This blog’s been quiet for a couple of days now. That’s been intentional.

I felt the world tilt a little on its axis Monday morning as I watched horrific televised scenes unfold at my beloved alma mater, Virginia Tech. The magazine’s creative director went to nearby Radford University. Like millions of people across the nation and beyond, the shock and numbness soon yielded to a searing sadness. It’s been some time since I’ve been unable to control my crying. Now there are hints anger is the emotion about to rule the day.

That building rage, though, is being mitigated by all the friends, family and strangers who’ve checked in and a sister in Blacksburg who’s provided the kind of compassion-filled coverage and commentary that no big-city news reporter ever could. My sister is a Blacksburg Middle School teacher, where four students lost a parent. FOUR! That should help those baffled by the continued coverage understand the magnitude this massacre has had on an idyllic Southern college town and its uniquely architected campus that has served as a sanctuary for hundreds of thousands of students since 1872. From what I’ve seen and heard in the last few days, many without bonds to Blacksburg do understand and do feel the same stabs to the heart that sometimes dull but just can’t seem to go away.

Which is why we are a nation in mourning. And which is why we haven’t put up any posts lately. The digital magazine is now available. The podcast version, God willing, will soon be consumable in a day or two, just about the time the print version starts circulating through the postal system. In the meantime, the sun’s still coming out each morning. Eventually, posts to our blog will surface with similar regularity. Just not this week.

–Anne

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 18th, 2007 at 5:31 am and is filed under Blog Entry. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.