There are no silver linings. I will never be grateful for it. I will never be glad for it. There are no silver linings. Trauma is not a Fortune 500 board of directors member, trauma is not a national league sports team owner, trauma is not an ivy league chancellor. Observers see that diamonds are forged from intense pressure and assume the same for humans. We know better. Trauma is an RBMK meltdown: lethal. It contaminates everything it touches. Pollutes at the microscopic level: diseased DNA passed on for generations. Trauma is poison contained in walls 10 feet deep. There are no silver linings. No one needs violence to be a better person. The freak accidents that beget human suffering aren’t morality tales. Aesop said the scorpion kills the frog: they both drown and the story ends. Not so fast: humans need to assign meaning. They wonder if the frog asked for it. What was the frog wearing, exactly? There are no silver linings. Don’t let anyone tell you that god works in mysterious ways. If god gets all the credit when things go right, it follows that god gets all the blame when things go wrong. Don’t let Carol’s existential discomfort that god would NEVER let something like THAT happen to his undeserving faithful dissuade you from what you already know. Fuck a silver lining. It wasn’t what Brendon meant, but I scream the lyrics at the top of lungs in the car. I scream, I scream sing until I’m crying, desperately wishing you were here. Wanting to go back in time and pause when we saw Brendon sing it live, together. I miss you so much. God I miss you so much. FUCK a silver lining. Fuck a silver lining. To those who know this to be true: I’m so sorry your life was taken from you. I’m so sorry your childhood was robbed, your resources plundered, your future impoverished from the predatory compounding interest of your past. Fuck a silver lining. We will never be grateful for it, we will never be glad. See us. See us and know WE ARE HERE.













