This president will never offer comfort, compassion or empathy to a grieving nation. It’s not in him. When questioned after a tragedy, he will always be glib and inappropriate. So I have a wild suggestion: Let’s stop asking him. His words are only salt in our wounds.

Let’s instead remember that the people in our daily lives are hurting too. Comfort comes in many forms, some of them small moments of kindness. Mother Teresa said, “We know only too well that what we are doing is nothing more than a drop in the ocean. But if the drop were not there, the ocean would be missing something.”

Those words, and the words of past presidents, can guide us, inspire us, strengthen us when we’ve been driven to our knees.