Nature freaks

While I work on some other stuff I have in my queue, I want to drop a quick note here relative to yesterday’s bombings in London.

It is terrible, yes. The roots of terrorism must be adresssed, yes. We must be as prepared as possible for these situations, yes. All our hearts are with Londoners today, yes, as they were with New Yorkers four years ago, as they were with madrile?ɬ�os a year ago. As they should be with irakis every other week. As they are and should be with many others daily.

But instead of discussing ad nauseam why did this happen and could it have been prevented, and fretting, and despairing, and getting ourselves more and more worked up, I suggest that those of us who can do nothing to help the ones that now most need it now (i.e. the victims) just go on with our ordinary lives.

Perhaps growing up in Madrid, with my mom’s car getting checked daily for bombs while entering the parking lot at her workplace, has rendered me numb to the terror threat. I don’t know. What I do know, however, is how I approach the ’terrorist threat’. I approach it as the inhabitants of, say, Florida, approach tornados: sometimes nature freaks out and we can’t do anything to prevent it, and there is very little we can do to protect ourselves from its consequences. We just have to learn to cope with it. Regroup, and continue moving forward.

(The gorgeous picture of Canary Wharf that accompanies this note belongs to Kit Hartford.)

Tags: current affairs

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