about the tragedy, questions that were asked, that have vanished. Vanished from big sites, like abcnews.com and CNN. No explanation. Unanswered questions. I wonder if I'm strong enough to start finding answers to those questions. But how can I be strong if I don't believe in anything? Hell, if Ari Fleischer can shoot down the venerable Helen Thomas in a press conference, essentially telling her to shut the hell up with her impertinent questions, what the hell chance do I have?

And meanwhile, and meanwhile, and meanwhile, my liberal college student roommate decries the evil of the International Monetary Fund while slipping on one of his eight pairs of Nike shoes to go shopping for yet another pair of shoes.

The whole mood I'm surrounded in, drowning in, is one of apathy alternating with jingoism. It's all rote flag-waving. It's like being invited to a war, and finding it only average and wanting. Hardly entertaining, no longer scary, nothing to protest, as long as we're "safe" There's no one to look at, to dump our bad feelings upon ... our Three Minutes Hate doesn't even let us see the face of evil all that often anymore. Who is my enemy? Who is my friend? How do I tell the difference?

And meanwhile, the New England Patriots win the Super Bowl, and I feel like it's been fixed, while everyone else seems to be dancing in the streets over how perfect a game it was. How beautiful that this year, the Pats finally win. It's so perfect, it seems too good to be true. It makes me unhappy, it makes me paranoid, it makes me question everything. Make it stop.

I want to do something, fire people up, make them wonder the same things (flight recorders, stock deals, suspiciously diverting bankruptcies and suicides) that I'm wondering. But I lack the conviction to do so. Keeping my head down, that's what I'm doing. But that means that they'll be coming for me soon. At least that's what I'm told, if I don't get "involved". Why would I want to get myself involved in a process that seems to corrupt everyone sooner or later is beyond me. This is the way to enlightenment? I doubt it.

And meanwhile, and meanwhile, I watch the lady across the street dealing coke from her house, which she also uses to run a day care center. I wonder which business it was that bought her that new car...and I realize I don't even know her name. She's lived across the street from me for six years, and I don't even know her. Me and my roommates jokingly (and meanly) call her the PTA Coke Whore.

I didn't do anything to shape this country's past. I've done damned little to help guide its future except vote regularly and, hopefully, wisely. I'll fire off the occassional e-mail to my elected representatives, hell I've even written president@whitehouse.gov a time or two. It's not enough, but I don't know what is enough.

And meanwhile, and meanwhile, and meanwhile, I deaden my senses with drugs, pretend like it's all right, and try to keep a smile glued to my face as yet another insecure male wants to talk to me about being 'curious'. All I want to tell them...scream at them...is to grow the fuck up and realize that the only reason they're allegedly 'curious' is because the women they know are comfortable saying "no" now, and the game just got a lot harder for them. Harder than it's ever been.

I've never felt this way before. About my government. About my country. About my countrymen. About the world, my place in it, and everyone else's place in it. It's a weird feeling. Edgy. A little dizzying and a little nauseating. I try to soldier on, and do the best that I can...

...and meanwhile, I don't even know if it's me that feels this way.

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