My mood today is swinging like one of those twisted amusement park rides. This morning so many of us Americans woke to hear of the senseless tragedy in Las Vegas. People were outside doing what they love. Listening to a concert.
Are you a concert-goer? If you are, you understand what I mean when I say that live music can lift your feet off the ground, bring joy to spots in your heart you didn’t know existed, even bond you to strangers whom you may have passed on the freeway just seconds before the concert. It connects the human spirit. I think that’s why today hit me. It made me scared and made me fearful like I have never been before.
Our stream of disasters has been many these past few months and as humans, our capacity to cope and comprehend becomes overwhelmed at a certain point. My own family has ties to Puerto Rico and the humanitarian aid trickling in there will be needed for longer than we know. We think we know, but we don’t. Each tragedy our nation has seen has been different in its own way.
While going about my normal routine today, I was trying to think of why this tradgedy dug to that final place where it just sat. I can’t move it, can’t make any sense of it. Each one of us will try and put into words why it just doesn’t make sense. Kind of ironic since the whole point of something being senseless is that it doesn’t make sense. To me, it hits hard because people were doing something they LOVED. It was carefree. It was VEGAS. I mean, hit the slots, ring the bell, go to that club at 3am and act like Monday won’t ever come. Even if you are 41!
No one drives to a concert thinking they will worry about anything but if their seat will give them the experience they anticipate. Tom Petty was a bucket list performer for me. I had the chance to see him with my husband and friends Bridget and John this summer. He reminds me of cutting 1st period(sorry mom, I still turned out ok, right?) with my bestie Sarah, drinking coffee, windows down, not a care in the world as we whizzed by the bucolic beaches in Connecticut. He reminds me of decades of rock n’ roll that I was too young to first be a part of but even to this day when I queue up his music, I still can feel the warmth on my face and the smile in my heart, the mischief and promise of knowing if I replay that song, it’ll bring me right back.
I don’t know why and I don’t have the proper words but if anything, those concert-goers were there because they loved to experience life sung through music. Just another reason I need to keep focusing on living mine to the fullest. You do that and no one can ever take that away from you.
Melissa F. Liceaga 