[Magdalen] Las Vegas shooting

[Marion Thompson]

On a quiet rainy day after my daughter's Thanksgiving dinner, this piece 
is contemplative, peaceful, and words like pathos and poignancy come to 
mind.  Thank you.  I did not know it.

Marion, a pilgrim


On 10/8/2017 3:25 PM, James Oppenheimer-Crawford wrote:
> I was going to the grocery store to pick up a few items, and, thinking it
> would be a good idea not to do this on an empty stomach, I stopped at the
> Dunkin Donuts which is co-located with the grocery store. Dunkin has this
> neat idea that they use a whole cluster of flat screen displays on which
> they both put their menus and a continuous feed of news channels. I picked
> up a coffee and a sandwich,  had just finished and was walking out when I
> glanced at the screen and saw a crawl on the bottom about some "Las Vegas
> massacre." I initially thought something like it must be about some
> dreadful new show, and was about to leave, but something stopped me, and I
> took another look, and realized something had definitely happened. I was
> thinking I had to turn on the TV when I got home, and then I realized I
> have a smartphone, and so I got in my car and turned my phone to google.
> Under "Las Vegas news," I soon found several potential sites with just
> about the same thing. Yes, something dreadful HAD happened. I was astounded
> at the death toll. How is that even possible?
> I turned off my phone and started my car to drive the short distance to the
> grocery store. I was tuned to Sirius channel 76, and the announcer stated
> that there were no words to respond to the horror that happened in Las
> Vegas. She was putting on a piece, she said, for herself, as she could find
> no words, and perhaps for the millions of others listening in who also
> could find no words.
> The piece she chose was "Mercy," by Max Richter, a composition for violin
> and piano. Hilary Hahn was the soloist.
> I felt it was like a gently cleansing liturgy; music steps in where words
> fail. How many others had that same reaction, I wondered.
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Kk-FJe43Aw
>
> James W. Oppenheimer-Crawford
> *“A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved,
> except in memory. LLAP**”  -- *Leonard Nimoy
>