The people who have given me the most hope this year, are the very same people whose plight has caused me to shed the most tears:
Londoners and New Yorkers
These two cities are full of brave, resillient people. I spoke recently of granddad’s cousin returning home to find his whole family had been blown apart. (Do not expect me to make it more palatable.) This is what happened day after day after day in London, during The Blitz.
Of course I am on the ground, in neither place. My perception comes from online news stories and a few blog posts, but from here it looks like, London and New York have once again gone through their horrific ordeals, (this time caused by a merciless virus) picked themselves up, brushed off the dust and carried on.
Have I had moments where I have feared the worst? I think my blog shows clearly that I have…
Yet I have been wrong…
Both cities have strong, vibrant hearts. Both have looked on at devastation at various points in their history, with utter defiance and courage.
For some reason the first vision that springs to mind, is that of Clint Eastwood’s character at a saloon, staring a villain in the eye and going back to his beer, before calmly despatching the problem a few minutes later.
On that note I have recently been investigating somebody’s ancestry in Arizona and learned that Dodge City is an actual place. Sorry America for my ignorance.
My grandmother had taken my mum to London during the period of unrelenting terror, referred to as The Blitz, in defiance of my dear grandfather. She used to readily admit that this had been a mistake, which had culminated in her throwing herself atop my mother, to protect her from bombs. My mother’s version of events was almost identical, except she is still undecided which horrified her the most – the bombs or having her mother land on her without warning.
Source: MyFaveMusic123
https://www.youtube.com/user/MyFavMusic123
New York too, has been faced with horror on an unimaginable scale. Yet both cities, like my mother after my nan had dropped on her from above, have got back up…
From Robert Jordan, The Fires of Heaven
“The oak fought the wind and was broken, the willow bent when it must and survived.”
I note that there seems to be various versions of this quote.
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