Last night I recieved some bad news. I will get into that part in a few paragraphs. But it is some news that I really want to write a good deal about which is why I haven't written all day. I've been thinking about it and avoiding it and... I'm in a funk. But first, let's go into the lighter stuff.

Last night I went to an AmeriCorps alumni party. That's where I got the bad news. Afterwards, I went to a lovely book club that was just the thing to lift my spirits and allow me to forget about stuff for a while. I got to meet several wonderful folks from diaryland (Mrs. Roboto, Dishery, and Soapboxdiner) and hang out with others whom I'd already met (reddirtgirl & friends). I had a great time, though I had to laugh when they talked about wanting a space with "just women" sometimes - I wanted to yell "TAKE MINE!!! PLEASE!" All of my co-workers are female, all of my housemates are female, all of my friends are female... I'm inundated in women!

Today I did my first training session at the gym. I am a wimp. That is all I have to say about that.

And tonight was the office party. It was boring, but there was good food and some nice people. I got a candle in the white elephant gift exchange, as usual. I always end up with candles.

Ok, so the news. Two years ago, I did my second AmeriCorps year at a youth center in West Seattle. Last night, I ran into the girl who worked there the year after I finished. One of the kids I used to work with was murdered a few months ago. This was the first I'd heard of it.

TN was a little bitty guy. My co-worker and I thought he was 8 or so when we met him. He was 12 and had just started the 6th grade. He was cute as a button. He had a little cowlick in the front of his hair. This little boy was NOT a gang-banger. And I'm not saying that because cute little innocent looking kids can't be in gangs. This is just something I know about him.

Since I left the center, one of the most upstanding kids there has apparently strayed and started a gang of sorts. Now, the gangs in this neighborhood aren't exactly LA style gangs. Most of the kids aren't packing heat or anything. They have gangs mostly in name only and there might be a bit of drug dealing here and there - more so in the older 20-something gangs than with the kids.

One night this summer, about 15 kids including a few who were in this "gang" were playing basketball. A car was circling the court. The kids got nervous and started to leave, but then the car pulled up and the guy rolled down the window and asked them for directions to some place. The kids started to help him out. And then he pulled out a gun and started shooting. TN was on his bike and was a little bit higher than the other kids and couldn't get off his bike and run as fast as the others did. He was shot twice in the groin. His sister (whom I was much closer to than I was to him) called 911. The kids say that the police took their time getting there. 4 others were shot as well. An ambulance eventually came. TN's sister sat there and held him on the sidewalk as he slowly bled to death. The ambulance drivers didn't even bother with him until after he was already dead. I don't know if they'd traiged him and found that he was too far gone or what. The kids apparently believe that they just didn't care. The police, however, I can easily believe that they didn't give much of a damn, but I have a little more faith in the paramedics. Anyway, what the point in worrying over it now?

The paper printed a little tiny article about it. They portrayed all of the kids as being in gangs including TN. So it was a drive-by "gang shooting." The kids know who did it. They got a good look at the guy, they recognized him as well. The police have not arrested him, they haven't done much of an investigation, they haven't asked the kids much about it at all. They wrote stuff down at the scene, but that's about it. Heck, he was "just a gang kid" so who cares? That's what happens to gang members.

What makes me feel sick is that I recognize this attitude. I used to live in the suburbs of DC and Baltimore. Every single day there was a murder. And sometimes the person murdered would be my age. And I'd scan the paper to find out what had happened and when I saw "gang related incident," I breathed a sigh of relief. Because I was not a member of a gang, I didn't have to worry about being shot or murdered or whatever. I figured that as long as I stayed clean, I wouldn't have to worry about it. I figured that the kids who were involved in gangs shouldn't have gotten involved and were just stupid for having been involved in the first place. It was probably due to some drug deal gone wrong or something.

But TN? TN wasn't in a gang. It wasn't gang affiliated. It wasn't a drug deal gone wrong. It was still portrayed by the media as a gang related incident though. And I think that they do this so that it is more easily dismissed. TN was Vietnamese. Vietnamese kids who wear yellow or red are "obviously" gang members. He lived in "the projects." That's all that needs to be said, right? It was gang related. We can all breathe a sigh of relief. It won't happen to us.

What if it had been a little white boy in a different neighborhood? And everyone saw who did it. And the parents of the kid could speak English (TN's parents speak only Vietnamese)? They'd demand the killer was brought to justice! There'd be a huge media circus over the little boy who was playing basketball and was shot to death. It just makes me SICK!

And this isn't the first time this has happened to one of the kids I worked with. In 2000, a kid I was MUCH closer to and knew VERY well was shot and killed one night while standing on his grandmother's front lawn. I went through a lot of this when VV was killed, too. VV was the first kid I met at the youth center. He was a wild one. He'd jump up on tables and dance and yell and make fun of me. He didn't listen to anything that anyone told him. He was incredibly difficult to work with. And then he made a change. You see, unlike TN, VV WAS involved in drugs - quite heavily. He was a gang member. He was living on the edge. But then, he quit using drugs. His personality changed like you wouldn't belive. He went from being the kid hooting and dancing on tables and making fun of me to coming up to me and sitting at my desk and helping me plan a summer retreat for the youth. He got his GED that summer. He started mentoring some of the younger kids. He stood up for the pain in the ass kid that we all secretly hated. He turned out to have the sweetest disposition of any kid there. At the end of the summer, I was at Bumbershoot (a huge Seattle end-of-the-summer concert series) and I was getting food at a Thai foodstand when I heard my name being called. It was VV. He was working, first of all - an honest job! And secondly, he was AKNOWLEDGING me in PUBLIC. (this almost NEVER happens with the tougher older boys - they'd rather die than have their friends know that they know a white hippy-dippy liberal do-gooder girl - by name, no less)He was about to start college classes! We talked a little, he gave me my Phad Thai, and that was the last time I saw him alive. He was the one kid I could point to and say that maybe I'd helped make a difference. But then, two weeks later, someone shot him in the back of the head. There has been no investigation to speak of and no one was ever arrested in relation to the murder.

His murder tore me to pieces. I don't know how else to describe it. I was miserable for months afterwards and I had a hard time picking up with my life. The murder took place about three weeks after my AmeriCorps job finished. After that, I knew I wanted to take a break from social services - and so eventually, I got the job I'm in now.

I kept dreaming of rewinding time and making it "not happen" and wondering what was going through his head at the time and if he knew he was about to be killed and if he saw or knew his killer and if he was afraid and what could have been done to stop it and... so on. My mind was obsessed with it. It has definitely left a mark on me.

And then, I also know that VV wasn't exactly an angel. He had a past. He certainly didn't deserve that end. He was a kind soul deep down - especially when he wasn't on drugs. He did things for the other kids. He was like a brother - a younger brother to me (he was 16) and an older brother to all of the other kids at the center. He wasn't just a "gang member." It made me angry that I knew that so many people who read about his death or heard about it would dismiss it just as I dismissed so many DC/Baltimore killings as I grew up. These kids are somebody to someone out there.

And TN! TN didn't have a history. He was practically an angel. And he too will be dismissed by so many as just a "gang member" by virtue of his race and the neighborhood he lived in.

I wish I could do something about this. I wish that I could just write a letter to the editor and get someone to investigate this and INSIST that it be investigated and INSIST that someone be arrested. I don't think that I could make the difference, though. I just wish that all things were fair and that the murder or a little 14 year old Vietnamese boy would be treated the same as the murder of a rich little 14 year old white boy.

So right now, I'm in about the same head-space as I was in immediately after 9/11. Everything seems stupid and pointless. All of my little dreams and desires seem stupid. Holidays seem stupid. Everything feels trite and insignificant. I can't stop thinking about this. I can't sleep. I just want to expell it all from my head.

And I apologize to any of you who have gotten this far - I'm sorry for being such a downer. I just needed to get that out of my system. I just ache right now. I'll probably feel better after I go back to work and get so stressed out that I can't think. And then I will have some vacation time. And maybe on that long train ride, I will think of a way to make the world a fair place. Ha.