This is not the type of post I would have thought I would be writing while abroad.
This morning I woke up and learned of the Boston Marathon bombing through a Facebook message from my mom. We have someone we know who runs with a team, so she was briefing me for the flood of news with the good news that the person we know and that person's team were alright.
But...
Many were not. I have read of the death and mayhem that this bombing has caused, and how it has changed some victims' lives. It...hurts. No word can describe the excruciating pain of bearing witness to another attack on US soil. With that being said, unlike 9/11, we cannot tell easily what kind of attack this was. I do hope we will know in the days to come.
Anyways, enough focus on the type of event this is. Let us remain focus for now on the victims to this attack. The most obvious victims are those who were killed or injured/maimed by the explosions. However, let us not forget the victims with invisible injuries, the ones who bore witness to the attack, the ones who were struck with fear over the possible loss of loved ones, the ones who did in fact lose someone, and the American people as a whole.
When something like this happens, we all suffer. Do not belittle your own suffering just because you are fairly removed from the event. You will still feel the pain of loss on your soul.
An attack like this wounds physically, emotionally, and mentally. We tend to forget the victims that were not amongst the physically wounded, since the wounded and the dead are the most easily identifiable victims of an attack.
When I heard about this attack, my heart, of course, ached for the physically wounded and the families who had just lost someone. But, my heart went out also to those who were invisibly wounded. I could imagine the breath my friend held in anticipation for the "We're ok!" from teammates and acquaintances. That hurts, waiting. I know, because I was that person when the Tohoku quake occurred. It's a fear that scars you for life, even if everyone you know was ok.
I thought about the people who stood witness...no....stand witness to the actual bomb. There is no past tense when you are confronted with an act like this. This is a wound that will never fully heal.
Then, as I chatted with another US study-abroad student here in Japan, via Facebook, I thought of the Americans who are abroad at this moment. We are culturally and emotionally isolated from the Boston Marathon attack. To us, this seems unreal, moreso than if we were at home. That is because we are isolated. We aren't going to walk out on the street and necessarily hear others discussing the bombing, nor will we easily find another American to open up to. Heck, we won't even be understood by others when we are distracted today. We are alone to a degree...which takes me to another set of victims....
The Americans abroad who have connections to Boston.
If you are in pain about this bombing, if I'm hurting from it, can you even try and imagine the person isolated by region and culture who's home has been rocked by an attack?
So why did I write this blog? It was not to honor the victims. It was not to add a check mark to my Americanism. It was because I am in pain from this attack. I needed others to hear my voice and to understand the viewpoint of another American who's experiencing this event abroad. And...it was to bring to light the different victims of such an attack.
I experienced the Oklahoma bombing as a young child watching the news, with very little understanding of the world nor my own nation. I experienced 9/11 as a middle-schooler being awoken by my mom for what was supposed to be a normal picture-day at school. Now, I am abroad experiencing yet another tragedy on my nation's soil, my home's soil. It hurts. It's unbearably painful not being home in the wake of this tragedy, even if my US home is hundreds of miles away from Boston. But from my own pain, I can realize the more fragility of those whose world was rocked right before their eyes, through bearing witness to the tragedy in Boston to having connections to Boston or its historical marathon.
This blog is the rawest blog I have written yet. If it seems like a rushing river of thoughts, well, it is.
Today I ask of you to think of all the victims of this attack, including those with the invisible wounds. Pray for our nation to gather these victims up in prayer and that God will use this tragedy for His Glory, for no event is too heavy for His Will! And Pray for the victims themselves, of course! Pray for the personnel having to handle the chaos before us, those in the medical field and those on the political front. We have yet to know who did this to our nation. It may have been a fellow American or an international. So you can only imagine how our law enforcement and political leaders have to handle this situation.
In short, pray for America this day. We grieve as one, we struggle as one, we seek relief as one. Let this be a tragedy that brings us back together as one family, just like how 9/11 initially united us as one. That unity, as tragic as it was, was one of the most beautiful and most hopeful miracle a child could see. Let us reunite as one for our children's sake!
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