running through my head.

Anniversary (noun) - the annual recurrence of a date marking a notable event

These things are easy to think but not to share. It is with great trepidation, I hit "publish post" knowing this could be read by others.

I can still hear the sound of my world view shattering. It's not a dramatic sound whatsoever, it is swift and finite like that of an egg dropping to the floor, and absolutely a figment of my imagination that assigns sounds and pictures to everything. The visual though, is different; my delicate little glass world was squeezed too hard by a firm hand... It didn't fall into a thousand pieces, it kept its spherical integrity (think broken windshield), but the one piece became many I'd have to refuse together with time.

Here's a conundrum: do you go on, unchanged after a truly heartless act, or do you let it change you? Do you at least acknowledge you are different or pretend you're not? This idea of letting evil "win" is troubling. I'm sorry, I didn't know we were playing a game. I don't know the rules. Is this force of good ever really the loser when it's up against evil? Maybe I don't know what it means to win or lose, then. We hear all the time, we can't let evil win. I don't know what that means.

The struggle for me seems to be how to go about this most difficult day. Should I break my routine or continue with it? I like that this day has come to mean gatherings are formed of people who understand, who come to just be. together.

I think about what I want as a legacy after my own death. Most of all I want to be remembered. Have everyone know how much I love them. So, then, is that the answer? Aside from letting our loved ones know we love them, letting those we've lost know we remember them, what they've gone through, and acknowledging their potential? I'm reading this book about the Vel D'hiv roundup and its message is clear: remembering is powerful. Remembering seems to be the only way to move forward when we can't change the past. Always remember, never forget, right? It just doesn't seem like enough.

What about letting them inspire you? For me, it's those 32 people with their 32,000 gifts. It's almost insurmountable to try to think what I could do on their behalf. Although I know many people who've suffered from the same hands that killed them, I didn't know them. If they are anywhere near as wonderful as their friends, their classmates, and their families, though, they were so worth knowing. What about recognizing the wonderful things about the people who are still here? I hate that we sometimes only see the dreams and gifts of the people around us after they're no longer here. I know these things about my friends, but what about the people I'm not as close to? I'd like to open my eyes a little more.

I should be studying right now; studying microscopic evils (infectious diseases), but I'm not. I'm pondering human suffering. Loss. Tragedy. Violence. Surviving. I'm sad. I'm wondering whether or not it's a good thing that a great act of evil has become woven into the fiber of my being and that I wouldn't even change it. Of course, if I could have prevented it from happening at all I would have... but if it was going to happen I wouldn't change having it affect me. It gives me perspective. It can, on a rainy day when I can't find motivation, be a sense of purpose... paying it forward for those who can't. I would never change having "been there" because the cosmic order of things would have put someone else there instead.

We have trouble with senseless acts because they prevent everyone from feeling safe. We hear time and again that life isn't fair, but it really messes with us when we see it being true because it prevents us from ever feeling safe knowing it could be us at any moment. This is why some organizations believe it necessary to find a reason why a higher power made this happen, and insist on letting us know through protest. They can't handle the truth that everyone is equally vulnerable to life's unfairness (although it plays out far from equally in the end), and spend their lives terrorizing ours because they want to construct a false bubble of safety in their own ridiculous and arbitrary rationalizations that perpetuate prejudices. I want to vent about their atrocity and simultaneously not mention them or give them any attention because then they are winning. There it is again. Losing a game I'm not playing. Ask any three year old what he thinks when he lost a game when he said no to playing and he'll scream, "NO FAIR. I SAID I WASN'T PLAYING." And back around again, with things not being fair. We're always playing this game of life, and it never is fair. It's all a continuum of chance that we have only some control over and only hindsight has the answers. That's life in all its wonder, I suppose.

All I know, though, is on this anniversary, I remember. I love those we lost and I love those that survived. I admire the strength and courage. I'm constantly inspired by those I see and their triumph over adversity, in this tragedy or others. I'm filled with love, hope and faith. I don't understand and I can never go back. But I can remember.