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Location: Home.
Listening: Soundbites. Nothing but soundbites.

Sitting here, drinking wine and smoking, wondering what to do.

When I was younger, I went through several job aspirations. From the ages of 3 to 7 or so, I wanted to be a truck driver (much to my mother's horror). From 7 to 14 (when I witnessed open heart surgery performed on a horse), I wanted to be a veterinarian. From 14 to about 21, I wanted to be a children's rights lawyer. At 21, I decided that I wanted to create books.

My aspirations all had one thing in common--I wanted to change the world. I wanted to "make a difference", be it through delivering cargo coast-to-coast, saving animals' lives, providing children with a voice in court or preserving human history and knowledge. Tonight, I still want to make a difference--and I feel like there's nothing I can do. I watched clips from New York of the Iron Workers' Union assembling in the streets to march into the wreckage of the Trade Center Towers. When asked what the job was, several men responded at once "Whatever it takes to save a life--just one. To get someone out of there.". There was no fear on the faces of these men. They knew what they had to do. Sitting on the sofa, watching them, I was acutely aware of how far away from the disaster I was and it hurt like nothing else today has.

300 New York firefighters are missing. 80 or so New York policemen are missing. Many were among the first to respond to the intial blast and are believed to be buried under the wreckage of the second tower. For someone who has always idolized firefighters in particular, this is overwhelming.

I want to be there. I'm young and stupid and headstrong and I want to be there. I want to have the chance to walk down to the blast site and pull my weight. I feel like I owe someone--the victims, their families, God, myself--that much. It's not a martyr complex and it's not a desire for some sort of perverted glory--it's an instinctual urge pulling me to jump into the middle of it and fight like hell, because I know I can and I don't need any other reason.

I used to work as a Student Officer for the Department of Public Safety at USC. I signed up because several of my friends worked there, it was one of the only on-campus jobs one could get without work-study, etc. I told myself and others that I was in it for the money, that I didn't really care about the job, that I was just going undercover as a straight to protect my own interests. What eventually gave the lie to these excuses were my promotions from officer to corporal to sergeant and the satisfaction I eventually took from a day of foot patrol. I worked Spring Fest concerts, graveyard shifts, bike-theft stings and a bomb threat on the LA Museum of Natural History. I remember leading my officers into the parking lot of the Museum, forming a ring around the perimeter, as my sergeant had ordered me to do, and stepping closer to the center with the thought that, should anything happen, I knew what my capabilities were and what I could protect some of the younger ones from. I eventually quit the department on ethical grounds (there was a rape in the Chief's son's fraternity, investigation efforts were lax as a result, officers were under a gag-order not to speak to the campus paper--the usual bullshit), but I felt empty when I turned in my radio and walked out of the briefing room for the last time. That was one of the last times I remembered feeling like I had made a difference.

Tonight, children have been left without parents, parents have been left without children and New Yorkers have been left with no recourse but what they can contribute on the most basic level. Tomorrow morning, I'll report back to my desk to make sure that cable affiliates across the country can pick up the Disney Channel. Tomorrow morning, rescue workers in New York will resume searching for trapped survivors. I have no illusions as to who will be doing the more important job. I'll be with them in spirit, but tonight, it's just not enough.