The Day After

School is open. People are going to work. Church services will be held this morning, or at noon, or this evening. The commentators are filling the airways. But most of us are numb, and every once in a while we hear a heart-rending interview with a family member of someone trapped in the debris.

Don't we owe it to one another to pull our own weight and to do our individual jobs to keep things going as smoothly as possible. Those of us not in the affected cities need to work even harder, maybe, to help take up the slack. For instance, if printers in NYC are being interrupted due to commuting problems or untimely delivery of supplies, won't part of their production shift to printers in other cities? Not that we want to profiteer from their hardships, just that we need to help out.

And the economy is so depressed, even before the events of yesterday, and seemingly even more so now and for the foreseeable future. How can we work harder if there is no work to do? Aren't we obligated to "make up" work for ourselves, to help "prime the pumps" and to keep ourselves in practice. When the going gets tough, the tough get going, they say.