HUMAN TRAGEDY

The only real story this week is the human tragedy that hit Marsaxlokk in particular and the country as a whole.

Our politicians and social leaders, whether they are bus drivers, church ministers, or band club presidents, and the rest of us, the commenting classes, would do well to take a few minutes from our precious time and reflect on the fact that while we were puffing our chests and making our oh-so-precious opinions known, the relatives and friends of the people lost at sea were going through a living hell. As were, forgive me for stating the obvious, the people who were on the fishing boat one minute and found themselves in the sea the next.

When I settled down to start writing this, I wasn’t sure what direction it would take. Somewhat surprisingly, I’m finding myself driven to apologising for amusing myself by teasing my many critics about their command of English while this tragedy was unfolding. I doubt that my flippancy registered on the consciousness of the people directly affected by what can only be called this disaster, but I still feel a bit guilty for going about my business as if nothing was happening out at sea.

I suppose it is only because I started thinking about the tragedy directly that these thoughts formed themselves. This blog started out as just another blog, a comment on current issues and when I cast around in my mind for a subject, the only one that stood out was this story: hence my opening line.

From this opening line came the thought that here I was, sitting comfortably at my computer, as I have been most of the time (when I wasn’t enjoying myself in other ways) while these people were slowly succumbing to the power of the sea, while others were conducting the search for them and, probably most awfully, while still others were waiting for news. It is illogical to feel guilty, I know, but perhaps the guilty feeling is just a reflection of the fact that – just maybe – there are more important things in the world than whether I should respond to some comment on my blog with a facile comment of my own.

Luckily for the human race, the world goes on, of course, and I’ve no doubt normal service will be resumed very soon, at least for those of us whose lives have not been destroyed, literally or figuratively, by this tragedy. The searchers will eventually come to terms with the fact that they had only partial success, friends and family will, in the main, mourn and try to move on. I have absolutely no idea how the immediate family and friends of the victims will cope: the enormity of the horror that has engulfed them is such that it defies objective measurement and it would be presumptuous of me to even attempt to encapsulate it.

I toyed with the idea, when starting this blog, of commenting about the way some people have been criticising the way the search and rescue was carried out, or about the way the media seemed to ignore the Somali crewman, apparently (but perhaps only apparently) because he was an immigrant or about the way many people resort to platitudes in the face of tragedy.

I think not: let’s just stop here, this time, and reflect on the fragility of life. Is this a convenient excuse for me to avoid writing any more in the heat that is beating down on Gozo, where I am enjoying the weekend? Perhaps it is: I’m as venal as the next man and I don’t pretend to have the answer to everything, for all that I try to give that impression most of the time.