A Word to Our Readers in Boston

It's difficult to know what to say when we're faced with such senseless acts as yesterday's bombings in Boston, so I'll keep it (relatively) short.  I grew up in New England and frequently traveled  down to Boston to see concerts that didn't make it up to where I lived in New Hampshire (i.e. all of them).  It was at Boston's Great Woods that I first saw Depeche Mode live in 1988, a concert that quite literally changed the entire course of my life.

 All of these personal connections are ultimately incidental.  They may make it feel a bit closer to home for me, but at the end of the day, this is the sort of thing that could happen anywhere.  So with that in mind, hug your kids, buy your buddy a beer, take your dog for a car ride with the windows down, write a song, paint a painting, tell your loved ones how much you love them, tell someone they're beautiful, spoil your nieces or nephews or grandchildren, hold the door for someone, smile at a stranger, bury the hatchet with a long lost friend, give to a charity.

We can look at these events as soul-crushing cracks in our humanity, or we can reject the idea that the actions of a misguided few mean we're circling the toilet bowl as a species.  We can separate ourselves further politically and point fingers before the victims have even had a funeral, or we can each individually do one thing today that makes the world a nicer place for someone else.  The choice doesn't belong to the maniacs who commit acts like this.  It belongs to us.