Author Dennis Lehane: Attack Won't Change Boston

Boston author Dennis Lehane echoes a common theme floating around in the wake of the marathon bombings: "They messed with the wrong city." But that's not a "macho sentiment," Lehane writes in the New York Times. When a Bostonian uses that phrase, what it means is: "You don't think this changes anything, do you?" So don't expect Bostonians to run out and buy a bunch of guns, give up any of their civil liberties, or cancel next year's marathon in the wake of this tragedy.

After all, "Bostonians don’t love easy things, they love hard things—blizzards, the bleachers in Fenway Park, a good brawl over a contested parking space." And "when the authorities find the weak and terminally maladjusted culprit or culprits, we’ll roll our eyes at whatever backward ideology they embrace and move on with our lives," Lehane writes. "No, we’ll never forget. But what we’ll cling tightest to is what the city was built on—resilience, respect, and an adoration for civility and intellect." Click for his full column. (More Boston Marathon bombing stories.)