In The Long Run ... Is The World Any Safer?

In light of what has been a horrific week, one can’t help but wonder, are the bad old days back?

Whether what happened in Boston turns out to be the work of Al-Qaeda, or that of a couple crazies, it brings up some uncomfortable memories.

For a dozen years, we in America have gotten a pass from the kind of violence that is painfully commonplace in much of the world. I hate to think that the party’s over but I didn’t sleep well on Monday and Tuesday wasn’t much different.

I’m starting to hesitate again when I reach for the TV remote for fear of what I might see. I’m a little slower turning on the radio or glancing at headlines in news racks.

Of course the bombing at the Boston Marathon may well have been a random act, but that doesn't make those folks any less dead or maimed.

It’s strange, however, when tragedy happens, how quickly our fears turn into admiration.

While watching the news on Monday, I thought about the uniformed responders on 9/11, lugging equipment up countless stairs … a climb that, for many, would be their last.

Determined faces focused on helping their fellow brothers and sisters. I saw that look again that afternoon in Bean Town. Only this time the helpers were in running shorts and Nikes.

That morning, when they stepped to the starting line and the gun went off, how could they have imagined that it would turn out to be the race of their life?

The Marathon, the dream, the cross-one-off-the-bucket-list, the “Tell the kids I did it, honey.” Yet, 20 yards from the finish, the dream went south. Their bucket lists and dreams were put on hold. The running stopped and the helping began.

Folks who seconds before just wanted to finish now just needed to help. Unhurt and in shock, they reached out to the injured and lead them to safety. All the while having no idea where safety lay.

Chaos is an odd landscape to negotiate for anyone. The fact that the marathoners, confused and depleted of energy, had the wherewithal to put others first, made them all winners that day.

Of all the awful sights and sounds that this week has left us, it’s the ones of people leaning on strangers to get through, that I choose to remember. And maybe that’s the way it should be.

Are things going to get worse? I hope not. But I’ll tell you this, I’m pretty sure that on Monday, we as a people couldn’t have been any better.