Statistically Speaking...

Stastically speaking, I live in the most violent city on earth; Ciudad Juarez here, in the state of Chihuahua, northern Mexico. Stastically speaking the daily death tolls are higher than those of Iraq, of Afghanistan but those wars were declared, "officially". While here, only we Juarenses and our mostly quieted family members living to the north dare to care, to remember, to mourn. And yes, I must make mention of the few- the activists and journalists brave and vital, who remeber too and count the dead. But further north say, in New England, in my Midwest, those untouched and unaffected remain ignorant to the truth. Even most history professors are unaware. And listening to the news, channel 5 at 5 I hear other statistics though not suprizing- that here, as many are dying from bullets as from accidents and disease. Still, it's human nature to bear greater fear of a death by gunshot than a slow lingering- better the sickbed than a sudden striking down because even gnawed at by disease- vile calamitys like cancer, heart failure one can still prepare mentally, we know that these spring from within an aberation of our own cells, failing organs. Yes, we have learned to accept the body's eventual detiorioration as grim, but natural. Yet to become a crime victim- to be murdered, slain by another human being, monstrous, though mortal is too shocking unexpected, unannounced contrary to nature's flow -and therein lies the fear. *Written after the murder of my brother-in-law, Rey David, 24 years old, on December 9, 2010. No investigation insued, the culprit/s are unknown.