These are just kids
I want to break in with a personal post here. Before the coup, I was taking long hikes, cooking up complicated dishes, reading academic books, and doing weeks of prep for a single podcast episode. Since the coup, my life is basically one 16-hour day after another.
When the coup first broke, I was a mess of emotions. I didn’t know how I was supposed to live in any kind of normal state when so many friends were now under such imminent danger. I found myself breaking down regularly for a couple weeks, even though I couldn’t remember the last time I had cried prior to this. Eventually I realized this was no way to live, not of any help me or others. I also learned the age-old human quality of adaptation, knowing that sooner or later I had to accept this state of terror that had now gripped the Golden Land, and stop reacting to the daily horror show. And the Buddhist training of accepting the reality that was manifesting before me also kicked in here. This skill helped to lessen the power of these emotions and see how little purpose they served, and to realize how rather than suppress them, I could just give them less food.
Since then, my life has basically become one 16-hour day after another. Although I never thought I would have to deal with the issues now in front of me, I’ve learned to do it with detachment, because that’s really the only way to get through it. But still, the emotion sill somehow finds its way out at times.
That happened this afternoon. I gave myself the rare gift of a one hour walk, and on the way back, I saw a kid leaving his house dressed in black, with goggles, a big backpack, and two baseball bats on either side of his bag. I stopped in confusion, forgetting where I was and uncertain what I was seeing. Until, I realized he was just a boy going off on an afternoon adventure, packing whatever toys he had for the imaginary journey that followed…
At that moment, I realized I had quite literally forgotten where I was. This is not unusual. I remarked to a friend that time and space have no meaning for me any more. I don’t mean this in any esoteric or philosophical way, I actually mean it quite literally. As for time, when people ask about plans at some point in the future, I can’t really understand that plans can exist, or even that time can exist, because there are no activities I’m contemplating beyond what needs to be done at this moment of the crisis. As for place, I do sometimes forget where I am— a week ago, I looked outside my window and saw a parent carrying a sleeping child, and the first thought that came to me was that the lifeless body was not in slumber, but no longer alive. After all, the Burmese military has killed 43 children to date.
That was the first time it happened. I was startled, but shook myself out of it and got on with my day. But now at this moment, this afternoon, I was experiencing genuine disassociation, mistaking this kid for those boys his age now in Myanmar. These are the ones whose donations we are now supporting with protective equipment and helmets. These are the ones whose deaths and bios we are writing about. These are the ones whose families we are giving a donation to after they lose their loved ones.
I don’t know when this realization hit me, but at some point, I just broke down crying then and there, realizing that boys like him were leaving their homes in Yangon just like him… and not coming home again. Their own military was killing these kids, day by day, and often stealing the corpses to boot. At that moment, freed from tasks, all the emotion came down and hit at once. I sobbed for a half an hour, right there on the public street, then walking home and crumpling on a sofa. I spoke with a friend later that evening with combat experience, and he said what I was experiencing was commonly known as “battle fatigue,” and it is not unusual even for those, like me, not actually in any conflict.
Anyway, back to #whatshappeninginMyanmar. These are just kids. The ones defending their country’s hopes for freedom, as well as literally defending the lives of those people on the street behind them.
Please consider sharing this post so that others learn what they can to support these kids to come home to their family safely.