Thursday, September 21, 2006

Archival insanity

i tell you, this inputting of old files into the system is gonna be the death of me. Not only is it tedious, but I can't quit reading about the deceased. Suicides, murders, car accidents, SIDs. I quietly rejoice when i come to an old man who died peacefully at home. Somehow they've been delegated in my mind as plain old deaths and I'm glad for them. First those files make the data entry process continue moving forward, unlike others which slow me down for ten to thirty minutes. And mostly, plain old deaths are how it's "supposed to be".

Yesterday I came across the worst of the worst. Two siblings, children under 12, cause of death for both said "mortally assaulted". No other information. Of course i googled them. Aaay, what the heck did i do that for? Their deaths were almost fifteen years ago, but due to the nature and the huge publicity they garnered, there was no lack of reading material. They were attacked and killed by a child predator, who then went on to kill again, was caught and subsequently executed. All afternoon yesterday, I thought about them, wondered how their families are. Prayed silently for their moms and their dads and for the third child's brother who turned his back for only a few moments and the predator struck. I worry that he took on the responsibility for his sibling's death, when he was only a child himself at the time and could have done nothing to stop it. I'm nauseated all afternoon.
I have nightmares last night. Children killing other children. A lone man stands in the background and supervises. I awake with a start, thinking it's only a dream, then fall back to sleep and restart in the same place I left off. Today I'm edgy and uncertain yet again about this job.

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