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Saturday, April 27, 2013

The Strength Of A City

Yesterday we went to Boston, which is about an hour's drive for us, to pick up BB3's cousin, who was in Boston since Tuesday attending a medical conference.  He goes back to Houston, TX on Monday, and is staying with us for the weekend.  But we also had planned on spending the day in Boston, and the most important thing on the agenda was visiting the memorial for those fallen and injured in the bomb blasts on the day of the marathon, which was April 15th.

Despite the tragedy and atrocity that occurred, it was simply amazing to witness, and for a brief part of time, be included in, a city and group of people that refused to be bullied and forced into living in fear.  People were out and about, laughing, crying, paying their respects.  There were news vans still lined up at the memorial, people were talking and sharing.  There were policemen and women there keeping watch over the scenes while calmly and politely answering questions from anyone who came up to them.  In the face of such a tragic event, it was truly a blessing to see that the city would not back down, and could come together to mourn and pay their respects in so many ways.  As I said on the AQ boards, the message wasn't whispered at all - it rang out loud and clear.  Here's a bit of what we saw...

Here we are on Boylston Street, where the attacks took place.

These were all prayer ribbons tied to a church fence that was close by the memorial.

News vans all lined up right at the memorial.


Here are some pictures at the memorial itself - I took quite a few, as there was alot to take in.

From here, we continued down Boylston street to the actual sites of the blasts.  Here is where the first one took place:

And a few blocks up the street, here is the location of the second one:



From here we turned around and started heading back.  We stopped at a small cafe and sat outside on a small patio right along the street.  After a little while, we heard something big coming down the street.  There was music, bells, honks, drums - we're not exactly sure what it was for, but we think it was some sort of tribute - there were hundreds of bicyclists coming down the street, on some sort of organized ride down Boylston Street:

If you get the chance to visit the memorial, I believe you'd find it quite moving to see all the tributes and testimonies that people have left there, and the feeling of strength and unity in and among those in Boston.  If not, I hope that this has brought a little bit of them to you.

Our thoughts and prayers, Boston - stay strong!

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