London is Calling

My heart goes out to everyone who lost loved ones in the London terrorist bombings today.  Also to those who were injured and/or traumatized by it.  My friends Andi and Neil are there for the summer, and thankfully they’re both all right.  Coincidentally, they’re staying in a building that overlooks Tavistock Square, the site of the bus that exploded. 

That’s all I have to say right now, I guess.  I need some more time to digest this experience.  All I can offer right now are sympathy and facts.  Terrorism baffles me.  Daily violence is not a part of my life – never has been.  The wealth and security that come from living in the U.S. have not trained me to deal with this sort of conflict.  I understand politics, hunger, economics, mental instability – other things that beget violence.  Yet understanding of terrorism eludes me.  I cannot comprehend the mind of the suicide bomber.  I cannot fathom how one’s life can culminate in this kind of deadly act. 

Thankfully my job is not to try.  I’m not charged with security of my country, and so if I live the rest of my life befuddled by terrorism the world won’t be devastated any more than it already is.  Or is that correct?  Shouldn’t every common person attempt to learn the motivations behind these tragedies?  I hardly think President Bush and Prime Minister Blair, even with the enormous resources at their command, will be able to change the course of global terrorism unless the ordinary citizens of their realms – nay, the world – can come to understand the conditions in which terrorism breeds and thrives.