a map of the world

Reading all the profiles of the Rhode Island fire victims is sobering on so many levels. It has, in a strange way, made me melancholy for the East. The Providence Journal is running short obituaries (like the NYTimes did after 9-11) and a lot of the people are from eastern Connecticut towns I used to know -- Voluntown and Baltic and Ledyard and more. I don't miss reporting but I do miss learning about the towns in an area. That was one of the best things about newspaper work: You really began to see the area in your mind, and started to think about how the places were similar and different and how they came into being and what they might be like in another decade. You also met people from all walks of life and developed a healthy respect for hard-working people whose lives weren't particularly newsworthy until something profoundly bad happened. The profiles reinforce that, and they prove what Mr. Rogers [RIP] always said: There is no one in the world exactly like you.