It’s the end of a grueling business trip – one in which you were locked in hand-to-hand combat for three days with the vexatious attorney of a troublesome customer. And you’re full of petty complaints and irreverent anecdotes. And that’s in spite of the fact that your client called his concierge service and used one of his personal vouchers to get you upgraded to first class. Because being impossible is your thing. And as you are sipping wine in your comfortable seat and reflecting on how best to express your minor grievances as jokes, you learn that madmen in Paris have done something horrific and incomprehensible.
At once, your complaints evaporate. You are stunned, bewildered, dumbstruck. And as you hastily read the account on your phone, you feel rage and sadness in equal measure, and also gratitude for being alive, and guilt for the same reason. Paris is the non-Texas city you have visited the most since you started your legal career. These people are your colleagues and friends. And monsters have attacked them and their very way of life.
In the days to come, the horrors of Friday are compounded by ignorant statements on social media, or hypocrisy, or finger-wagging lectures about ignorant statements and hypocrisy. Some people show solidarity, and then are called out for having failed to display solidarity during other tragedies. And it is all so heartbreaking and disappointing. Then the refugees are demonized, and it turns your stomach. And you find you lack the will and perhaps even the capacity to engage. You have no voice. And what could you say anyway? The world is insane.
So you withdraw, and you cloak yourself in your family, and you celebrate their little victories. Your daughter wins the role she wanted in The Lion King musical at school. Inexplicably, your kindergartener is also cast in the musical, which is supposed to be a middle school production, and he beams with pride. Your dyslexic daughter finishes her first real chapter book, and gets a perfect score on the Accelerated Reader test she takes on it. Your older son proudly completes his Global Studies project, which features a meticulous Minecraft version of the Paris Catacombs – a project he started before the attacks, but finished in earnest after them.
You take solace in these and other moments. Because no matter the evil that exists in the world, there is still goodness and light. And as the days pass, you find your strength gathering and your voice returning. Indeed, you feel a growing compulsion to communicate. Because as tragic as the events of the last week were, the real tragedy would be to let the terrorists change and degrade the way you experience life. For truly it is better to die free than to live on their terms.
And while you’re still a bit raw, and you don’t find things very funny right now, you’re at least looking for the humor again. And that’s a step in the right direction.
A step toward healing.
A step toward frustrating the designs of the evil spider people refer to as the “mastermind” behind the attacks. But really, isn’t that name a little generous? Doesn’t it make him sound really smart (which, given the stupidity of his ideology, is probably inappropriate). Shouldn’t we be referring to him as the “asshole” behind the attacks? Or the “savage madman” behind the attacks? Or maybe we should just call him the “loser who really wants attention and whose parents clearly failed the world”.
I dunno. But what I do know is that I haven’t let friends, or employers, or even common sense shut me up yet. I’m not about to let terrorists start.
P.S. Let’s all be decent to each other.