When world news finds its way into your tiny rural town: Iranian tragedy

Being over in rural Ontario you tend to feel as though the happenings of the outside world don’t register as strongly as they should. Well today it has come to light that one family among those 176 lost, and of the 63 Canadians travelled in similar circles as my family. A friendly, quiet family staring back at us from the pages of an Obituary. A friendly and quiet family you recognize from your daughter’s pre school play group. We weren’t close, or even acquaintances, just on friendly and knowing nods in greeting as we piled our raucous and unruly young children into and out of the play room, wrangling our kids for snack or at circle time, and keeping our wee ones excited while chasing oddly shaped rubber balls on the field. We were all Canadians, doing our best to teach our kids, but now only some of us remain. A real tragedy. Brings the news, unrelenting as it is, right to your doorstep and demands you pay attention, even if you think its world news and not your concern. Humanity finds a way. Nothing I can say to their extended family would bring them back, or fill the void left by their untimely departure. May cooler heads prevail, and their contributions to humanity never forgotten.