Monday, April 16, 2007

not again

I remember where I was when the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake hit. I remember what I felt when I saw on the news the sadness of Columbine in 1999. I remember the shock that registered through me when a friend told me the horror in the morning of 9/11. I remember standing in the living room and watching the Indonesia tsunami in Dec. '04 and then Hurricane Katrina in Aug.'05. These country (and world) events stay with me. I remember them vividly.

And now, sadly, I have a new one.

I came home from Mexico last night and was so tired, I couldn't even put words together to form coherent sentenes for my roomates. I went to bed and didn't wake up till noon today. I was still so incredibly tired. "Gosh, what an amazing week," I was thinking. "These high school and college students built 5 houses. We all bonded as a family. There were no major illnesses, accidents, car problems. Such an awesome experience!"

Because I had planned to not leave my bed all day, I grabbed my laptop and went to check my email. As I got on yahoo, my heart stopped. WHAT?! A school shooting? Virginia Tech? 33 people dead and more than 15 injured? How could this happen???

It felt so surreal. Here I was, recovering from an incredible mission trip and feeling so tired and weary...and the first day back, I am reading about the worst shooting rampage in our nation's history.

I was watching the news and they showed about 20 seconds of someone's cell phone video capturing the sounds of the gunfire inside a school building. I seriously felt like I was going to throw up. And then a half hour later, they played it again. STOP! I felt like back at 9/11 when the news kept replaying the scenes of the planes hitting the towers over and over again. I wanted to look away or turn the TV off, but I couldn't. I felt so sick to my stomach.

I am so sad.

I don't get our world.

1 comment:

rené said...

i know...i just don't understand how we can get so caught up in our own junk that we lash out in such horrible ways...and then we have to relive the moments everytime we turn on a t.v. yuck. :(