Tuesday, April 17, 2007

A Black Day


Where were you when you heard about the black day at Virginia Tech?
I was sitting in the SUB (Student Union Building) at The University of New Mexico. I had just completed a test and I was feeling pretty satisfied with it. I was setting up my computer to read my e-mail and check the blogs I follow. Then I heard the sound of shooting.
It was coming from the giant flat-screen in the corner near where I was sitting. And as I listened to the eye-witness accounts, I was thinking that I was seated in front of a floor-to-ceiling plate-glass window. If someone with a gun were to decide the shoot at the SUB..... well, I would be in harm's way. I didn't move.
As one does, at times like this, I was thinking that the peaceful scene outside the window--newly leafed-out trees swaying in the wind, undergraduates going by in flip-flops with eighty pound backpacks, a couple holding hands at a table outside--felt like it was not in the same world where this tragedy happened.
Thirty-three lives. Gone. Just...like...that.
It was hard to come back to my world...the one on a campus where such a thing would never happen. Would it?
There will be much to say in the coming days about the how's and the why's. I am sure there will be finger-pointing, calls for legislation, hand-wringing and lawsuits. I may even have an opinion or two. Maybe. Next week.
But for now, it is a time to think about the loss of 33 individuals--people with dreams, goals, joys and sorrows. Gone. Just. Like. That.

3 comments:

Megan Bayliss said...

I was driving when I heard the first news flashes. Boy was talking but fell silent as I lifted my hand to indicate quiet.

I pulled over and sat astounded. Mass killings are something that evades my understanding of life and death, good and bad. I apprecate that life is shades of grey, not black and white, but...33 lives falls beyond even my appreciation of shades of grey.

My thoughts are with the families of everyone affected.

Lides said...

I should have been on campus yesterday morning, but my seven year old had had a migraine the night before, so I'd had no sleep and stayed home. The kids were playing downstairs while I tried to write a (long over-due) paper upstairs. Writer's block led to checking the news, and so I found out.

It has hit me so hard. So hard.

I have to believe that the powers of light are stronger than the powers of darkness.

All I can do, right now, is pray.

Mama Squirrel said...

Elisheva: looking at your recent posts, I think what you're saying here could also be applied to Yom Ha-Shoah. Tears for them all because each one was a person. The Common Room's Head Girl posted something about that yesterday too. http://heartkeepercommonroom.blogspot.com/2007/04/parents-teach-hate.html