I am out of town, and yesterday afternoon BatDad and I had lunch in a restaurant that had the news on. All we knew was a small plane had crashed into a high rise. I shuddered--I hate those small planes. I know a young writer who died along with her whole family when her father's plane crashed on her first book tour. BatDad and I were out all day and when I got back into the hotel room I saw Larry King interviewing Cory Lidle's twin brother. My first thought: They're interviewing Yankee siblings now? It took a moment to realize what had really happened. The death of those two people--Lidle and his thus far nameless flight instructor--is terrible. We hear lots of platitudes on CNN over "what's really important"--above A-Rod and Joe Torre and the Yankees collapse, as if any of us ever believed that those things were more important than the implicit promise that our loved ones make each time when they walk out of the door--I'll come back. Baseball is not life and death, it is a beautiful, maddening fantasy--one that allows us to escape life and death in order to live and die with every pitch, every swing of the bat. This accident brutually shattered the illusion, put a face on a meaningless tragedy, but mostly it deprived two families of seeing their loved ones come home at night. My thoughts are with all of them. Everyone take care of yourselves, and be safe.

Please see Alex Belth's excellent post at Bronx Banter.