Walk with Alison in Boston to Marathon Finish Line/Bombing Site

 

During lock down, Alison and I spoke on the phone and re-planned to meet up for our walk. We met on Saturday, April 20. Which was my 32nd birthday. She picked me up at Jesse's and we went to the Flour Bakery. There I ate the most food I had had in weeks...I ate a BLT and a berry short cake with homemade whipped creams AS MY BREAKFAST. :)

Afterwards, we started our walk. Alison put coins in her meter and we started our walk from the bakery over the bridge. Alison is a good friend and it was great to get to walk with someone and feel so comfortable. My icon for this walk looks like a cloud and that is how it felt, light and comforting. We spoke about jobs, teaching, and our lives. I keep speaking about liking someone that is far away and hasn't said anything about liking me back. I don't know if it is because people expect me to have information like that, that I have to offer it. But he keeps coming up. Something that is so up in the air and unsaid keeps being said to other people...

As we walked over the Mass Ave. bridge, it was VERY windy and VERY cold. We shouldered on the wind and kept going. We watched rowers row and tourist take photos.We took a picture of our hands at the center of the bridge. Once again, this was a walk down memory lane as the first place I lived was on Commonwealth Ave in a MIT frat for a summer.

After we crossed the bridge I was hesitant to ask Alison to go to the bomb site/marathon finish line. I asked though and she said ok. We held hands and walked through the area that held some flowers and you could look out at the crime scene.
There were a dozen men in haz mats combing the street slowly. Nothing had changed. The metal stanchions were still in place...the blue finish line was still in place...cops were posted at the ends of the memorial. It was eerie and sad. And as we left we were presented with the media spot on the corner.

As people, stood in line to be interviewed about how they felt. I felt numb and confused. Not impressed by the big smile of the tv person's face. The media was a shroud on these events. I get angry at media and how they spin something. How rude they were to the bomber's family and how they dig for a story from spectators when there is nothing more to say. How they have no consideration for people's feelings and polarize the event. I don't want to hear what one more spectator has to say. I want to help people heal. I want people to say I am sad. I want to grieve. I don't want to chase after celebrity.
As we walked by the media stand I almost got run over by a man walking by. Alison and I somehow dodged him and we walked by the Copley Station metro stop and a tank. Commenting on how they looked jammed in there and bored. We then walked back over the bridge and back to the Flour Bakery for raspberry seltzer water.
Alison is an artist also. It felt great to sit down and pour ink on our papers and reflect on the morning. 

I was exhausted after this walk. Partly from too much sugar at the bakery and because of the weight I felt from seeing the site. Alison said she was glad to see the bombing site and pay our respects. I felt the same way. It is overwhelming to try to digest and understand my feelings around this. I feel so many things for Boston, for the wounded and dead, and for the bombers. I truly feel sad for everyone involved. I didn't celebrate the capture because after sitting for a day learning about this young man...a young man who received a college recommendation letter from someone I knew when I lived in Boston, a young man that has a much more complicated story than the story of terrorist tells. I started to just feel sad for all sides of this story. As I looked at the picture of a man with no legs and a man holding his arteries shut...I am seized with terror and sadness and revulsion for the bombing. There is sadness for lives lost and for fear taking over a city. I have no answers and I have no idea how not to hate the bombers and I have no idea how no to feel sadness for a 19 year old who destroyed his life and the lives of others. It is all just too much to comprehend.