Holes
Posted: March 16th, 2011, 9:56 am
Pulled from an AP news story -
Immediately after the quake, Katsutaro Hamada, 79, fled to safety with his wife. But then he went back home to retrieve a photo album of his granddaughter, 14-year-old Saori, and grandson, 10-year-old Hikaru.
Just then the tsunami came and swept away his home. Rescuers found Hamada's body, crushed by the first floor bathroom walls. He was holding the album to his chest, Kyodo news agency reported.
"He really loved the grandchildren. But it is stupid," said his son, Hironobu Hamada. "He loved the grandchildren so dearly. He has no pictures of me!"
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It's a strange but unreported occurrence that the quake and resulting tsunami are now spoken of as past events. But it is by no means so. The tsunami especially are still reaching inland, still traveling inward into the minds of the survivors and will do so for all the days and months and years and decades that are left to them to live out.
It is not that the dead live on but the holes they leave behind them do.
Immediately after the quake, Katsutaro Hamada, 79, fled to safety with his wife. But then he went back home to retrieve a photo album of his granddaughter, 14-year-old Saori, and grandson, 10-year-old Hikaru.
Just then the tsunami came and swept away his home. Rescuers found Hamada's body, crushed by the first floor bathroom walls. He was holding the album to his chest, Kyodo news agency reported.
"He really loved the grandchildren. But it is stupid," said his son, Hironobu Hamada. "He loved the grandchildren so dearly. He has no pictures of me!"
____________________________________________________________
It's a strange but unreported occurrence that the quake and resulting tsunami are now spoken of as past events. But it is by no means so. The tsunami especially are still reaching inland, still traveling inward into the minds of the survivors and will do so for all the days and months and years and decades that are left to them to live out.
It is not that the dead live on but the holes they leave behind them do.