Thursday, April 18, 2013

Story # 51: "The Terrible Things"

These things happen, but they don't have to. The terrible things pull us closer together, but if that's what it takes, then maybe we're better off apart.

Why, though, can't we find common ground in the face of no tragedy at all? Why can we not laugh with each other as well as grieve? There's certainly much about ourselves at which to laugh.

Instead we bash each other relentlessly, butting heads and locking horns with our fellow man, just for the sake of argument. What's so wrong with not being right all the time? What's so right with pointing out others' wrongs?

What happened was awful, and no amount of rhetoric or posturing or suppositions will change that fact. Yet no amount of harmony will make it go away. True, it may dull the pain, but can never completely heal it.

I don't have all the answers, but I do have more questions than usual. Like, when is it okay to take a life? Before birth, in self-defense, in times of war, or on a whim? Or never?

The terrible things make me question what's real, what's important, and what I can't live without. But why is it only in times like these that I make these considerations?

I'm not ashamed to say that I don't know.

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