virginia tech shooting...

Of course there's the gun control issues. Of course there's the weak-politicians-lousy-system debate. Of course there's the "will there be backlash against Asians?" question. Me being me, though, the one thing that arouses my curiosity from the V-Tech incident is: "what went through the killer's mind when he shot the people? what even made him do that?"

Read in the newspaper that the shooter is indeed a "disturbed" person. He handed in a piece of paper with a question mark when he was asked to write his name. He reportedly stalked some girls. He liked to write plays and poems on death and violence. (Which makes me think. I often write poems on death, too, fascinated by the final closing of the curtains that everyone - from beggar to president, from Gandhi to Hitler - would have to go through. Am I disturbed? Hmm...)

What struck me in the article was this sentence: "No one understands him." Is that true? He is alone in this world, then. Did he want to share his life with anyone? Was anyone even capable of understanding him?

Questions. My specialty. Can't answer any of them, though. But this I know, to have just one person who truly understands you - be he friend or enemy - qualifies you as very fortunate indeed. It gives you so much - a sense of belonging, acceptance, joy, relief, even more faith in humanity-in-general. No wonder people go to great lengths to find one, and commit great vices when they have no one.