What is there to say?

What is there to write, really, on a night like tonight?

On an ordinary Friday night in November, I might write about the rain, how because we didn't lose power tonight the storm is soothing to me, coaxing me into pajama pants at five o'clock as soon as we pull into the driveway after running errands. Ordinary errands: a haircut for Isaac, a quick stop at Trader Joe's. The kids slurp on their suckers and bother each other and I sneak a package of special holiday Joe Joe's into the basket while they're not looking. Matt and I hide these in the laundry room and dole them out slowly, or we eat them secretly ourselves. Usually the latter. The kids have plenty of Halloween candy still, and they only eat that a piece at a time. Their stashes last all year long.

Earlier this week, if I had sat down to write, I'd have ranted: about how one whackadoo pastor gets actual time on CNN for complaining about Starbucks coffee cups being anti-Christmas or anti-Jesus because they don't have snowmen and reindeer on them, about how I read like eighty-five posts in a row on Facebook about how ridiculous that was, and about how I just wanted to say, Stop feeding the trolls, people, everyone knows no actual Christians are mad about the fucking Starbucks cups because I did not and do not know one single real-life person who actually believes that the sign of the devil comes on a coffee cup unadorned with snowmen and reindeer. Perhaps my rage was disproportionate to the situation. I think any time I find myself raging at Facebook I should probably just take a two-week break. It's probably about that time.

But aside from that, I had a few rocky days. What would I have shared about that? Something terrible happened to one of my students and it shook me but out of respect for her privacy I will not use her story to Make A Big Fat Point. And it's not my story to tell, anyway -- only, possibly, to learn from. I might have written about a friendship that means a great deal to me, about how I felt particularly grateful for it this week. About how the moments that crack my heart make it bigger.

There were lovely moments, too: taking my kids to Freighthouse Square on Wednesday, eating a cozy lunch and riding the Link to Union Station. Walking to Hello, Cupcake. Watching movies as the afternoon grew darker. Meeting my brother and his wife for dinner in Tacoma and tucking my babies into bed, too late for a school night and smiling because they are old enough to understand that indulgence.

But how do I do that, when the world is as absurd as it is? When I'm driving through the rainy streets to pick up my children from school, listening to NPR, and I hear about the attacks on Paris? When at home headlines scream "THIS IS A HORROR"? When I realize I've been living my blissfully ordinary, beautiful, safe little life while others are, right now, learning what it means to lose everything?

(But that's not new. That has never not been true.)

I logged on to Facebook, which was stupid. I understand why people are posting "Pray for Paris" and sharing artful photographs of tearstained faces superimposed over the Eiffel Tower, I guess, but the more I scroll the more inadequate it feels. It's easy to push a button and share an image and say poignant things, but I guess I also just don't think it matters: Facebook, that is, and whatever we throw up there. I guess I just don't think it's going to mean anything if I say I stand with Paris. I'm just one person on the internet, one person on the other side of the world -- and so I don't post anything, because what is there to say? But I keep reading, like an idiot, scrolling past more of the same thing, and suddenly it's like the drinking game: how many comments in any news article about anything ever before somebody blames the president? Hashtag Obama Sucks! Because that's a logical place to direct our anger right now. And if you're not angry at the president, be angry at the people who don't also post about Beirut, or Syria. How can Facebook show what's in our hearts, and what if we show the wrong thing at the wrong moment, anyway? What if we leave something out that someone else things we should include? I want to punch the whole internet in the damn face. It's not big enough for our hearts.

So I will just say this: Everything seems terrifyingly absurd. I feel crazy. (I have the luxury of sitting in my own safe house and feeling crazy; this is not lost on me.) Paris is under attack and my student is under attack in her own life right here and I am sitting on my couch in my own comfortable house with my children tucked into bed. And I know that's all people are trying to make sense of when they turn to Facebook, really, because the world is grieving and afraid, so I don't mean to sound like a jerk. But all the same, I find no comfort there, only more absurdity, and I don't think I can be of any real use anywhere if I keep reading it.

Today before any of this unfolded I had a conversation with some of my students about this very phenomenon, about how desperately glad I am that Facebook and social media didn't exist when I was in high school. I was a little surprised at how quickly, and how sadly, my kids agreed with me. But then again, teenagers are smarter and more savvy than many adults give them credit for. And sometimes my heart hurts for them and what they have to bear.

I'm just one person, on the other side of the world, trying to cling to a little hope and a little gratitude every day for this cosmic lottery that I seem to have won through no virtue of my own. And probably my restless tapping away in this little text box is my own version of "Pray for Paris." And it's still not enough.