Oh Elizabeth, THANK YOU! For finding the words, for writing them, for knowing that the people trying to insist this mass murder of babies is justified, are just dead wrong. I can barely write anything these days, because just carrying on with my life in the face of this horror seems ludicrous, and yet what else can we do but take the next breath, do the next indicated thing, keep living, while so many keep dying. Thank you for your humanity, for helping me understand that I'm not crazy, I'm seeing what I'm seeing, the nightmare is really happening, even if outside my window the leaves turn peacefully, a world away from gray bodies being pulled from the rubble, the sobbing fathers, mothers, children, the hollow eyed doctors, and everyone starving, everyone parched. And now it is raining here, and all I can think in that the people of Gaza are forbidden to collect rainwater, as by legal statute it belongs to the Israeli government. How can this be?
It sickens me to know, to see, to understand, that the world cares nothing for children, that they are disposable, collateral damage. I want to scream at someone, but to who? When I was pregnant with my middle daughter, children were dying in a war. When I was pregnant with Katie, children were dying in a different war. Why the fuck is this still going on?
I don't think there are many who witness it, even secondhand, who don't care, except the kind of people who can't imagine themselves in another's shoes. It's a matter of feeling helpless to stop it or change it from our own comfortable living rooms over here. Who knows the solution, other than learning as a species to handle disagreement and conflict, anger and greed, in a nonviolent way? As a species, we never have. But looking throughout history, there are fewer wars and less violence than there has ever been. Maybe we will get where we need to go eventually, but it appears not without a lot of suffering along the way. So sad there are always these bad actors who seem inhuman and make terrible choices ... many of them from the safety of a war room. I feel horror, and focusing on it drags me into an abyss I don't deserve to be in any more than those who are suffering right now deserve it. We can only witness and hope for better.
Yes, everyday I grapple with the sorrow of so many killed and wounded, the trauma that will embed itself in the generations to come. I struggle with what can I do? Feelings of anger with the hate and prejudice in the world and the power of men who want to WIN, whatever that means. I don't see an end to it in so many places in the world. It seems like the state of the human race for those that rise to power wanting more and willing to devastate lives to gain it while they remain safe from the consequences. I feel fear about what is to come.
Oh Elizabeth, THANK YOU! For finding the words, for writing them, for knowing that the people trying to insist this mass murder of babies is justified, are just dead wrong. I can barely write anything these days, because just carrying on with my life in the face of this horror seems ludicrous, and yet what else can we do but take the next breath, do the next indicated thing, keep living, while so many keep dying. Thank you for your humanity, for helping me understand that I'm not crazy, I'm seeing what I'm seeing, the nightmare is really happening, even if outside my window the leaves turn peacefully, a world away from gray bodies being pulled from the rubble, the sobbing fathers, mothers, children, the hollow eyed doctors, and everyone starving, everyone parched. And now it is raining here, and all I can think in that the people of Gaza are forbidden to collect rainwater, as by legal statute it belongs to the Israeli government. How can this be?
It sickens me to know, to see, to understand, that the world cares nothing for children, that they are disposable, collateral damage. I want to scream at someone, but to who? When I was pregnant with my middle daughter, children were dying in a war. When I was pregnant with Katie, children were dying in a different war. Why the fuck is this still going on?
I don't think there are many who witness it, even secondhand, who don't care, except the kind of people who can't imagine themselves in another's shoes. It's a matter of feeling helpless to stop it or change it from our own comfortable living rooms over here. Who knows the solution, other than learning as a species to handle disagreement and conflict, anger and greed, in a nonviolent way? As a species, we never have. But looking throughout history, there are fewer wars and less violence than there has ever been. Maybe we will get where we need to go eventually, but it appears not without a lot of suffering along the way. So sad there are always these bad actors who seem inhuman and make terrible choices ... many of them from the safety of a war room. I feel horror, and focusing on it drags me into an abyss I don't deserve to be in any more than those who are suffering right now deserve it. We can only witness and hope for better.
My heart breaks. Over and over. A tenderizing. An annihilation. It depends on the day.
Yes, everyday I grapple with the sorrow of so many killed and wounded, the trauma that will embed itself in the generations to come. I struggle with what can I do? Feelings of anger with the hate and prejudice in the world and the power of men who want to WIN, whatever that means. I don't see an end to it in so many places in the world. It seems like the state of the human race for those that rise to power wanting more and willing to devastate lives to gain it while they remain safe from the consequences. I feel fear about what is to come.
Yes
You’ve described it so well, all of it. Thank you.
Xoxo
Barbara
Thank you.
Crying. mostly people just don't care. So many people dying.
Nothing to add. Thank you for wrapping it all so gently, still.
And our hearts break. You capture it so well, Elizabeth. And still it continues.