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On Monday I went out to eat at a local restaurant with my family. When we got to the restaurant, I saw the news channel reporting the events that had unfolded in Boston during the marathon. My wife and I were unaware of the situation until then, and then my seven-year-old daughter Brianna started in with the questions. Have you ever been in that situation, trying to explain the rationale for why people would consider doing such terrible things to defenseless and innocent people, to a child?
While I was trying to process it all, I started to wonder — I started to wonder what it was like for those terrified runners, who, on top of running a 26.2 mile race, have to deal with all of that. I started to wonder what it was like for the innocent bystanders who may or may not have been affected by the tragedy. I began to wonder and ask the larger questions, even out loud. I asked, “Why do people feel they need to do this sort of thing? Why?”
I don’t like to hear bad news, and I don’t enjoy watching the repeated video footage of the bomb going off again and again and again. I even said so much to my wife. I also told her that while I understand the need to inform people of the event, I would prefer that the news refrains from making such a big deal of it, simply because sometimes the people who do these sorts of thing get a kick out of seeing the amount of panic it causes and how much attention it generates.
But most of all, I just wish we could live in a world free of hate and cruelty to others. I just wish we could all get along, and for heavens sake, if you are someone who feels that life has gotten so horrible, and if you are someone who feels that drastic measures are necessary, then please by all means carry out the drastic measures on yourself and yourself only, and leave other innocent people out of it. My goodness…What compels someone to act in a way that can tear apart families and forever change people’s lives? For what reason? I wonder…
I once read that one of the things that sets humans apart from other animals is the large brains that humans possess, and that the reason for the evolution of the large brain was because it gave us the ability to “read minds.” By reading minds and “wondering” what it would be like to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes, we could develop empathy, and be well on our way to greatness.
Well, I’m at a loss, still two days later. While I am filled with empathy, and while I am still wondering what it must be like, among other things, for a set of parents to have their eight-year-old son lose his life and have a six-year-old daughter lose her leg, simply because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time in a horrible twist of fate, I am also filled with deep sadness about how “not great” we humans can be sometimes.
Why we still continue to perpetuate anger, fear, hate, and selfishness is something I hope one day I won’t have to wonder about anymore.
