A lot of things have shocked me during the past few days:

1. I've neglected this site for so long.
2. Bush's address last night impressed me and left me feeling positive - and he didn't even flub a multisyllabic word.
3. Despite the life-altering attack, my friends and I still find ways to be extremeley petty and lack perspective.
4. Last night was only the second time I'd been to the beach since I moved to my house on the 7th.
5. People keep talking about returning to normal. Look what normal brought us.
6. I care very little about the blogging community.

Well, maybe that last one's not so shocking. There are a lot of people who are doing wonderful jobs gathering important news and commentary, but I just can't be one of them. Whenever something like this happens I find myself on the fence, part of me wanting to immerse myself in information and another part wanting to avoid getting sucked in and paranoid. An "expert" on terrorism who was on NPR the other day mentioned how people in Lebanon largely fell into two categories: survivor and thriver. The former is all about ingesting so much information and harping on the negatives until you become constantly paranoid and live your life ruled by fear. Thrivers take in necessary information, but are rational enough to live life as close to normal as possible. We need to thrive.