Gender and Stomach Flips

Posted by dkrashb on November 19, 2017

I am struggling with what it means in 2017 to be a woman in America.

It wasn’t all the men being accused of (and/or admitting to) sexual misconduct of late that was the tipping point for me (although they certainly contributed). It was a random series of events that caused me to end up sitting through a continuing legal education requirement with an attorney-friend that motivated me to finally sit down at the computer and write.

I was surrounded by about 50 attorneys in a 1-hour class on legal ethics. (Were you aware that attorneys have ethics?) The question was raised regarding the case of Mark Giannini, a Memphis businessman who was accused of raping a woman. Giannini’s defense attorney made the following statement during his closing argument: “People can be very good at lying. Women can be especially good at it because they’re the weaker sex.”

From the Tennessee professional rules of conduct for attorneys, this is an excerpt from rule 8.4: “It is professional misconduct for a lawyer to . . . (d) engage in conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice.” In the comments to the rules (which are meant to explain the intention of the rules), it says, “[3] A lawyer who, in the course of representing a client, knowingly manifests, by words or conduct, bias or prejudice based on race, sex, religion, national origin, disability, age, sexual orientation, or socio-economic status violates paragraph (d) when such actions are prejudicial to the administration of justice.” (You can look these up here: http://www.tba.org/info/tennessee-rules-of-professional-conduct).

Yet, in this room of about 50 attorneys, there was a great deal of skepticism that the defense attorney had violated this rule. What struck me most painfully was the moment when the presenter said, “What if his comment would have been about race?”

I imagined that quote again. I imagined it saying: People can be very good at lying. African Americans can be especially good at it because they’re the weaker race. My gut did a flip. The kind of flip that your gut does when the core of your being is reacting to something you know innately is horribly, horribly wrong. I imagined that quote revised one more time to say: People can be very good at lying. Jews can be especially good at it because they’re the weaker race. My gut flipped again.

I’m glad my gut flips when I think about people having such ridiculous, prejudiced beliefs based on someone’s race and/or religion. What I found so disturbing was that my gut DIDN’T do the same flip on the actual quote. Intellectually, I was outraged. But in my belly, the true test of what I really feel, I remained calm. Why? Why would the core of my being feel OK with being accused of being better at lying? Or, of belonging to the “weaker” sex?

I have given some thought to this question. One thing that occurs to me is that in the 2 alternate examples, I cannot be a victim of this thinking as I am neither African American nor Jewish. Is it the innate sense of duty to protect the rights of others that causes my gut to flip? But if that is the case, shouldn’t my gut still flip for the sake of all women? Do I not have the same duty to protect women regardless of the fact that I am one? What scares me the most is the possibility that deep down in my unconscious feelings I feel helpless to protect my own gender.

Is it possible that what I really feel is that it’s every woman for herself? I believe in supporting other women. I believe that women must band together in the face of prejudice and fight it together. I believe in the strength of numbers. Yet, every election, I watch women doing things I cannot explain nor comprehend. In the face of our president being exposed as a self-described grabber of women’s genitalia, I saw women “friends” post things on Facebook like, “boys will be boys.” This is consistent with my personal experience in life–I have found gender to be an unreliable predictor of who will be the biggest supporters of women.

Perhaps then it is a prejudice of a different sort to be emotionally aghast at the thought of someone saying something so offensive about minorities to which I do not belong. To assume that they need me to be aghast. Ultimately to view these categories of people as a whole, homogenous category rather than unique individuals who can also fend for themselves as individuals.

Or, is it possible that our culture is so permeated with subtle messages of misogyny that we rarely notice or, when we do, it seems so normal that people feel compelled to defend such behavior?

I do not have great insight as to why this is. But I am not alone in my gut doing a bigger flip over race than over women. The implication to me is that we, as a culture, are less able to protect women from sexism than we are to protect other groups from other forms of prejudice. And you know what? We really suck at protecting other groups. Where does this leave women?

Taking Stock

Posted by dkrashb on June 8, 2014

Cliffside outcroppings at Stone Door

The boys and the dogs

My bestie looking mighty brave on a rock ledge

Looking down the stone door

View from an overlook at Stone Door on a hike

My friends in a crevice at Rock City

Taking time off with friends over Memorial Day weekend at Lovers Leap-Rock City

It’s officially been 2 months since my leave of absence began. I thought it would be a good time to enumerate both the new lessons I’ve learned and the old lessons that have resurfaced as particularly relevant to this major shift in my life.

Your time will fill. No matter how much you have to do or how long you think you have to do it, time will pass more quickly than you expected and you will get less done than you planned.
It doesn’t matter how much of an out-of-the-box thinker you are; if there is no box, you can’t think outside of it.
When you have a mile-long list of things to do and believe you have only a fraction of the time you need to get them done, you manage your time far more judiciously than when you have a short list of things to do and believe you have all day. (See #1.)
There is always more opportunity than capacity.
When one thing has been your biggest time investment for a long time, when you pull it out of your schedule, everything that surrounded it collapses on top of each other and you have to scratch and claw your way through the crap to shove in something new and get all the little stuff safely held at bay.
Staying busy is not the hard part. It’s staying busy doing the important things instead of the distracting things that’s hard. (See #1.)
Just because something must be done urgently doesn’t mean it should be done at all.
I really mind a dirty house less than I mind cleaning it.
We treat people we have an intimate personal relationship with like someone we have an intimate personal relationship with even when the topics are professional–it takes effort not to hear “I don’t love you” when you disagree.
Working with your spouse is an opportunity to better your overall relationship. Creating artificial lines between your personal and professional relationship is only lying to yourself. The two roles are inseparable and must feed one another, driving both a closer, more intimate relationship and more creative energy from the feeling of being on the same team working towards the same goals.
Sleep helps. This is theoretical. I used reverse logic: lack of sleep makes everything harder. Therefore, I believe that if I someday get enough sleep, it will make everything easier.
Every day we have the opportunity to be more focused, more productive, more playful, more creative, more effective, more attuned to our health, and to get more sleep. We probably won’t do all of these things in the same day, however.
At the end of the day, it’s you. There is only you and what you did and didn’t get done, whether what you did made a difference, and whether that difference is the difference you intended. Ultimately, there is not, and really never has been, anyone else to blame.

Showing Up

Posted by dkrashb on May 11, 2014

Orchard Oriole refusing to come closer so I can get a good shot

Green Heron doing his best to look like part of the tree

Another “tree” pose by a Green Heron

Bluebird with a juicy looking worm on his way to his nest full of hungry babies

Dad downy woodpecker with a beak full of baby food

Hungry baby downy woodpecker looking for his nearby dad

Baby and Dad

Baby’s red cap showing and Dad’s red spot

Great Blue Heron shortly after swallowing a large frog (before I got my camera)

Cliff swallows gathering mud

More mud gathering

The group grows and the swallows continuously flutter their wings as they collect mud

Eastern phoebe with a lost cardboard “sled” drowning in the background

A mud-gathering cliff swallow about to suffer an aerial attack

I remember once, many years ago when I was teaching for a community college prison program, having a conversation with another instructor who was telling me about advice he’d given a student. He’d told the student, “Just show up. Showing up is half the battle.”

I was reminded of a student in one of the classes I taught during my teaching certification field experience. He showed up to class, sat down, put his head down on his desk, and promptly fell asleep. I asked him if he was feeling OK and he told me he’d been up until 2AM that morning playing video games. When I asked him how he expected to succeed in school if he didn’t sleep at night so he could stay awake during class, he replied, “I’m here, aren’t I?”

I think this requires considering what “showing up” means in this context. It doesn’t mean physically moving your body from one point to another and not actually being there mentally. Showing up means paying attention, watching and listening for opportunity to present itself. It implies both an awareness and recognition of opportunity.

Even with this revision of the definition, I don’t know if I agree that just being there is 50% of the battle. There’s also preparedness. It doesn’t do much good to realize you have an opportunity if you’re not in a position to take advantage of it.

For example, I walk my dog in our neighborhood park 3-4x a day. I spend this time mostly looking for birds. I am aware, paying attention, watching and listening for the opportunity to see interesting birds present themselves. However, I’d really like to get great images of these birds. Yet, in spite of this desire, 9 times out of 10, I rush out the door with the dog but not my camera.

The opportunity to photograph birds presents itself nearly every time I walk, but only 10% of the time am I prepared to actually capture an image of a bird.

Yet, oddly, I seem to be less likely to see birds when I am most prepared. This is like seeing that the weather forecast is for rain, taking an umbrella, a raincoat, and wearing waterproof boots only to have the weather turn sunny against all odds.

If we apply statistics to this equation, I think it comes down to this: I’m going to see birds I could photograph 90% of the time I walk. If I carry a camera only 10% of the time I walk, the odds that I will actually capture an image of a bird drops to 9 times out of 100.

Like everything else in life, showing up, being present, and being ready have to come together with luck. The more frequently we do our part, the more frequently our readiness will connect with good fortune. So, I guess that means I will be carrying my camera a lot more often in the future!

Meet Tom Turkey

Posted by dkrashb on May 4, 2014

This chick likes hanging around.

Hopping off the “swing”

Why did the chicken cross the road?

Pastured Penny Chickens

Tom looking dapper in the sun

Self-Portrait (hint: look closely at Tom’s eye)

Tom doing his best to look irresistable

Tom dragging his wings on the ground making a funny raspy, drumming sound that’s presumably very appealing to hens.

Chicken hen checking out Pat’s shoe

Hello, Penny!

A free-range hen hanging out in the woods

Shoelaces are just too tempting

Stalking the shoelaces

Tom and the egg carton

Meet Tom. Tom is a Bourbon Red heritage turkey who is free-ranging it on a farm in Wildwood Georgia where the grass is green, the sun is bright, and the hens are . . . well . . . at the moment, scarce. Tom’s Tinas are off sitting on about 20 eggs they laid in a secret hiding spot where the two hens share incubation duties of a combined nest.

What’s remarkable about this story is that Tom and his Tinas participated in the act of procreation without assistance from humans. That happens to be one of the criteria for a breed of turkey to be considered “heritage”–they have to be able to breed on their own.

But what exactly is a “heritage” turkey? Perhaps the best way to define a heritage turkey is to say that it is a traditional turkey from back before tradition became to factory raise turkeys who can barely walk, let alone breed.

The criteria to be a heritage turkey are: mate naturally, have a long productive lifespan, and grow slowly. By “long” and “slowly,” I presume what is really meant is “longer than” and “slower than” the dominant breed of turkeys used by factory farms. You can read about it from a better resource at the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy website, which I was paraphrasing.

Tom takes the first item on that list quite seriously. However, after spending about 15 minutes trying to convince Tom that I am not a turkey hen and only being able to divert his attention by offering the distraction of my husband, I wonder if there might be a criteria missing? I suppose the approach of attempting to mate with anyone and anything until one of those things turns out to be a turkey hen will work as long as the hens are close, but it seems a bit inefficient.

It also made Tom a challenging model when I was trying to get pictures. It’s hard to hold a DSLR with a heavy lens and press the shutter button with one hand while holding back a horny turkey with the other. When I squatted down to try to get an eye-level shot, Tom rushed me. Thankfully, Tom is persistent but not violent. He just keeps pushing his puffed chest up against whomever has attracted his attention over and over again in this crazy dance of you pushing him back and him pushing forward. It’s a dance with only one step in two directions.

When we got ready to leave, we pulled an empty Styrofoam egg carton out of the car only to have Tom pull it out of our hands, drop it on the ground, and proceeded to jump on top of it as if it were a Tina. It was the most remarkable display of species confusion I’ve ever seen. I guess it’s a good thing that how many attempts it takes a turkey to figure out who to breed with isn’t part of the heritage criteria.

Equinox

Posted by dkrashb on April 20, 2014

I wrote a really long, rambling post of over 800 words and decided it would be easier to just start over.
Here are the pertinent points: my staycation is ending. My 6-month leave is starting. So is my new role of working on my husband’s business and balancing that with my other pursuits like photography and getting myself from adequately healthy to ridiculously healthy.

I immediately feel the need to go on a rant about how long I’ve had a job, been self-supporting, yada yada yada. Basically, the need to justify slowing down, even if only temporarily, as if I have to prove I am deserving of this time.

I have suggested to friends that we should all stop cleaning our houses when we’re visiting each other. Then, we would all just be accepted as we are, clean house or dirty, and we wouldn’t drive each other to keep wasting time pretending that we’re neat nuts for people who are supposed to care more about us than about the cleanliness of our homes.

I suggest we do the same when it comes to using over-work as a way of saying we’re important. Let’s just drop the judgmental tones and patronizing comments about people doing things for fun. As I mentioned in an earlier post, there’s plenty of research that suggests people who play more are also more creative problem solvers and more effective and efficient at work (and healthier). So, let’s start bragging about making play a priority instead.

The next time someone says, “Oh, I don’t have time to do x,” let’s remind one another that we all have time to do what we choose. Sometimes we’re willing to make the choices to prioritize that time and sometimes we’re not.

In the end, we only get one lifetime (at least in this form, depending on what you believe) to create meaning. A universal truth I keep reminding myself of is that people never regret not spending more time at work at the end of their lives. People regret not laughing more, crying more, playing more, connecting with loved ones more.

So, here I go into the next stage of my journey. Perfectly timed with the spring equinox. What better metaphor than spring to begin anew? I might have liked having 13 weeks of winter to rest and recuperate from the past 30 years, but I suspect not. After all, it can be hard work getting rest.

Black, White, and Shades of Gray

Posted by dkrashb on January 12, 2014

An antique look added to B&W for the monument at Craven’s House on Lookout Mountain

The setting sun lighting the path ahead of us as we took a short hike.

Sun flares

The monument at Craven’s House above the city in the valley below.

Renaissance park

backlit grasses in the evening

more backlit grasses in the evening

The underside of the Walnut Street Bridge

A different angle on the under belly of the bridge

The world is not black and white. Or so we tell ourselves. If, of course, we were not endowed with whatever particular function of our brain tells us we see colors, the world would be black and white indeed.

Today I decided to conduct an experiment in black-and-white. I re-processed a series of color images without the color.

It’s interesting we refer to it as black-and-white. While I suppose in the purest sense, only black ink is used on white to create the shades of gray that lurk between pure black and pure white.

I like the metaphor. Even when we have only black and white to work with, we still end up with shades of gray. I am convinced that the essence of life comes in shades of gray. It’s the shadows created by what we believe to be absolute truths that hold the real truth.

And that real truth is a paradox: there is no real truth.

Someone recently asked me what a RAW image file looks like. We cannot view the true RAW file as an image. We can only view the subset of the RAW file indicated by the camera settings recorded along with the rest of the data or the version we create when we change those settings in software.

This is because the file contains the data for many possibilities and we have to choose which possibilities we want rendered into an actual image in order to view it. The truth of the file is greater than what we are able to perceive at any given point in time. I think this is exactly how all truth works.

Take, for example, the old story of the 3 blind men, each touching a different part of an elephant. Each accurately describes the part they are touching, but each describes an elephant completely differently. Each is correct, yet they are also wrong.

Today, we have more data available with less effort than anyone imagined possible just a few decades ago. But we can only extract a small set of information based on our personal settings. Our internal filters tell us what to notice, what to agree with and what to reject. Ultimately, we come away mostly with what is consistent with everything we already believe or want to believe.

This is like using the camera settings to decide how to render an image. It’s automatic and easy. Peeking into the shadows and looking at what other possibilities we might be missing takes energy and intention.

What fascinates me is that even when I know I am uninformed, under-informed, misinformed, I rarely fail to form an opinion–usually a passionate one. And I am not alone. Without this human tendency, we would have nothing to argue about–we would all be too busy realizing we can never know who is really right.

Is it possible to decide what we think is best without believing we are right?

Happy Christmas

Posted by dkrashb on December 25, 2012

I am re-posting my blog from last year Christmas Eve. Feeling both nostalgic and concerned about what small things we can each do to make the world just a little bit better, it seemed like a good time to repeat this post. This time, I decided to add photos. I asked myself “what looks like peace?” when I went poking through my photos. I wish I had more portraits, but, turns out I’m a landscape photographer. Who knew?

All I Want for Christmas is World Peace

(originally posted December 24, 2011).

I would very much like to think of myself as a non-judgmental person. But then I catch myself saying something like, “that crazy person is so judgmental–s/he thinks s/he is better than everyone else” and realize this is a lesson I’ve yet to master.

If you judge people, you have no time to love them. Mother Theresa

Judgment riles me up, makes me feel righteous, justified, and even vengeful. It separates me into the “right” and leaves those I judge in the “wrong.” Having cast judgment, there is no need to listen or consider; all that can follow are proclamations.

Why do I judge? There are practical reasons to make judgments. For example, I choose to spell “judgment” with the standard American spelling instead of “judgement,” the standard British spelling. Which is preferable?

In my case, this simple choice hides a deeper judgment. I spell it “judgment” because I was taught that Americans who spell it “judgement” are ignorant. If someone were to comment that I misspelled “judgment,” I could point them to a dictionary and explain that this is the correct American spelling. I would be left feeling redeemed and, if I am painfully honest, even superior.

What I would not feel is connected to my fellow human being, negotiating the world together in harmony.

Love is the absence of judgment. The Dalai Lama

What would I lose in giving up my judgments? Clearly, my judgments benefit me in some way or I wouldn’t make them. Would I be less smart if I never judged someone else to be stupid? Would I be less hard working if I never judged anyone else to be lazy? Would I be less competent if I never judged someone else to be incompetent? Or do I make these judgments out of fear that I am what I judge? Is pointing at someone else and calling them names a way of separating myself from what I don’t want to be?

I would hate to be discounted because I made a mistake. What I would like is to be accepted for a flawed human being with the best of intentions. What I need is to be heard and understood without being called good or bad.

The moment that judgment stops through acceptance of what it is, you are free of the mind. You have made room for love, for joy, for peace. Eckhart Tolle

And that, dear reader, is what I want for Christmas: love, joy, and peace. I arm myself with the awareness that I judge. I prepare myself to notice when I am judging. I know that with attention, I can create more space for love, joy, and peace. And in this gift to myself, I hope I can contribute just a little to a gift to the world:

World peace must develop from inner peace. Peace is not the absence of violence. Peace is the manifestation of human compassion. The Dalai Lama

View of Downtown Chattanooga from Stringer’s Ridge in the fall

The rising full moon pauses over Walnut Street Bridge

This Eastern Bluebird–a harbinger of luck and happiness

While mountains offer dangerous adventures, viewed from a distance, their steadfastness always makes me feel peaceful.

Shot from Signal Point, the setting sun always puts me at ease.

What is more peaceful than a sleeping dog?

Beautiful skies always make me feel hopeful.

Christmas trees alone in the dark always seem so quiet and still. I can sit and stare at a Christmas tree for hours.

The ocean, when relatively calm, soothes all your troubles away.

Looking down the Tennessee River valley after a long hike makes my day.

Fog filters through the trees in the Black Forest in Germany.

I love light beams peeping through clouds–“god beams” as at least one of my photographer friends calls them.

Beautiful sailboats sail peacefully on this calm day on the Bodensee in Germany.

Fear and Fear Itself

Posted by dkrashb on December 18, 2012

The hula hoop never seemed so exciting before.

Tonight’s images are from some of the most dynamic participants in the Starlight Parade. I think the gymnasts were the most thrilling. Although the fire twirlers are evocative, perhaps it just comes down to the degree of difficulty between twirling brands with burning ends and flipping and hand springing across asphalt–and, the probability of disaster.

While fire, of course, creates its own sense of danger and requires respect, the probability of lighting oneself on fire seems to be rather low, although I was concerned about one young woman’s choice to wear a gathered skirt. The probability of falling on one’s face mid-flip onto also-known-as-cheese-grater black top seems quite high.

It could be that this is just my personal experience. I feel relatively safe handling burning things and have actually never (knock wood) caused an uncontrolled fire. I’ve also never burnt myself playing with sparklers, candles, burning marshmallows (which strikingly resemble the firebrands twirled in the parade), campfires, camp stoves, or grills. I believe the only non-cooking-related fire injury I’ve ever suffered from was when I tried to light a bunch of birthday candles with a lighter and the metal part of the lighter overheated and burned my thumb. It was only a minor burn.

While I’ve had my share of bad burns in my lifetime, none of them have involved flames. What woman my age didn’t at some point accidentally brand her neck with a curling iron? Or get in a hurry and grab a pan out of the oven without getting a hot pad first? Or how about wipe out on a moped and get a third degree burn from the muffler? We’ve all done that, haven’t we?

And speaking about wiping out on a moped, this brings me back to the fear of asphalt. The most painful accident I ever had (including many broken bones) was when I took a ride hand turn on my bicycle way too fast for the space I had. I was turning onto a narrow side street coated with what’s fondly known as “chip and tar.” Instead of the smooth goo they put down for asphalt, they spread a layer of fine gravel and then spray it with a tar coating to stick the gravel in place and keep the dust down.

My rear wheel slipped across loose pieces of gravel. I went down hard enough to slide about a foot or so.

When I got up and looked at my knee, I pretty good chunk of it was missing. I looked more carefully and realized there were fine curly-queues of a substance resembling wide dental floss coming out of my knee. I later learned they were “shavings” off the tendon below my skin. Still gives me the creeps to think about it.

In the end, I have come to the conclusion that the human brain works very simply when it comes to fear: We fear what we most know to be terrifying.

This woman is marching, looking straight up, and twirling firebrands. I’m impressed.

Father and daughter watch the parade next to me.

Graceful and dangerous–very entertaining.

I was really worried she was going to catch her skirt on fire.

Gymnast and shadow about to be re-introduced.

This guy was fearless on the asphalt street.

Bring on the Parade

Posted by dkrashb on December 17, 2012

Not sure if there’s still room to sleep in this camper, but the tree sure looks nice.

It’s hard for me to look at my parade pictures today. I remind myself that every child shouldn’t suffer because of the 20 lost on Friday. Perhaps the loss makes Christmas (or whichever holiday each family celebrates), hope, and cheer that much more important.

I realize the feeling I have is the same one I always get following a tragedy. It’s best described as “heightened visceralness” (even if it’s not a real word).

Most of the time, I go through life thinking about what I need to do in the next hour, the next day, the next week. I push aside any bubbling sensations in my stomach, throat, or guts and stay focused on what I need to get done.

In the process of disconnecting from my visceral reactions, I also seem to disconnect from my own life. I often walk into rooms and wonder why I’m there, fail to realize my husband has come home or left, or drive somewhere without being able to recall any part of the drive.

When I am reminded how tentative life can be, first I choke. My throat closes, I have trouble breathing. Then I cry. Then I am left with rumblings in the pit of my stomach that I suspect are the disquiet of knowing I am doing nothing to change anything.

I have a sneaking suspicion that these visceral reactions happen every day, but until I am literally choked with tears (which doesn’t happen often), I refuse to pay attention to them.

Now that I am paying attention, I am reminded once again that I must pay attention to now. To the moments I have. Like the moment I am in right now sitting on the sofa, typing, dog curled next to me with a warm foot pressed against my leg.

To fail to notice each moment because I’m so distracted by the news is to give a piece of my life to a dead gunman in Connecticut when it’s far too late to make a difference.

And so, I close my browser full of news feeds and videos about Sandy Hook elementary. I pull up the photos I’d prepared for yesterday’s post. I think of all the smiling children at the Chattanooga Starlight Parade with a warm feeling akin to a mental hug. I say to myself, “Bring on the parade.”

“And when it rains on your parade, look up rather than down. Without the rain, there would be no rainbow.”

~Gilbert K. Chesterton

That said, here are the next set of photos from the Starlight Parade in downtown Chattanooga. I’m normally not that excited by cars in a parade. But, I did enjoy the creative decorations folks came up with. I especially enjoyed the children around me calling out the names of familiar characters they saw go by.

This VW bus makes for a more creative way to enter a float.

The lawn mower racing team made a striking night time appearance.

Smiles adorned this float.

This ancient fire truck hitched a ride so it too could make an appearance in the parade.

The Chattanooga Zoo opted for simulated animals instead of live ones.

Not a great shot, but I love thinking about how much more fun the Grinch would have had taking this down the mountain!

A brightly lit Rudolf adorns this collectible car.

14,016,000 Hours

Posted by dkrashb on December 16, 2012

I completely missed the news on Friday. By Saturday morning, posts on FaceBook were furiously popping to the top of my newsfeed about the shooting. Several were a photo of a beautiful young woman who, at 27, is believed to have died huddled over her first grade class.

I made the mistake of going to the WSJ page that profiles the victims. Every loss I’ve ever felt seemed to rise up from some place outside my consciousness and stick in my throat. These tiny children. These innocent, unsuspecting children with an entire lifetime ahead of them. All gone. In minutes.

Another post appeared on FB. It was a line from comedian Andy Bororwitz. It’s too true to be funny: “Maybe I’m a dreamer, but I wish mental health care were as easy to get as, say, a gun.”

I find myself imagining Daniel Barden going to swim practice today. Olivia Engel twirling around in a tutu. Catherine Hubbard swinging on a playground swing, snug in a warm winter coat. Chase Kowalski grinning ear-to-ear while tossing a baseball. Jesse Lewis drinking hot chocolate with bright pink cheeks, having just come in from the cold. Emilie Parker making homemade christmas ornaments for her teacher. Noah Pozner growing up and going to his bar mitzvah.

I read through the list of names that seems to go on forever. I have to stop imagining the futures that will never come.

A friend posts a quote from Mr. Rogers on FB: “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’ To this day, especially in times of ‘disaster,’ I remember my mother’s words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers — so many caring people in this world.”

I adore Mr. Rogers. There is no one more comforting. But I remain troubled that all the helpers in the Sandy Hook Elementary tragedy–and there were many–couldn’t stop one man with 3 guns from killing 26 people in minutes. Not just 26 people; 26 futures. About 1600 years of future were lost amongst just the children killed on Friday. 1600 years, 584,000 days, 14,016,000 hours of future. How many hours does it take to cure cancer, end hunger, solve health care, find a way for us to peacefully co-exist? What did all of us lose because we collectively haven’t found a way to prevent these tragedies?

Another friend shares a post from Maya Angelou, one of my personal heroes:

“Our country is grieving. Each child who has been slaughtered belongs to each of us and each slain adult is a member of our family. It is impossible to explain the horror to ourselves and to our survivors. We need to hold each other’s hands and look into each other’s eyes and say, ‘I am sorry.’”

I am deeply, deeply sorry.

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Combining living on the road with a mainstream lifestyle

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