empathy / engagement

so sometimes at certain times of the month i find myself with almost no empathy whatsoever. it's weird cause i also accept the fact that there is way too much to care about in this day and age. i suppose it's a matter of how much you feel like engaging yourself within whatever context you are in.

issues of access are especially interesting to me. why is it that it's always the older women in my classes that have the best input? i suppose that it makes sense. unless you're a person who cares about things, you probably wouldn't be taking university classes at that age. i hope i never lose the will to learn new things.

things took a total 360 today. i felt like fucking shit this morning and was bitching nonstop to lamat letting it all come out. christine reminding me to just "take it for what it is" and then telling myself just to take things one step at a time helped out. classes engaged me today. the shit we talk about in medical anthropology always brings me to the verge of tears, and it makes me feel great. reminds me that i'm not completely cold and i have the ability to be compassionate.. sometimes something i wonder if i give myself more credit for than i should.

after finishing the first segment of the age of aids (you can watch it online), and being set up to look at it with terms of framing and naming, ideologies, the social course of the disease and the life it takes on, origin and myths associated both with aids and within the context of the movie.... prof garcia finished off the class by saying that aids is widespread and has impacted so many people, leaving us with the idea that aids is worth our time. and i agree. shit's crazy. i mean even without the physical aspects of it, the fucking social aspect of the disease in itself is nuts. i wish i could really commit myself to one thing and stick with it..

and how it's so easy to care and not to care. who cares? why should i care? what shouldn't i care about? i mean there's so much out there. last quarter i definitely remember saying "i don't give a fuck about case studies in public health" and this quarter i found myself saying "who the fuck cares about epidemiology." and clearly something changed, maybe in the framing, maybe something as subtle as my disposition at that moment.. but yeah, i care. it's worth caring about. after freaking bombing the epi midterm on tuesday i told myself i was going to go to class today. i sat in the 3rd row and i put my phone away. i took good notes, supplementing the slide notes, instead of just copying the slides, and i had a separate notebook in which i was chronicling my own questions and insight about the implications of the material being presented to me. and it's funny if you choose to be engaged you can find so much shit to care about. i had never imagined myself even remotely paying attention in a class like epidemiology. especially now. it also helped that the class isn't cummulative and being there against the backdrop of it being a very empty day in the classroom today encouraged me that this was a brand new start, and i was there to be able to take advantage of this.

also i guess it's in the news that obama said something about empathy, but i don't know shit about that. i only heard of it cause i had the colbert report on in the background yesterday. yuup. someone else can care about that for me.

cheerz