Normalcy Guilt

I’ve been blogging on the fate of New Orleans for some time now, in part because it seems wrong to be concerned about anything else while so many people are suffering so badly, and in part because the extent of the disaster is fascinating and terrible to behold. But the fact of the matter is, I have had plenty of other things on my mind, too.

For two days, it’s been non-stop action for me — logging more than 200 miles on the car in a day driving around very inefficient routes to satisfy my various responsibilities; depositions and tracking down information for experts; grading and teaching classes; trying to find quality time to spend with my wife and my critters; getting paid and paying my bills; and tonight, enjoying clear skies to see the conjunction of Venus and Jupiter, and later to look for the double star Albiero (at the west end of Cygnus). In short, I’ve been living my own life pretty normally all week.

In fact, the skirts of the hurricane that went through here was pretty much a big thunderstorm, nothing really remarkable. It blew some lawn chairs across the deck and knocked over my barbeque. Big deal. Katrina has not affected me directly and personally in any way. It has only indirectly affected me in that I’m now paying nearly a dollar more for a gallon of gas than I did a week ago, thanks to a largely unnecessary panic over petroleum supplies.

I feel a little bit guilty about this. It takes someone with less empathy and self-awareness than a wet Hefty bag to look at the television and see the surreal, horrifying images from New Orleans, and compare that to one’s own normal, relatively comfortable life filled with everyday, normal cares, pleasures, and comforts. My personal needs for food, clothing, shelter, clean water, electricity, and cash flow are being met. At least a million Americans can no longer say that. I want to do something that will help them. But, I can’t take time to travel to the Delta and donate my time and labor; indeed, with gas prices being gouged out of control, I need to stay and provide for my family’s immediate financial needs more than ever. That, and I’m not too keen on getting shot by a looter. Besides, the only suggestions that I’ve heard being made for how to help are to give money to a charity like the Red Cross.

Now, recall that the Wife and I are trying to save money to buy a house of our own. Still, so many people have no homes or shelter of any kind — and I don’t know if we should give some of our money to help out those in much, much greater need than us. It would set our plans back a little bit, and if we take some money from our savings out for that, then we’ll do it again for something else next week, and then do it again the week after that, and pretty soon, all the savings will be gone and our money won’t have made a huge difference in the world anyway. So yes, we must be disciplined with our own money.

The essence of good moral behavior is to act as though one’s own actions were being used as the model for rules of universal application. (Yes, I know that this is pretty much Kant’s categorical imperative and I don’t apologize for that at all.) Consider how ought others to act, and then act that way yourself. It seems to me that I want others to help out people in need because if I were in need, I would need the help myself. So I should help out those in need now.

So I’ve not made a financial donation to any of the many good causes trying to help (yet), because I’m not feeling very financially secure now when I take a long-view look at our situation, and I’m not yet willing to break the savings discipline that The Wife and I are hoping will make that long-term outlook brighter. I’m making good money now, but that can change at any time and I’m not feeling particularly secure about the employment situation at the firm. I wish things were more secure for us, because then I wouldn’t even hesitate to make a financial contribution to try and provide some relief.