Quake and Wave

SUNDAY, MARCH 13, 2011


I am numb. The horrendous impact of the earthquake and subsequent tsunami on the human beings in Japan, so vividly seen on TV, has triggered a series of emotional responses in me that ranged from shock, to heart break, to deep sympathy and concern, to overwhelmed and numb. Glued to CNN, I have watched the devastation, the wave, the shaking, the fear, the loss until I can stand no more. I have seen all this before, other times, other places, other natural events that wreck havoc on our civilization.

We are prescient beings. We advance and improve as each generation builds on the knowledge from the previous generations. There is much we have learned to control from our earliest days as small groups of huddling mammals, gathering roots and berries, eventually tools, eventually hunting, eventually mastering fire, eventually farming. With shared words and symbols we advance. As our numbers grew, we huddled in larger and larger colonies, fueled from outside. We are now vast in numbers, vast in expertise, superb at developing food, shelter, clothing, and transportation. We journey "up" into space, "down" into the oceans, and "over" every inch of our planet. And just as we are secure in our advancement, the earth moves, the winds come, the rain falls.

How silly it seems today that we come to blows over politics, that we strike out at those of other faiths, that we posture regarding debt and taxes, that we make war over resources, that we create our own quakes and waves. How humbling it is to be reminded that we are alive on a planet and in a universe that is subject to forces far greater than we can control, even if we learn to understand. A plate shifts. Havoc erupts. We can not predict its coming and stand helpless in its arrival. We suffer, we die. And life goes on.

We want to know why, we want to know how, and that is the gift of our prescience. My sense of self, my deep beliefs, my connection to others, triggers both thoughts and feelings. I mourn all I know and love who have suffered or died. And with what we call disasters, I mourn all the other anonymous humans who suffer in mass, die in mass. I know we are blessed with a rich planet, an atomosphere, oceans, life. A planet that brings me the warm sun of early spring and the flowers bloom and the corn breaks ground. And on that same day it shifts a little and creates ripples.

The quake and wave have touched me and I mourn. And in my grief, I long for the day we stop unleashing such disasters on each other by human action.

Life is precious. Life is brief. Let us help one another.

POSTED BY EILEEN GOOD AT 9:17 AM

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1 COMMENTS:



Anonymous said...

sort of 'resets one's perspective' doesn't it?