Horrible, horrible night last night. Disbelief. Stark terror. A few dry heaves at 2:51 in the morning. Grief for everything we lost and for everything we’re going to lose. Then going to work and trying to put on a brave face, feeling like I’d already died and my body just hadn’t realized it yet. While I was there, a fragment from Tolkien came to mind, so I tracked it down when I came home.
“There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty forever beyond its reach.”
Amidst all of the anger, and the pain, and the fear, I think it’s important to remember that the sun still came up this morning. We are all of us still here. Our lives go on, because the light and the beauty are in us. That’s what we have to keep fighting for. Not for ourselves. Not even for our country. We have to keep fighting for the best in one another.
I’ve posted only a handful of times in the years I’ve been here, but I’ve been grateful to all of you for the laughter, the snark, the truths, the stories, and the comfort. I hope I can give back at least a touch of that comfort to some of you tonight.