Inescapable Grief
01/03/14 08:20
Sometimes you just want to close your eyes and never open them again. It is better not to see and read things that cause pain to you and those around you from which you cannot escape. There is pain and there is inconsolable pain. To experience it second hand makes it no less painful especially when it happens to people you know and especially when and where children are involved. There are families here in town who are going through their own hell with the death of one young man who was going to school abroad and the diagnosis of another child who has been diagnosed with a rare but aggressive form of cancer at the tender young age of 10. What does a 10-year old boy know of such things? How does one discuss death with a child who is just getting over being afraid of the dark and has probably put his own boogymen out of his head for the foreseeable future? How does a mother fret so as not to scare her child into a senselessness that is dark and foreboding?
And just when you think you're college age student is well on his way in life you get that fateful phone call informing you that your son is missing after spending an evening with friends at a bar. And then you spend two days, two of the longest days of your life, hearing nothing and thinking the worst. And then the unimaginable happens. Your son is found in a railroad tunnel and was reportedly killed by a passing train in the early hours of the morning. How does that happen? The boy was so bright with a life so promising. He would never do such a thing. Someone must be responsible - who? The anguish is palpable and unbearable for those closest to him and certainly not out of reach for the hyperbolic reporters who transmit their stories on midnight blogs and back country rags in search of their own personal pulitzers. This does not rise to Lady Diana proportions but is a small town variation on the same theme and no less painful for those closest to the story. It is a story that may never be truthfully told because no one knows the truth. Almost no one, that is. We know someone knows.
But the world carries on and with the Olympics in Sochia, Russia now in the rear view mirror we are on to things more meaningful than gold medals, doping allegations, and corrupt figure skating judges. I don't pretend to understand the political machinations in the Soviet realm but it has been reported in the last 24 hours that the Russian troops have occupied Crimea. It is an incursion that does not sit well with the NATO countries and there is considerable consternation over the fact that Russia has now effectively invaded a sovereign country within its sphere of influence. The NATO forces are dusting off the latest and greatest copies of the non-proliferation treaties looking for loopholes and dangling participles which they hope to exploit, politicize, and even embarrass the Soviet Leader Putin into reversing his actions before a full scale war breaks out in the region.
Our feckless leader, otherwise known as "the fearless leader" and even "the community organizer" hasn't a clue as to how to manage the crisis. He is quick to draw a line in the sand as he did with Syria but cannot follow through on his bravado. He has no support nor respect in the world community and is universally mocked for the cheap suit that he is. Where is his "pen" and his "phone" now? The latter is his response to how he hoped to effect change as a lame duck president since he has little support within his own party for his initiatives much less in the opposing party in Congress. He is more concerned about the rights of the illegal immigrants crossing our southern borders than he is with the men and women patrolling those borders. He is more concerned with the rights and needs of the people in this country who would find a reason not to work than with those hard working americans who want to work, contribute, and find a reason to love this country. He is more concerned about the members of the LGBT community and their rights than he is with the religious and business institutions that would resist their lifestyle choices as perverse and socially unacceptable. He is doing what he promised to do; to transform our country.
And when his attorney general tells attorney generals across our nation that they can elect which laws to enforce and which not to enforce he takes aim at the rule of law on which our nation is based. Don't know what the right answer is when it comes to the Ukraine as I sit here this morning but I know one thing for sure; that cheap suit in the white house does not have this nation's best interests in mind. He cannot be trusted to make the right decisions when it comes to our actions as the world looks past us for leadership. God help us. And god help those children caught in the crosshairs of his indecision. They will be the political pawns of tomorrows battle and he will exploit them as he did the community of Sandy Hook in the wake of an otherwise horrific incident when he and his minions tried to gut our second amendment rights by implementing more restrictive gun laws. Who was it that once said, "never let a tragedy go to waste"?
And just when you think you're college age student is well on his way in life you get that fateful phone call informing you that your son is missing after spending an evening with friends at a bar. And then you spend two days, two of the longest days of your life, hearing nothing and thinking the worst. And then the unimaginable happens. Your son is found in a railroad tunnel and was reportedly killed by a passing train in the early hours of the morning. How does that happen? The boy was so bright with a life so promising. He would never do such a thing. Someone must be responsible - who? The anguish is palpable and unbearable for those closest to him and certainly not out of reach for the hyperbolic reporters who transmit their stories on midnight blogs and back country rags in search of their own personal pulitzers. This does not rise to Lady Diana proportions but is a small town variation on the same theme and no less painful for those closest to the story. It is a story that may never be truthfully told because no one knows the truth. Almost no one, that is. We know someone knows.
But the world carries on and with the Olympics in Sochia, Russia now in the rear view mirror we are on to things more meaningful than gold medals, doping allegations, and corrupt figure skating judges. I don't pretend to understand the political machinations in the Soviet realm but it has been reported in the last 24 hours that the Russian troops have occupied Crimea. It is an incursion that does not sit well with the NATO countries and there is considerable consternation over the fact that Russia has now effectively invaded a sovereign country within its sphere of influence. The NATO forces are dusting off the latest and greatest copies of the non-proliferation treaties looking for loopholes and dangling participles which they hope to exploit, politicize, and even embarrass the Soviet Leader Putin into reversing his actions before a full scale war breaks out in the region.
Our feckless leader, otherwise known as "the fearless leader" and even "the community organizer" hasn't a clue as to how to manage the crisis. He is quick to draw a line in the sand as he did with Syria but cannot follow through on his bravado. He has no support nor respect in the world community and is universally mocked for the cheap suit that he is. Where is his "pen" and his "phone" now? The latter is his response to how he hoped to effect change as a lame duck president since he has little support within his own party for his initiatives much less in the opposing party in Congress. He is more concerned about the rights of the illegal immigrants crossing our southern borders than he is with the men and women patrolling those borders. He is more concerned with the rights and needs of the people in this country who would find a reason not to work than with those hard working americans who want to work, contribute, and find a reason to love this country. He is more concerned about the members of the LGBT community and their rights than he is with the religious and business institutions that would resist their lifestyle choices as perverse and socially unacceptable. He is doing what he promised to do; to transform our country.
And when his attorney general tells attorney generals across our nation that they can elect which laws to enforce and which not to enforce he takes aim at the rule of law on which our nation is based. Don't know what the right answer is when it comes to the Ukraine as I sit here this morning but I know one thing for sure; that cheap suit in the white house does not have this nation's best interests in mind. He cannot be trusted to make the right decisions when it comes to our actions as the world looks past us for leadership. God help us. And god help those children caught in the crosshairs of his indecision. They will be the political pawns of tomorrows battle and he will exploit them as he did the community of Sandy Hook in the wake of an otherwise horrific incident when he and his minions tried to gut our second amendment rights by implementing more restrictive gun laws. Who was it that once said, "never let a tragedy go to waste"?