Tragedy— an event causing great suffering, destruction, depression, anger, anxiety, emotional numbing, and an increase in substance abuse.
These are the mental side effects of a tragedy. Whether it is the death of a family member, a home burning down, or a car crash killing your best friend, lives are forever changed in a single moment.
Yet these tragedies foster community. These tragedies bond America together. These tragedies make America great.
It’s a typical Sunday morning. You wake up to the sound of water trickling. Scarcely alarmed, you roll out of bed discovering ankle-deep water instead of the comforting rug which usually meets your feet.
Your morning feet are shocked by the chilled water that suddenly covers them; you rub your eyes and look around, only to see your home covered by a layer of water.
Reality sets in seconds after the shock. Waking your family up in a frenzy, you empty cabinets and try to salvage your belongings from the rising waters. Your couches are soaked, as well as bedding, low cabinets, appliances, tables, and chairs. The flood waters are rising. You need an escape plan.
The waters are too high to drive to safety; you do not own a boat. So, you call 911. The line is busy.
You are stranded and terrified alone with your children in your home wondering what will come next. Hurricane Harvey left many families stranded, scared, and in shock as they watched Houston flood. Twenty-seven trillion gallons of rain fell throughout Texas, some areas receiving more than 50 inches. More than one-third of Houston was underwater.
Yet, throughout these horrors there were heroes. A community sprang up and bonded together to save lives and rescue the stranded. A surgeon left his own flooding home and paddled a canoe to an injured 16-year-old boy who needed immediate surgery.
A community member used his boat to search and rescue stranded individuals, saving many. Local high school coaches drove buses around town to pick up community members before the waters were too high. Two brothers hitched their boat on their trailer and drove 200 miles from Dallas to Houston to save strangers.
Four bakers, who were stranded in their bakery, decided to not sit and wait, but to bake bread for the survivors in need. A Gallery Furniture store took its moving trucks out to save those stranded and bring them to the mattress shop where they’d have a dry bed to sleep on.
Hurricane Harvey brought a tremendous amount of devastation and ruin, but it also brought together a community. People united to save the lives of their neighbors, customers, friends, family, and even strangers. Despite tragedy, a community still stood. This is what makes America great.
Multiple other tragedies have struck America and left many families broken-hearted.
Many school shootings have occurred last year across America. However large this tragedy may seem, countless heroes have still emerged. Janitors hurrying students away from school shooters, teachers funneling extra students into their classrooms to keep them safe, and students risking their lives for their peers. These individuals are preserving the future and enabling a future to even occur.
Another great example of American heroism was demonstrated on Sept. 11, 2001. On this day, firefighters, police officers, co-workers, and Port Authority officers risked their lives in order to save others.
They ran up the stairs of the Twin Towers as the masses poured down. They dug in the rumble for those who didn’t make it out. They administered first aid to the injured. They desperately looked throughout the flames searching for any survivors.
A community has flourished like no other within America. We have stood together when our enemy and even our own have tried to shoot us down and tear us apart. We have held hands in prayer after the death of thousands. We have raised our flag in pride amidst immense tragedy. It is this endurance, selflessness, and compassion that unites these communities, and ultimately makes us one.
A wise man I know once said, “We must find the heroes and healings in every tragedy.”
And this is what we have done. This is what makes America great. Community makes America great.