Not quite a year ago I wrote about dodging tornadoes on the way to visit a friend in Arkansas.
And appropriately enough, as spring storms roll through here again this morning, my Good Lady Wife showed me an article in the Rural Missouri newsletter which is a follow-up to that weather event. Here’s the first bit:
Donnie Guinn steps out of his small farmhouse to greet his wife, Marty, who had just returned home from the grocery store. While reaching down for a bag of groceries, Donnie stares toward the sky and pauses, as something doesn’t look right. As a dark line of clouds creeps over the horizon, he urges Marty to head downstairs.
They didn’t realize it, but they were about to experience what several counties across southern Missouri faced May 8, 2009: a derecho.
Spanish for “direct” or “straight ahead,” this term describes a widespread, long-lived windstorm with a band of rapidly moving thunderstorms.
Straight-line winds in excess of 90 miles an hour. Baseball-sized hail. Actual tornadoes embedded here and there. 3-5 inches of rain in an hour.
Good times, good times.
Jim Downey
Fascinating:
Fossil finger points to new human species
In the summer of 2008, Russian researchers dug up a sliver of human finger bone from an isolated Siberian cave. The team stored it away for later testing, assuming that the nondescript fragment came from one of the Neanderthals who left a welter of tools in the cave between 30,000 and 48,000 years ago. Nothing about the bone shard seemed extraordinary.
Its genetic material told another story. When German researchers extracted and sequenced DNA from the fossil, they found that it did not match that of Neanderthals — or of modern humans, which were also living nearby at the time. The genetic data, published online in Nature1, reveal that the bone may belong to a previously unrecognized, extinct human species that migrated out of Africa long before our known relatives.
Carl Zimmer has about the best explanation I’ve found (no surprise – his writing on science in general, and evolution in particular, is nothing short of brilliant). Here’s a good excerpt:
The scientists succeeded in fishing out human-like DNA from the pinky bone, and so far they’ve sequenced its mitochondrial DNA–that is, the DNA that is housed in mitochondria, sausage-shaped, fuel-producing structures in our cells. The majority of our DNA, which sits in the nucleus of cells, comes from both our mother and father. But mitochondrial DNA comes all from Mom. When the scientists compared the pinky DNA to DNA of humans and Neanderthals, they got something of a shock. If you line up the mitochondrial DNA from any given living human to any other living human, you might expect to find a few dozen points at which they are different. Compare human mtDNA to Neanderthal DNA, and you’ll find about 200 differences. But when the scientists compared the Denisova DNA to a group of human mitochondrial genomes, they found nearly 400 differences. In other words, their DNA was about twice as different from ours than Neanderthal DNA.
The implication, again from Zimmer:
The Denisova DNA split too recently from our own to have been carried by H. erectus, the first globe-trotting hominids. But paleoanthropologists have found a fair number of other hominid fossils in Europe and Asia that might belong to more recent waves out of Africa. (Here, for example, is a report on hominids in Europe 1.2 million years ago.) So perhaps there was at least one other wave aside from H. erectus, the expansion of Neanderthals, and the spread of modern humans. If that’s true, this new discovery also means that this wave produced a long lineage of hominids that survived long enough to live alongside humans. We coexisted with yet another species of hominid–along with Neanderthals, H. erectus, and those lovable hobbits, Homo floresiensis–for thousands of years. Our current solitude is a recent fluke.
So, out of five (or more??) species of hominids, only we’re still here. Luck, or violence, or absorption – whatever the reason, at one time there were other similarly intelligent species right here on this one planet. I’m amused in how this supports my vision at the end of Communion of Dreams in two ways [spoiler alert!]: the revelation of humankind’s deeper history/ability and the fact that there are many other advanced races among the stars.
Jim Downey
. . . how anything could go wrong with this:
PARIS (Reuters) – Thrill-seekers in France tired of the usual array of white-knuckle sports are turning to a bizarre new service to get their adrenaline rush — designer abduction.
For 900 euros ($1,226), clients of Ultime Realite (“Ultimate Reality”), a firm in eastern France, can buy a basic kidnap package where they’re bundled away, bound and gagged, and kept incarcerated for four hours.
Alternatively, they can opt for a more elaborate tailor-made psychodrama, involving an escape or helicopter chase for example, where costs can quickly escalate.
Note – this is supposed to happen at a time and a place which the client/victim does *not* know, to add to the realism of the experience.
When in college, me and a couple of college buddies came up with how much fun it would be to stage a ‘mafia hit’ in some nightclub, preparing all the special effects (guns shooting blanks, small charges in walls to simulate bullets striking them, blood packs on the victim and one of the hit men, et cetera). We thought it would be hilarious to set up such a thing and spring it on some unknowing nightclub patrons who would only be told that they were going to be attending a “special event”.
Of course, we gave up on the idea shortly after having a good laugh, because we knew that it was insane. Exposing people to that kind of traumatic event – even as just a witness – was dangerous and irresponsible. Not to mention that there could be someone (off duty cop? actual gangster?) with a real gun loaded with real bullets in the audience who would react poorly to such stimuli.
And that was under the reasonably controlled conditions of one room.
Now, these idiots want to pull this kind of stunt in public?
Dipshits.
Jim Downey
I put on a ball cap this morning, prior to heading out for my daily walk.
And my head hurt.
No, not a headache. A soft knot of pain localized right on my temple, where the cap fit just a little tightly.
* * * * * * *
I’ve mentioned the SCA here a number of times in the past. How I used to be very involved in it, how I still have a number of close friends from those days, how I learned a lot from my years of active participation.
I don’t think I’ve mentioned too much how I also blame the SCA for some of my aches and pains. But shall we say that I have been known to grumble a bit from time to time, how my days of fighting led to several joint surgeries, multiple fractures, and so forth. Oh, the SCA combat is actually quite safe, if you do it in a sane manner with decent armor. But in my younger days I didn’t always take the proper precautions, and pushed myself pretty hard to compete at the highest level – well beyond what I would consider ‘sane’ these days.
Still, those old reflexes probably saved my life.
* * * * * * *
Last October I wrote about an incident involving my stupidity and moving large chunks of wood, how it gave me a good smack upside the head and a pressure split of the scalp.
Sometimes it is only in hindsight, seen from something of a distance, that you can appreciate just what actually happened in the case of an accident. Such is the case with this incident.
It became pretty quickly clear in the weeks following that episode that I had actually suffered a concussion and likely a skull fracture. I say this because I know how bones ache when healing from a break, having broken something north of 15 of ’em over the decades. Other kinds of injuries just don’t feel the same.
Anyway, I didn’t seek treatment for it, because in spite of all the pain, there wasn’t much of an indication of anything really dangerous happening, and besides taking X-rays/cat-scans and confirming the break there wasn’t much that medical science would be able to do for me. They don’t put your head in a cast for a simple skull fracture, and I had painkillers sufficient to deal with things. Yeah, had there been some kind of bleeding inside my brain they may have done something, but I had no evidence of any such injury – I was extremely lucky.
I was *extremely* lucky.
* * * * * * *
Where the handle of the hand truck struck me on the temple was right where the cap fit a little tight. I was wearing that cap when the accident happened.
And thinking about it, and thinking about what happened and how, I now realize something that I didn’t really realize before. When, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the handle of the hand truck swinging my way, I flinched away.
A normal reflex.
Yes, but one which had been reinforced and conditioned by years – years – of SCA combat. Combat which largely consisted of people trying to hit me upside the head with stout sticks moving at high speed. Combat in which I came to be one of the best in the world for a brief period of time.
Now, I can’t prove it, and don’t care to test the hypothesis by duplicating the experiment, but I would bet that the injury I received – skull fracture, concussion – would likely have been a lot worse had I not had that honed reflex. Had I not seen the handle move, or had I moved in response just a little slower, it could well have left me with permanent brain injury or even dead. I’m not trying to be melodramatic here, just honest with myself about the close call I had.
And you know, I don’t think I’ll bitch quite so much about my aching joints from here on.
Jim Downey
Filed under: 2nd Amendment, Ballistics, Guns, Preparedness, Survival, Terrorism, Violence
“What’s that?”
“Oh, I got it for giving a donation to the snipers.”
I looked again at the pewter skull, about the size of a silver dollar, hanging on a thin ribbon on my friend’s chest. There was a hole in the middle of the forehead, through which the ribbon ran.
A shudder ran through me.
* * * * * * *
The SHOT Show was huge. Massive. Some 50,000 attendees. I heard that if you walked all of the paths through the various booths and displays, you’d cover something like 34 miles.
Big chunks of the show were dedicated to booths catering to “Law Enforcement,” though there was more than a little para-military stuff in these areas. Not surprising, given how much police agencies deal with para-military tactics; they need para-military equipment.
I wandered through these areas, along with pretty much all the rest of the show. Not that I have any real interest in any of the stuff most of them were featuring – I don’t have a ‘wannabecop’ mindset. I was just curious. And it was . . . educational.
* * * * * * *
“Ballistics by the inch? What’s that all about?”
The man stopped next to my table in the food court, looking at my name tag. It was early evening, but I was beat from walking most of the show and dealing with the crowds. I don’t do crowds well. My ‘extrovert batteries’ were worn out, and all I wanted was just a light dinner before going to hide in my room and charge up again for the next day of the show.
But, he was smiling, and seemed nice enough. I gestured to the empty chair across from me. He set his tray down, and we introduced ourselves.
“Well, BBTI is a project myself and several friends did, testing how muzzle velocity varies according to barrel length for 16 different handgun cartridges.” I handed him a card.
“Just external ballistics, then?”
“Yeah. But we’ve put all the data online for people to use freely. We launched the site about 14 months ago, and we’re now approaching 2 million hits.” I’d given this little spiel enough times already at the SHOT Show that it pretty much rolled off my tongue automatically. “Why?”
“Well, I’m into ballistics, too. Though that isn’t my ‘day job.'”
* * * * * * *
One of the major reasons I went to the SHOT Show was to make contacts, to meet people with whom I had corresponded. One of these was Kathy Jackson, editor of Concealed Carry magazine and the person behind the excellent Cornered Cat website. I had chatted with Kathy many times over the years, and we worked with her on the great article that Concealed Carry did on the BBTI project.
Anyway, when we did finally have a chance to meet in person the last day of the show, it was a delight. There were four of us, all chatting together. In the course of the conversation, she asked “what is the silliest thing you’ve seen here?”
There was, truth be told, a *lot* of silly things at the show. There was the odd little bayonet which was supposed to affix to your pistol. There were the “mall ninja” toys and people who wore them. There were the science fiction/fantasy themed custom knives which would be useless in the real world. But I said “All the grim-faced men and women in the advertising photos and banners in the LE section of the show.”
* * * * * * *
“What’s your day job?”
“I’m a research scientist. We do a lot of work for NASA and the various aerospace industries, mostly things like orbital mechanics.”
“What brings you to SHOT?”
“Launching a new ballistics calculator, for long-range shooting. Really long range shooting. Stop by the AI booth tomorrow, and I’ll show you.”
We chatted from there, comparing notes on the show, discussing our respective backgrounds in shooting and what got us each interested in the projects we developed. Smart guy. Very smart guy.
* * * * * * *
There was a very interesting post last night on MetaFilter. I know I mention MeFi a lot, but that’s because I am frequently impressed with the quality of the discussions which take place there. This one was about Simo Häyhä, one of the most deadly snipers in history with over 800 confirmed kills during the Finnish “Winter War“. The whole thread is here, but what caught my attention was the discussion which ensued concerning the ethics of being a sniper.
Several people commented that snipers were little more than sociopaths who took some pleasure at killing. Here are two such comments:
How does it feel to have personally murdered that many people?
posted by monospace at 9:11 AM on January 28
And:
Also, the idea that “legalized killing” is really conceptually different from illegal murder would seem to imply that the people who are best at “legalized killing” are temperamentally unrelated to those who murder. I do not buy this. Häyhä’s lack of retrospective remorse is no doubt related to the fact of why he was such an effective killer in the first place: hurting others didn’t have much of a negative emotional effect on him. He probably enjoyed hurting people, which is how he was so calm and good at doing it.
It’s not a stretch to believe that the dispositions that make the best soldiers/snipers are identical to the dispositions of the worst rapists and serial killers. The only difference might be a slightly different life context. The difference between a certain person being celebrated as a war hero or reviled as a serial killer might come down to the chance event of a war happening at a certain time.
posted by dgaicun at 1:59 PM on January 28
There was a lot of push-back against this mindset. The best is from a woman who lived through the siege of Sarajevo. Here’s an excerpt from her:
Sarajevo was a city with a mixed Serb, Croat and Muslim population, as well as significant numbers of Jewish and Roma people. Probably the most obviously “multi-ethnic” city in the former Yugoslavia. It was also a peaceful, cosmopolitan place. This made it a particularly significant target for those Serbs who used ethnic hatred and “the practical impossibility of people living together” as justification for genocide and violent aggression. Sarajevo’s existence proved that to be a lie. Naively, many Sarajevans – myself included – assumed that our solidarity as a city would magically ward off any attacks. Wrong!
Because Sarajevo is in a valley surrounded by mountains which quickly were controlled by Serb forces, we were in an indefensible position. We didn’t have much to defend ourselves with in any case. We were, at first, a purely civilian population. But we were shelled and massacred anyway.
Slowly, some of the men in town who owned rifles (for hunting) realized that one of the only ways to defend themselves was by becoming snipers. These were the same guys who – only weeks or months earlier – argued that only through pacifism would we survive and show the world. We soon discovered the world didn’t care much. As many of us lost family members and started starving, we realized that if snipers would slow the numbers of civilians being killed, that’s what needed to happen. There wasn’t any other choice.
I lived frighteningly near the frontline. So much so, that in quiet moments, there would occasionally be dialogue between “our” snipers and the Serbs shooting and shelling us from the hills. Usually, it was our guys shouting at the Serbs in the hills to lay down their arms. (Most of the Serbs were “local” and frequently each side personally knew the guys on the “other” side.) These requests were quite obviously ignored. It didn’t stop our guys from trying, and they were heartfelt pleas. Our snipers were engaged in self-defense, and I’m amazed that people are so ignorant of war – even in secondhand terms – that they see no difference between self-defense and aggression.
posted by Dee Xtrovert at 4:26 PM on January 28
And another from the same comment:
I can’t idolize a sniper, no matter how tough he was. To be a sniper you have to be no more than one notch away from a psychopath. To kill 800 people, looking at each of them in the face, you have to be dead inside.
How can I say it? That’s just fucking stupid. Maybe, if you know you’re firing on civilians in an act of senseless aggression, it takes a kind of heartless person to do that. But that certainly wasn’t true for Häyhä, who was defending his country and people and likely saved many more lives than he took. Unlike probably everyone else on MetaFilter, I have been a victim of snipers twice, with scars to prove it. That’s not including a shelling that killed my parents, broke my scapula to bits and put me in a coma for weeks. Or the white-hot shrapnel. So if anyone has a right to judge snipers harshly, I am her. But I make the distinction between the people who shot me for no good reason and those who were defending a peace-loving, multi-ethnic city. Because there is a difference.
* * * * * * *
We stopped at the Accuracy International booth, and the fellow gave us a demonstration of the ballistics calculator he’d developed. I don’t want to go into a lot of detail, but suffice it to say that this hand-held device was extremely well designed and robust, capable of holding up to the worst kind of weather and, um, ‘field conditions.’ With it, a capable marksman with the right kind of gun could easily hit a moving target at the range of thousands of yards. Indeed, it is so sophisticated that it will calculate air density differentials according to elevation, and the effect that they would have on the flight of a given bullet at a given angle, because it was meant to be used for making shots up or down the sides of mountains. It’s such a powerful tool that it actually falls under the US laws concerning weapons technology transfers.
* * * * * * *
My comment about the grim-faced men and women was missed in the general chatter, and I’m glad. I meant it, because using those images was so over-the-top in many applications as to be absurd. You know, the whole ‘warrior’ images being tied to a particular flashlight or type of boot. Just . . . silly. Those I know who have been in real grim situations seldom celebrate the fact or try to draw notice to it.
But it is easy to misunderstand that. Sometimes a little black humor is entirely appropriate.
Before I left the show I stopped by the sniper’s table and quietly left a donation. They were out of the little skulls. Which was just fine by me.
Jim Downey
(Cross posted to the BBTI blog.)
Filed under: 2nd Amendment, Civil Rights, Failure, Guns, Humor, Marketing, Music, RKBA, Society, Survival, Violence
When you get in trouble and you don’t know right from wrong,
give a little whistle!
Taking the old song lyrics to heart, if inverting the intent a bit, police in the Chicago suburb of Oak Park have come up with a cunning plan to thwart crime:
Oak Park crime: Police pass out whistles to help residents fight back
Jump in burglaries and robberies prompts giveaway
Thousands of Oak Park residents are being equipped with a simple device to help fight crime in the village.
Police are passing out whistles that they are urging citizens to blow if they are victims of or witnesses to a crime.
Officers distributed hundreds of the shiny whistles at two stations along the CTA’s Green Line in Oak Park on Friday and will be passing out more Wednesday along the Blue Line. Giveaways elsewhere are expected to take place in the weeks ahead.
“We think they are going to go quick,” said Oak Park Police Cmdr. Keenan Williams.
The village conducted a similar program in the 1980s, and Police Chief Rick Tanksley earlier this year suggested bringing it back after statistics showed that burglaries and robberies were on the rise.
I’m sure that criminals will now flee Oak Park, in the face of this devastating new crime-fighting tool. I mean, they might actually have their hearing damaged, should a brave citizen use their police-issued whistle. And based on previous experience, and the complete eradication of crime in Oak Park following the last time this tactic was used . . .
. . . wait, what’s that? You mean crime wasn’t eliminated in Oak Park by the whistles last time? Huh. Maybe that would explain why this brilliant program hasn’t been put into effect in cities around the country.
Then why do it? Well, here’s another small bit from the Tribune article:
The village had about 3,000 whistles delivered at a cost of about 50 cents each, he said. The cost was paid by Community Bank, whose logo is on the side of each whistle.
I mean, I hate to be cynical or anything, especially this time of year, but it sure seems like nothing but an advertising gimmick to me. One backed by the boys in blue. I wonder who in the city government got what kind of special favor for that little trick?
Now, in all honesty, I do actually carry a whistle with me. No kidding. But when it comes to wanting a defense against crime, I’d prefer one of my concealed-carry pistols.
Except, of course, that that isn’t allowed in Illinois. Hmm.
Jim Downey
(Cross posted to UTI.)
Filed under: Connections, Guns, Health, Privacy, Society, Survival, Violence, Writing stuff
I just sent the following email:
University City Chief of Police
Colonel Charles Adams
6801 Delmar Blvd.
University City, MO 63130Colonel Adams,
40 years ago, in the early hours of 12 December, my father, Wilbert James Downey, died while performing his duties as a patrolman for the University City Police Department.
Your department, and the people of University City, have always graciously recognized his sacrifice, and honored his memory. This has always been a comfort to my family, and to myself, though I have not participated in any of the remembrances in recent years.
This morning I would like to ask your assistance in doing some research for a book about my father. I need some information which is not readily available, but it may be in your archives or in the collective memory of the department.
I would like to know about my father’s service revolver. I know that it was a .38 special, probably a S & W Model 15. If you could confirm this, or provide any additional information, I would greatly appreciate it. Is it possible that a serial number was recorded? Was the revolver retained by the department, or was it considered personal property?
Any help in this matter would be most welcome. If there is someone else there at the department with whom it would be better for me to correspond, please let me know.
Thank you for your time, and your service to the community –
James Downey
And with that, I have begun a new project, a new journey, likely a new book.
I’ve mentioned before that this time of year always leaves me feeling . . . nachdenklich. This year the intensity of the rumination has been greater than before. I’m not entirely sure why. Regardless, the feeling is there, and it has been growing on me all this year.
So, I’ve decided to embark on a quest to find my father’s gun. Specifically, his service revolver mentioned above. And through this, to find him.
Because the gun itself doesn’t really matter. What does matter is the journey. As I told my sister in an email this morning:
I too had been feeling that this year was somehow more ‘significant’, and it has had a greater impact on me than in most past years. In fact, this morning I was going to draft a letter/email to Chief Adams at the U City PD, and thereby initiate something I had been thinking about for the last couple of years: writing a book about dad through the mechanism of trying to track down his service revolver (working title idea “My Father’s Gun”). My intent is to explore a lot of the things I have thought about and wondered about over the last 40 years, as a way of understanding him and the lives he touched. I was planning on incorporating all my correspondence and such available resources as I can find – which will also mean my finally coming to terms with things I have deliberately tried to avoid (I think for good reason).
I’ve invited her to join me on this journey (we get along very well, and could work together on such a project easily), adding her perspective along the way. We’ll see.
Just thought I would share this.
Jim Downey
Update: I did hear back from the Chief’s office, have the serial number now, and have confirmed by it that was a Model 10 which was manufactured in early 1961. This fits perfectly with about the time my dad started on the force. JD
Sent this to a friend a few minutes ago.
So, here’s the deal. A neighbor decided to take down a big tree a couple of weeks ago. She asked us whether we wanted the wood from it. Not really, since it was a live tree (meaning it would need to cure at least a year), and not one particularly good for firewood (soft maple) anyway. But to save her having to pay to have it hauled off, I told her I’d get it first chance I had if no one else got it first. Figured I’d just stack it up for next year.
I noticed it was still there this morning when on my walk with the dog. Figured since I had a social thing over at a local arts school my wife is involved with this afternoon, the day was going to be something of a wash anyway, and I might as well go move the lumber. The wet, heavy lumber.
Got the first couple of carloads moved, and stacked. Went back for the last one, this the largest bits of trunk. Took my two-wheeled hand truck, since those remaining pieces are simply too heavy for me to move any distance on my own. Got three of the seven pieces shifted and loaded. Went to move the fourth, transferring from being on top of another piece to the hand truck.
Then my luck kicked in.
Hand truck leaned back (I didn’t notice this) as I shifted over the wood, since I had cleverly put my foot behind the wheel to stop it from moving. When I then dropped the wood the 18″, it hit the bottom of the hand truck with considerable force. This functioned as a lever, the wheels as the fulcrum, slamming the upright part forward. This I *did* notice, because it smacked me upside the head – right on the right temple. And me having given my SCA helmet away just a month ago . . .
Well, I didn’t lose consciousness. And after the world stopped spinning, I checked, and yes, was bleeding profusely from the large lump swelling on my temple. But I didn’t feel any shock or anything serious, so I finished moving that piece of lumber into the car, tossed the hand truck in the back, and got in. From what I could see in the mirror, it didn’t look too bad – not enough that I needed to go straight to the ER, anyway.
Came home, went to the bathroom, asked my good lady wife to come take a look. Nasty knot the size of a half golf ball, pressure split of about 3/4″ just outside the hairline. Lots of blood (head wounds always bleed a lot), but didn’t look serious. We cleaned it up, applied antibiotic, and I walked my good lady wife through applying suture strips to the wound. I have some symptoms of a mild concussion, but nothing too serious – thanks to lots of SCA/martial arts experience, and being a klutz all my life, I know how to deal with it from here out. Unless things go significantly downhill, there’s no reason to go to the hospital.
But I think I’ll skip the social function this afternoon.
Jim Downey
PS 10/18 8:30 AM: Got through the rest of the day and last night just fine, with only the usual and expected symptoms. Doing much better this morning, though it’ll likely be a couple of days before I’m back up to par.
Filed under: Daily Kos, General Musings, movies, Society, Survival, Violence
It’s always dangerous to quote yourself. But I think this is worthwhile:
“You think about those famous truths in our culture-about a son’s coming to adulthood and seeking to avenge his father’s death. It’s been a recurring theme in Western culture for centuries. Look at Shakespeare. The first ‘Star Wars’ movie was largely that.
“One of my favorite movies is ‘The Princess Bride.’ There you have one of the main characters, Inigo Montoya, say, ‘You killed my father. Prepare to die.’ And that refrain plays out through the entire movie. It is interesting because one of the things that same character says in the movie is: ‘There’s not a lot of money in vengeance.’ That’s a very insightful thing. I could not have allowed that to twist my life, to give me that sort of single-minded determination, to seek revenge in one way or another.”
At the mid-century point of his life, the pain is still there.
“Talented authors can explore these themes, but I was actually faced with dealing with it. My father was murdered and the man who did it was sentenced to death for that crime. But his sentence was commuted to a life sentence without parole by the court in the mid-1970s,” reflects Downey.
“If I dwelled on who he was and what he had done, there would have been a lot of rage that would have been given personification. I really wanted to avoid dwelling on the negative things. This man is presumably still in prison. I have tried my absolute best to ignore him. By distancing myself that way, I don’t feel like I have to seek vengeance personally. But the thought still crosses my mind every time I watch a movie that has that theme, every time I read a book or watch a movie, or an officer dies,” he adds.
That’s from page three of an article in this month’s POLICE magazine, titled “What Happens to the Children of Fallen Officers”.
Trust me, that was not an easy interview to give.
I’ve written about this subject before, and mentioned it in passing. It’s obviously, and appropriately, been a major factor in my life – one which has never been far from my awareness.
It’s almost trite to say “we are defined by the choices we make rather than the experiences we have,” as if life were just simply a game of cards where you sought to win some small pot of money. I know hard choices. Choices that have to be made again, and again, and again, in the face of ongoing societal pressures pushing you to make different choices. And because I have had to face this, I am much less inclined to pass judgment on those who have chosen poorly. I know full well – as lucky as I have been to have a loving wife, a loving family, and friends who care deeply – I know full well how close I have come to making poor choices myself.
Rage and vengeance are part of our heritage, part of what makes us human, part of what has enabled us to survive. That cannot be denied. But they are less important than love and community – which have allowed us to start to build a civilization.
Jim Downey
(Cross posted to Daily Kos.)
Communion Of Dreams 