to the sound of careful digging
Thursday I felt lucky to hear on the radio the voices of many Londoners in their resolve to take care of each other, whatever way they each can. I realized then that, simply because I can't much understand recordings of Spanish spoken in real time, the bombings in Madrid had never become as real to me as they would have if I could have really heard— one voice at a time.

If one wanted Britain as a whole to say to one, "So sorry we displeased you! What can we do for you?", attacking civilians is about the most counterproductive thing one could possibly do. Maybe some countries would try to conciliate one afterwards — but Britain? How ignorant of Britain would someone have to be to imagine that would sway them?

Déjà ouï: Tony Blair's voice, recorded several different times over the course of the day of the attacks, kept on putting me in mind of a Kipling poem I found soon on my shelf: "Et Dona Ferentes".

From my own rubble heap: Over the weekend, out of the swarm of random papers in my home, there swam up an unused postcard, whose graphic is a (1990!) system map of the London Underground.

A wish: that the people who helped with doing the bombings and are still alive may swiftly find their heart changed, rather than go on thinking it was a good thing to do.