It is not right that children fail to outlive their childhood. Their young legs should in an ideal world, enable them to run free, to find wonderment in the environment that is their playground, to leap with their imaginations into the recesses of their young minds, as yet untainted by the cynicism of adult life. And this imagination and carefreeness should come with the love and care of those who are charged with shaping the environment in which they grow.
When we think back to our childhood, on those blue-skied days that seemed to dominate our holidays and on those rainy days on which we trudged to school, we find ourselves running — after a ball, after a friend, climbing and falling and picking ourselves up again. It is a freedom of movement that cannot be replicated in adulthood. To run with carefree abandon down the road as I often wish to do, would have you locked up and regarded with suspicion.
Yes, childhood is about expressing yourself physically, the joy of movement in the days before we are all disciplined into uniform accepted mores of composure.
And so on Monday night when the news came through of the Boston bombings we are revulsed to hear of the maiming that left many people, and several young people without both of their legs. We know of the family who lost their eight year old son and brother, of a daughter who lost a leg and of their mother who is battlling for her life. There were other young brothers who had legs blown off.
It is horrific, more so because many of the victims are children. But we should be revulsed by the sheer horror of it because it was yet another example of where children find themselves the unwitting victims of mankind’s cruelty to one another. And we should remember this revulsion when we hear of any cruelty to young people. Every day of the week, innocent children are dying in various parts of the world, yet their passing receives little mention in the world’s media, because they take place in countries where such events are commonplace. However the death of a child through terrorism should not be allowed to become commonplace.
The love of a family for a child is no greater in Boston than it is in Baghdad, Damascus, Kabul, or Gaza. The hearts of the world go out this week to all the families affected by the bombings in Boston, but it also goes out to all families and all children who have been robbed of the joy of childhood by the blatant disregard by some people for the value of life.
