Just the feeling

It's tough to really describe the feelings that come to you when you stare out over a leveled suburb. It's tough but I'll try:


You look, you blink, and you can't believe it was ever a row of tidy houses. You keep looking and you think about how much wood there is. You expected to see electronics, toys, and broken tableware. You still see those things, but they are greatly outnumbered by splintered beams, ragged walls, and roofs that have been dashed to pieces. The reality is that there's a whole lot more wood in a person's physical existence than anything else.

You blink again and you see a woman's shoe. A dark, low-heeled pump. You think to yourself "I bet she's missing those. They look like the kind of shoes you only wear to formal occasions and funerals. I hope she's still alive enough to be missing those shoes."

You tear your mind away from that, and blink at the unchanged sky.

You look back again and realize that the houses that are still standing have circles spray painted on them. Some of them have an X as well. Before you can stop it your brain pops up with a theory " The circles mean a house has been searched, an x means a body."

You say something, anything to stop thinking about that, about things you can't know. Maybe something like "I can't believe it." ,or "Those poor people". No matter how much you believe the sentiment, it still sounds so empty.

It's difficult to even form prayer. When there are thousands dead, and thousands more missing, what do you ask for? For time to turn back? For houses to fly back onto their foundations like a tape being rewound?

Why pray for one and not all? Can a person pray for it all?
It all seems so arbitrary.

The only emotion that is easy to place, an the one that stays with you long after, is a feeling of being very, very small.


…

I promise I'll post something later that talks about what we actually did while we were there. I'm working on it now. I'll try to even include something funny. I just wanted to set this up first. Because what I described above was buzzing incessantly in the back of my head the entire time we were there.