Shaken, Not Deterred

by Linda Sharp

As if the continuing reports out of Myanmar are not heartbreaking enough, with firm estimates of over 32,000 dead, tens of thousands still missing, and an aid response still hampered by the military junta...

Now we are faced with the staggering numbers coming in of dead (official number as of this morning: over 15,000), trapped (26,000 - very fluid number), and missing (14,000 - again, expected to rise dramatically) after Monday's 7.9 magnitude earthquake which rocked nearly all of China.

Happening at approximately 230pm, the results are devastating - think of where your entire family is at 230 in the afternoon:  kids at school, you and/or hubby at work, in the Walmart, friends at the Mall, grandma at the grocery store, post office - everyone going about their busy day.

Then imagine the earth deciding to throw a major hissy fit for long minutes, shaking everything to its core, pulling every structure from its foundation, burying alive you and everyone you love.

That's the part I cannot get away from in my mind.

The number of schools which have turned into tombs.  Office buildings, hospitals, factories, all crumbled like a child's Lincoln log creation.

This morning there are reports that 18,000 people remain trapped in one city alone.

ONE CITY ALONE.

Roads are blocked, the weather is hampering any attempt at dropping paratroopers into remote regions where the full impact is still not known, and the entire country is faced with a Where-do-we-even-begin scenario.

As a parent, my heart has been in a vise for the past 48 hours.  I picked my children up at their schools yesterday and imagined how I would feel if I arrived to find the buildings were piles of rubble and my daughters lay somewhere beneath - alive?  dead?  injured?  frightened?

I don't believe there is a higher purpose when events like this occur.  I no more believe God sends an earthquake to bury school children than He does a cyclone to destroy entire towns.  I don't believe He is behind babies being raped and killed, mothers turning their children into pole dancers, or drunk drivers taking out entire families on their way home from church.

I believe sh*t happens.  And it happens to good people, bad people, innocent people, God fearing people, Atheists, Buddhists, Boy Scouts, pedophiles, accountants, Red Cross workers, Mormons, Catholics, 7-11 workers, waiters, students, teachers, rapists, murderers, Shiites, Sunnis, Bulgarians, pandas, giraffes, dogs, cats, monkeys, you, and me.

And when it happens, whether it is Mother Nature's fury, another human being's insanity or bloodlust, bad circumstances, wrong place, wrong time, a hemmorage in the brain, or even slipping in a puddle and fatally hitting your head - THAT'S when I believe God steps in.

THAT'S when I believe His hand reaches out to catch those who tragedy has befallen, to cradle those whose bodies have let them down, to comfort and welcome those who never saw it coming.

I have to believe that.

Because right now there are tens of thousands of people, whose blood runs as red as mine, whose children are their entire worlds, who were sitting in classrooms like my daughters are at this very moment, whose lives will never be the same, whose deaths have yet to be discovered - who were simply living their lives.

And it is with all of them in mind that I kissed my children goodbye this morning, shaken, yes - but undeterred.

Life is about living.  In this moment.  Living fully, loving completely. 

Because as we have seen demonstrated over the past two weeks, there is no guarantee of another moment, another heartbeat, another breath.

So use this one wisely.

Comments

[Monica]

great post, amen to all of the above

[Sam]

Oui, d'accord. Thank you for writing this blog, Linda.
-Sam