here baby

no image for this post.

still glued to internet, reading, reading, reading, watching videos, trying to keep up. the vids are all starting to blend in my mind - the shambles, the dust, the bodies - arms frozen in death, reaching, the wide-eyes, the absolute wreck of everything.

but i can't stop thinking about one particular video, where an australian reporter covers the miraculous recovery of a an 18 month-ish old girl who'd been trapped for three days underneath a building. i know a lot of such videos are circulating, but somehow this one's still very distinct for me (despite the kind of awful, cliche narration produced around the live footage) and i think it's because of the sound, as much as the images.

first - you hear this little girl shriek in response to voices outside the building [a shriek you will never, ever forget] and then when they extract her, the reporter - who up until that moment has retained the calm, cool, collected (and somewhat condescending) professional veneer - pulls her up into his arms and is so fucking freaked and incredulous he just keeps repeating, for nearly 30 seconds: 'here, baby. here, baby. here, baby.' someone hands him a bottle of water, he pours it over her head and into her mouth, 'here baby. here baby. here baby.'

the rest of the video unfolds like so many others - a blend of french/creole/english broken communication about the situation, surrounding people shell-shocked, trying to understand what's just happened, a quote or two from the heroes, acknowledgment of this miracle in the context of thousands of others dying at that very moment. but i was just bawling by the end of this one and can still hear that reporter: 'here baby. here baby. here baby' in my head.

we're all connecting with/slamming into what's happening in haiti at different moments and for different reasons. please, after reading this, make a donation to your organization of choice. and then make another one when you can. and maybe another one next month. and the month after.