Cardioplegia, also known as intentional cardiac arrest, is a very creepy surgical technique that ensures a "still and bloodless field" in which to cut and sew. I'm thinking about it because the way Boston was shut down yesterday, from the vantage point of my shamanic vision, amounted to a metaphorical version of cardioplegia. The city soul was put into cardiac arrest when they asked people to stay indoors and not answer the door or go out for any reason. Amtrak was stopped, public transportation was stopped, flights were curtailed. Friends who live there told me the empty streets were eerie.
They got the city moving again, but the energy will be weak and uneven for awhile. Also I would expect the energy to be wobbly, like a patient recovering from open heart surgery. And there will be residual fear, post traumatic stress, and grief spiraling through the city soul. How could there not be?
My prayers include the hope that the citizens of that venerable city find ways to be gentle with themselves for the next little while. Knowing what I do about the city, I'm dubious this idea will even occur to most Bostonians, nor catch on in any overarching way. But even if there are pockets of gentleness, it will help the city recover more quickly and fully than if everyone tries to pretend everything is back to normal.
Even worse would be if the citizens came together to demand that all Chechens be exported or that we should invade and bomb Chechnya. After 9/11, we declared war on Iraq, just because we had to drop a bomb on somebody. That didn't do anyone any good, did it? I really hope angry mob mentality does not take hold, in Boston or elsewhere in the U.S. That's all we need.
It's worth praying for.
Shalom. Salaam. Peace.
3 comments:
I may be wrong, but I don't foresee a mob reaction to this event. I think people understand these guys were renegades. And I certainly don't anticipate an international response, though it will be interesting to hear whether the older brother got any kind of formal terrorism training while overseas last year.
I hope you're right. I'm seeing many xenophobic statements on Facebook.
Steve, I also hope you're right.
It helps some that the charges will be carried out through civilian courts, not the military. That would surely have escalated the whole thing.
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