The Massacre...

Dear Friends,

Its been ages since I blogged and a lot has happened in the interim period.......my exams, for instance (and that IS a lot!!!!). But now all that is behind me and I am back to what I love most....writing!

If there's anything in the recent past that has affected me more than anything else, it has to be the disaster wreaked by the suicide bomber at Virginia Tech last month. I know its a bit late for me to be writing on that now. Nevertheless, I will add my humble two-pence to the story. 32 people dead (including the killer himself) and so many more injured, it was something that took almost the whole world by shock.

Just imagine.

A student who spoke to her parents the previous night saying everything was fine and she was very happy with the way her studies were going and same with life in general at Virginia Tech. And next day, those parents get to know that she's gone. They'll never see her again, hear her voice again........

Just imagine.

A group of friends who met, planned a get-together on the pretext of combined study. And before they know it, their plan is blown up just as their bodies, into innumerable shrivels, the bits never to be out together and the plan, never to materialize..........

Just imagine.

Professors in the staff room, huddled over a desk making course plans, setting timetables, preparing test papers or simply chatting over some tea/snacks and the next thing they know, they're gone......just like that........in a fraction of a second......like clicking your fingers.......

Just imagine.

The pally twosome walking around the campus cheerfully talking, gossiping, laughing and fighting.......and then bidding goodbye across the ground not realizing that its the last time they'll be doing so or worse still, one of them suddenly seeing the other going up in flames and smoke........

Just close your eyes and imagine all of these................................

The physical damage that has been caused is definitely very costly. Loss in terms of infrastructure, damage to the lawns, the building, etc can be seen and felt. But infinitely more serious damage has been inflicted on the survivors and their mental and emotional stability. The ones who went up in flames suffered for a nanosecond and before they could realize what was happening, they were gone...forever. But the people they left behind were, and indubitably still are filled with a deep sense of loss and a shock that'll continue to haunt them for life.

The parents of the deceased, their close relatives, friends and acquaintances are bound to be consumed by grief but even those they may have never known, the common man like us, is terrified by the event. The prospect of sending a loved one away from us (more so for parents sending their children abroad) suddenly seems frightful.

In the midst of all this comes a second angle to the tale. The killer - Seung-Hui Cho. A person who was subjected to neglect and at the same time made an object of ridicule, who eventually succumbed to his own insecurities and decided to take away a few dozen other lives along with his own. However much we sympathize with this lad (though I must admit I don't in the least), the premise can't be a legitimate one for an act such as this. Whatever it was that egged him on to perform this disgusting act was surely not laudable.

If anything, he was a psychopath who shrouded his instability of the mind by a veil in the nature of a complex insecurity cast upon him by his colleagues at the university in one of the two ways - neglect or ridicule. And he played this trump card making it the supposed motive of his cowardly act.

Whatever the reason, friends, a massacre is a massacre and nothing can justify it. What's done is done and all that remains is a charred legacy of the height of a sadistic psyche. The tragic sight of the bombing will remain with the witnesses and always remind them of how narrowly they escaped, how ruthlessly their colleague had behaved (misbehaved rather!!) and how tragically they had lost their friends.

This post is a prayer for those poor shattered souls that are up in heaven now and for their families who grieve for them and feel a deep sense of bereavement. Amen.

A tear-jerker this one, hope for a happier post next time. Till then, from Slo, this is Tally-Ho!