When the laughter dies (emails from abroad)

Dearest Friends,

I write to you primarily to relate to you that I am indeed safe, healthy, and extremely thankful right now for both those things. There is no need to worry about me. (any more than normal)

I also wish to communicate the first hand emotions of this tragedy. This will probably be the most profoundly sad of my memories here in Spain. We seek consolation and there is simply none to be had for an act this devastating.

Classes were cancelled today. We all sat on the floor and tried to comprehend what had happened to our joyful Spain, our exuberant Madrid. So full of life, bustling with an energy and zest of which I have never seen the like. And to see that energy forced into a conversion to solidarity in grief, a solidarity that quieted an entire metropolis for five minutes today at noon, is one of the most prominent losses I have felt in my young life. The streets that normally bustle with nightlife stood morbidly empty last night, as I'm sure they will again tonight.

Because I live in a sort of technological hole with neither television nor radio and only occasional internet access, the emotion of the events of 3/11 did not fully hit me until I saw today's newspapers. The numbness of human atrocity that I am familiar with only through 9/11 resurfaced, only this time with an edge of personal fear. This is a city I consider very much my own. This was a place that I have been to many times. The last bomb, found minutes ago, was in a Metro station I had used this morning.

An overwhelming, helpless fear overcomes me. What can I do? What can I say? Pray? My prayers feel altogether too weak to touch my sentiment, too feeble to soothe the pain of so many, too frail to forgive such an atrocity of men.

A few of us laughed. We took to laughter to soothe the rawness that we each felt inside. We had to laugh, otherwise we would dissolve in the salt of our own tears. But it was soon pointed out that our laughter was insulting to Spaniards on a day of such grieving. We are indeed foreigners here, and I respect the need for a healing sadness so encompassing that it covers the country like today's low-hanging stratus clouds.

So what is left? What happens when we have lost our laughter? We cry.

We cry for those who awoke yesterday in love with partners, in arguments with parents, in joy with the pleasure of another God-given day, only to be ripped from this world so furiously we all question our humanity.

We cry for those who no longer have their parents, lovers, friends, children, because we know how many have touched our own lives, and how horrendous it would be to have one, just one, of those threads torn from our tapestry of friendships, to leave us in ravels.

We cry for those who have lost so much of their human consciousness so as to be able to commit such an act. We cry that these people exist all over the world.

But we also cry in the bittersweet fact that although so much is lost, mush is also found in the Promise of our Lord. Those who died in faith will continue to live in faith. But we still cry.

I cry.

My friends. You all have blessed me continually in my life, and I am so grateful for you all. Please keep me and all those affected by this tragedy in your thoughts and prayers. I send you all my love, and hope for a better world through forgiveness,

Christian