I heard the news today. Oh boy.

First:  On the front page of the New York Times, a picture of children killed by bombs on a beach, taken by a long-ago photographer acquaintance of mine. All I could think of was my step-nephew and other friends and relatives currently scattered across various locations in the umbrella of Middle East war.

When I got to work and logged in, I was greeted by a plane that had fallen from the sky over Europe. Within minutes, we knew it had been shot down and my wife and I were thinking about whether she would feel safe flying from her upcoming business in Malaysia to Paris in a few weeks to join me and the boys for holiday. The thoughts felt small in light of such tragic loss. The fear was real. I abandoned my office at midday to escape the news vortex and suck up a little comfort from the street. NYC rarely disappoints.

You try to move on. But with lunch not long over, I snuck a glance. Microsoft had edged into the headlines with news of a five-figure layoff. Nick Bilton of the Times wrote today about trying to wean ourselves from social media addiction.  Good luck with that! Now we were wondering if a good friend was about to join the ranks of the unemployed.

Day over. I find myself glued to CNN. Lives lost on MH 17 were enroute to the AIDS Conference in Sydney. We had talked about going just weeks ago. We have friends there now. The distribution of pain. So much to go around in just a few short hours. Six degrees of separation? I wonder how many others were palpably touched by the events of the day.