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What Would Derrida Do?
2004-10-13 3:08 p.m.

During the last presidential debate, one of those "undecided" audience members asked W something about why his administration has been trying to prevent importing prescription drugs if such importation has been able to keep costs down for the consumer. Ask me how hard we were laughing when he said he was just trying to make sure the drugs weren't coming from "the third world". "AAAACK!", we simultaneously yelled, "NOT THE THIRD WORLD!". Then we missed Kerry's response, because I was on my impression-tirade, almost making Steve's drink come out of his nose from laughing when I stood up waving my arms around, and said "These here drugs, they might be from Kenya!". Except I said it like "Kin-ya", since I was trying to do the twang and all. It was a rare moment for me, I'm usually not that spot-on funny.

Well we thought it was funny, anyway.

Oh I know, I know, it's a real issue - shoddy drugs that come from countries where standards and regulations aren't what we're used to here. I've seen enough domestic African air carriers to know that I'd never want to get on one (with the exception of SA) again; I know they're not held to the same FAA regulations we are here and that those carriers usually buy old, reconditioned planes. Gah! So the potential for cheap and ineffective drugs is there - I just can't help mocking most of what he says.

But I didn't feel bad for taking that dig after someone asked W about Stem-Cell research, which he quickly turned into an Anti-Choice lecture, finishing with "You can run, but you can't hide!". To whom does this refer? OB-GYNs? Women who've had abortions? Women who want to have abortions? Women who have to have abortions? Nurses? Stem-cell researchers? Fertility clinics who provide researchers with resources rather than throw unused embryos in the trash? And isn't that what he says/said about Sadam Hussein/Osama Bin Laden? Or what he says when he tries to collectively address terrorists? A little psycho, if you ask me. Thanks, but no thanks; most of us want no part of whatever self-congratulatory holy war you think you're waging.

So yes, that bridal shower. It was for my pal Sharon, who is SO happy to be getting married. I'm so happy for her - she's just so cute in all her pre-wedding glee. I'm glad she's enjoying it; none of the stress I felt in planning my own wedding seems to be affecting her, and for that I'm really happy. She deserves to just enjoy this time.

My old boss is contemplating going into the Peace Corps since he just retired, and I'm sure it's no shock that I gave him a big thumbs up - and even wrote him a reference letter since I've known him for over ten years and since I have extensive experience with volunteer work and organizations myself; especially at the international level. I saw his daughter-in-law at said bridal shower, and she semi-scolded me for "encouraging" him.

"If he goes to Africa", she said, "he'll totally die". Hmm. Ok, he's not in perfect shape, and he's pushing sixty, but given his experience with owning and running his own business for the past twenty years or so, he'd most likely be placed in some managerial position, advising or helping to build up businesses so that some local economy can become a bit more stable. I highly doubt they'd stick in some village, far, far away from anyplace, and instruct him to dig latrines.

"Well he'll probably be in a city somewhere," I explained to concerned daughter-in-law. "No, no, NO," she said, "they're thinking of sending him to Africa". "Um, yes," I said, "But they'll probably send him to a CITY, so he'd have at least SOME resources". She was extremely flustered at this point, but just simply said again, "They're going to send him to AFRICA".

I caught on after a second that "city" and "Africa" didn't make ANY SENSE AT ALL to her, since she seemed to think that there were NO CITIES IN AFRICA. That the only people who live in Africa are either guerrilla fighters or little kids dying of starvation or traditional villagers whom Coca-cola hasn't reached yet.

OOooooh k. I tried one more time: "Look, what I mean is that he'll probably be placed in an African city - maybe Accra or Lagos, Sokode or Nakaru. At least there, he could be near a hospital if God Forbid he ever need one, and have running water and electricity and newspapers and whatnot."

I could see her brain working. "'I know the word "city"'", it seemed to say, "'and I know the word "Africa". But what is an African City'"?
I realized that she just couldn't conceive of the idea that in some ways, an African city can look a lot like Newark, NJ. Not an ideal place, maybe, but certainly modern enough.

Oh I don't mean to be so mean. But it was pretty funny, and I think that's the kind of stuff you set yourself up for when you run your mouth off about something you know nothing about. I also think it's ridiculous for them to think he can't "handle" it simply because he's over 40. If anyone I know has adaptability and can deal with struggle, rolling with the punches hard work can give and smiling all the while, it's my old boss.

And I think I was especially mean (at least in my own head) because I was projecting. Someone said to me once "what we dislike in other people is what we dislike in ourselves", or maybe it was more like "what we dislike in others is what we fear ourselves becoming...", something like that. It doesn't work every time - some people are just racist morons, for example, and I certainly am neither racist, nor a moron, and I still dislike racist morons.

Anyway, it fits here, since I hate that I sometimes do that to my own mother - act all ageist and protective and like she can't doing things alone.

Take this week, for example - she's planning on doing some Walk For Breast Cancer across the Brooklyn Bridge, and I insisted on driving her rather than letting her take the train. "Oh," she said, in a little girl voice, "Should I not take the train all by myself?" She got me good - it was totally condescending to say "I don't want you taking the train to New York at night alone!" to my own mother, who had been "taking the train to New York at night alone" twenty years before I was even born.

Or take some of our other conversations that we sometimes have:

Me: I think I might want to move to Dar Es Salaam someday and teach or something.
Mom: That will be lovely! And then I'll come to visit you.
Me: You can't.
Mom: Why not?
Me: It's too dangerous.

This, I know, is ridiculous, not to mention completely contradictory to everything I always say about Africa.

I know my mother is no fool. In fact, she's quite smart. I always thought my overprotectiveness was the product of losing one parent way too early in my life - that somehow I feared now the other one was also "at risk" and would also die, leaving us all orphans. I've read all about Oliver Twist, I know how crappy that'd be.

Maybe I learned things about mortality too young and it has made me paranoid. Or perhaps my irrationality with this is the product of my mother's "singleness" - that she does most things alone. But much of this is her choice, I think I have to realize, and not some sad acceptance of loneliness that makes her more vulnerable and susceptible somehow to dangerous situations that may arise.

Heh - I just remembered that once, during a time when we were all living at home with my Mom (we all = me & two brothers, and all of us at this point over 21), we had a mini crisis one night in this particular arena. Mom was supposed to come home around 8 pm from work, but by 9 when she wasn't home, we were just frantic. By 9:45 we were absolutely hysterical, ready to call out the national guard. One brother called all of her friends, the other searched through her calendar hoping to discover some hint of where she might have gone instead of coming home. I called her job and had them freaking out since she'd left "over an hour ago".

When she walked through the door around 10, boy did we let her have it. We fired questions at her as if she violated curfew, as if we were her parents and she had been acting "irresponsibly" or something. Turns out she stopped by a friend's house. This is something a woman who has raised a family, worked her whole life, buried two parents and a husband, and somehow managed to be compassionate with her sometimes surly teen-age daughter without the help of a partner, has every right to do.

But we wanted answers. Was she angry? No, she thought it was just hilarious. And then I did too, thinking about myself and my two brothers, well into their twenties at this point, acting so irrationally. But then I supposed it was because we all share that fear - one parent's already gone, don't let anything happen to the other. Even our most rational, level headed oldest brother seemed a bit tweaked over it all.

Wonder if that's biologically driven somehow?

Could just be because we love her so much.

I must go - I have a stack of Women's Studies papers to grade now, all of which deal with (I hope) history and the interfering nature of "perspective". And speaking of Feminist Theory, history, and perspecitve, it's too bad that Jacques Derrida should pass away right when we need him most, huh? So sad - pancreatic cancer is just horrible. The obit is here - the BBC one is the best I've seen so far.

xo