When you are lying on the cold, hard floor for more than 12 hours, listening to loud reports of guns you only thought existed in movies echo across the area, leaving the impression that the shooter is right outside your door; you have a lot of time to think.
Your terror-filled thoughts oscillate between prayers to wishes, to regrets, to your loved ones and complete resigning to fate, then back again in that order. You pray that God lets you live to see another day.
You make promises that suddenly seem doable. You promise to change your ways for Him, to appreciate life more, you even promise to make a burnt offering of a spotless lamb if that’s what He wants.
Anything not to face these heartless monsters unleashing mindless terror a few meters from where you lie.
You wish you had done all those things you keep procrastinating about.
That business idea you keep shelving, spending time with your loved ones and friends because ‘life is busy’, the self-improvement project you know will definitely improve your life but you just can’t find time to launch it.
The dusty to-do-list in your head suddenly comes to focus and you wonder where time went. You think of all the missed opportunities, all those times you could have made a difference but didn’t, the most important things in life that you took for granted and regret takes over.