Words that pale

I started a blog post earlier about something else, but instead, I feel like I need to write something about Japan.

But I don't know what to write about Japan. Anything I might say pales in comparison to the reality, especially since I'm so far away.

Every time I read or see the news it seems to get worse. I saw on the TV attached to the treadmill next to mine at the gym tonight that over 13,000 people were now dead or missing.

And maybe it's that last sentence that makes it so hard to say anything worth saying. It is amazing to me that while in one place, the whole world is falling apart, here life goes on as normal. While workers desperately try to save nuclear reactors and ex pats flee the country, today I went to work, and helped some people pay their power bills, tried to visit a woman at a nursing home (she was asleep), attended a board meeting, went to the gym. Those are all good things, but they are normal things. While the headlines on BBC.com are all about earthquakes and radiation, a link on the side brings you to a story about Boston's Running of the Brides. While people starve and die, others are storming Filene's Basement. That sounds like a condemnation, but it's not. It's just the way it is. And though that means that those of us on this side of the world buying dresses and counting calories aren't thinking all the time about what's happening in Japan, when we do think about it, it makes it even more awe-inspiringly heartbreaking, and even harder to say anything about.

The earthquake was Friday. Then there was a tsunami. Then there was radiation. Things have been getting worse for days. And yesterday, I blogged about potatoes.

The dichotomy there reminded me of lyrics to a Dave Matthews song. I wrote out the lyrics and then deleted them. They didn't seem like an appropriate response. Maybe that's why when something horrible happens, or someone we love dies, we have a moment of silence. It's the response with the most integrity.

In that case, I guess I've already said too much. I'll end with just three more things, not even in complete sentences: prayers, and grace, and a belief in a God who suffers with us.