My sister-in-law and her sister were there, at the race, this afternoon. They are okay. On the train, safe, hurtling back here to Gardner, about forty-five minutes away. We were all watching the marathon, on t.v., knowing several runners and friends of runners on the course. Then, cameras covering the finish line: KABOOM!
Seconds later, even as people ran in every direction, runners being pulled from the course, just seconds from crossing the blasted area, some standing dead-stop, in confusion and wonder, a second blast, fifty yards down Boylston St.
Immediately, American Yankees do what Americans do best: deal with emergencies. At our finest when things are at their darkest, common citizens from all over the world dashed into the flames and smoke and bleeding bodies, doing what needed to be done. On camera we see students, runners, family people, tourists, grabbing debris and pulling it away from horrific victims. The press pitched in, though they kept filming and talking. However, people, once they realized that it was NOT a celebratory explosion, but a bomb set down to kill, didn't just run away but ran toward the scene of the crime--to see what they could do to help.
Emergency personnel immediately appeared--first city then state and finally federal officers. Bicycle cops helped lead people down the saturated cobblestoned alleys, past the jammed buses, to safety, to the Boston Common. Runners stayed as calm as could be expected, but then, it hit: exhaustion mixed with terror and abject fear. The sudden surrealistic stopping of the most famous race in America, at the finish line, on a beautiful spring day--do to terrorist attack--or what everyone is assuming is a terrorist attack.
Yes, this is America--it's flagship city of Revolutionary ways and days--under attack, even as it hosts the world's athletes--celebrating the glory and joy of human accomplishment--celebrating the human experience of democracy: old, young, able-bodied, differently challenged, the elite running in the same race as those whose amateur attempts mark a kind personal miracle...For those who seek to tear apart the gossamer fabric of human civilization, these kinds of attacks aimed at gatherings of multi-national, multi-cultural, multi-generational citizens are the most heinous crimes imaginable.
A holiday in my state of Massachusetts: Patriots Day, celebrating the people who have given their lives in the past to create a still-evolving country. Now, it is marked in the blood of innocent children and athletes. Boston is changed. It will recover, as all great cities recover from acts of cowards. But it will never be the same.
And for those whose bodies are blasted away on this spring afternoon: they and their families join the thousands of victims all over this planet of blood. No matter who is responsible... the question is always the same: will we never learn?
Seconds later, even as people ran in every direction, runners being pulled from the course, just seconds from crossing the blasted area, some standing dead-stop, in confusion and wonder, a second blast, fifty yards down Boylston St.
Immediately, American Yankees do what Americans do best: deal with emergencies. At our finest when things are at their darkest, common citizens from all over the world dashed into the flames and smoke and bleeding bodies, doing what needed to be done. On camera we see students, runners, family people, tourists, grabbing debris and pulling it away from horrific victims. The press pitched in, though they kept filming and talking. However, people, once they realized that it was NOT a celebratory explosion, but a bomb set down to kill, didn't just run away but ran toward the scene of the crime--to see what they could do to help.
Emergency personnel immediately appeared--first city then state and finally federal officers. Bicycle cops helped lead people down the saturated cobblestoned alleys, past the jammed buses, to safety, to the Boston Common. Runners stayed as calm as could be expected, but then, it hit: exhaustion mixed with terror and abject fear. The sudden surrealistic stopping of the most famous race in America, at the finish line, on a beautiful spring day--do to terrorist attack--or what everyone is assuming is a terrorist attack.
Yes, this is America--it's flagship city of Revolutionary ways and days--under attack, even as it hosts the world's athletes--celebrating the glory and joy of human accomplishment--celebrating the human experience of democracy: old, young, able-bodied, differently challenged, the elite running in the same race as those whose amateur attempts mark a kind personal miracle...For those who seek to tear apart the gossamer fabric of human civilization, these kinds of attacks aimed at gatherings of multi-national, multi-cultural, multi-generational citizens are the most heinous crimes imaginable.
A holiday in my state of Massachusetts: Patriots Day, celebrating the people who have given their lives in the past to create a still-evolving country. Now, it is marked in the blood of innocent children and athletes. Boston is changed. It will recover, as all great cities recover from acts of cowards. But it will never be the same.
And for those whose bodies are blasted away on this spring afternoon: they and their families join the thousands of victims all over this planet of blood. No matter who is responsible... the question is always the same: will we never learn?
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