because i don't have internet access at my apartment, my knowledge of world events tends to be pretty eastern hemisphere-specific (particularly those things reported in the evening standard, when i can get my hands on it while i'm walking home) and early-in-the-morning us events. this can be somewhat disorienting, especially when i get to the library in the morning and check facebook (admittedly an entertaining way to get a good recap of nd football games).

anyway, last night i went to a shadow puppet performance of one of the cheerier winter stories, the little matchgirl. this particular performance was conceived as a passion, so there was lots of bach at parts, as well as a melding of the anderson text and the crucifixion account--deeply moving on a number of levels. afterward i walked home through the former slums of east london, thinking about the incomprehensible vastness of human suffering, the pervasiveness of systemic violence. i didn't find out about what happened in connecticut (on the heels of the attack in china) until i got to the library today, after eating my oatmeal and stopping at costa for tea and getting my hair cut and browsing around for a coat. i don't have any pithy comments to offer up, just that, once again, while there is much that is good and beautiful in this world, it is also a place of unfathomable cruelty and pain and trauma, and it is important to remember that in tandem with the examples of goodness we seek in part as proof that all is not lost.