I'd like a side of normal please

The BBC News / Alert Espresso (your daily shot of humanitarian news) reads for the day:

--189 massacred in church by LRA rebels (Uganda), those dead are mostly women and children (DRC)
--6,000 children are believed to be fighting in Darfur as rebel combatants
--Election Orphans: Rebuilding their lives after the Kenya election
--Ebola virus breaks out in the DRC
--Zimbabwe malnutrition rises

...Zimbabwe cholera deaths increase by 2/3 in December
...6,500 children are believed to be domestic slaves in Addis Ababa
...and the news continues

I swear I wonder how I wake up every morning just to read the day's headlines that disgust me every day. One day last week, when I originally meant to write this entry I just about wanted to jump on a plane and make my way through the DRC to Goma in the northeastern region of the country and declare an all out war (mind you verbally) on the rebels who have just recently kidnapped more children into their ranks as child soldiers and sex slaves. Yes, I realize that I would have done nothing productive at all. I probably would not have assisted a single child and perhaps killed myself in the process, but I seriously just DO NOT get how these horrific events can occur on a daily basis and certainly do not understand how the world is comfortable sitting back enjoying their daily lives as 10,000 children needlessly die every single day.

Do I have fun? Absolutely. Do I enjoy my life? Sure, Absolutely, Sometimes. But my mind is also almost always on these events occurring everyday. I WISH I WERE "NORMAL." I wish I could have a regular every day conversation about meaningless things without having my mind drift to, "I should really be reading up on child sex slavery," or "child domestic servitude." And don't get my wrong, I find everyday things important but I have a very difficult time prioritizing them.

What did you do on Christmas Day? Well I spent time with my family during the morning and the afternoon and then I went home and enjoyed a great manual on how to assist child victims of slavery - it's usually a great conversation starter. Right.

Or perhaps what did you do on Sunday? Well I slept in, because I was too depressed to get out of bed (hmm... daily headlines perhaps?) and then I went and spent the afternoon at Barnes and Noble trying to finally put on paper the proposal for a non-profit in Ethiopia that will provide emergency shelter, formal foster care and rehabilitation for trafficked girls, but I just couldn't get my mind around all the thousands of pages of research I have read on the topic - and as always - felt like I really didn't know what I was talking about and instead decided to read another hundred pages on how to assist child victims of slavery. Good times. And again, really gets a conversation started.

I'm hoping for the day when I can just relax and say, "this is my life and I'm going to stop fighting so hard and just enjoy it." but then again, that's not really me. I wish I got myself more so I could really understand why I fight so hard for something that seems so unattainable... Or at least understand myself enough to know which fight it is I have to fight so I can begin accomplishing something real.

... And that's the vent for today folks.

(This post is not meant to minimize the hard work of others, this is just me, venting so please do not take offense)