His Fifteen Minutes

I didn't want to talk about it. There are enough people talking about it. Analyzing it. Thirty-three people dead. Murdered without reason. "Without reason." Senseless. That's what makes the situation all the more tragic, all the more depressing. Sad. There was no reason for it. It was just spleen. Everyone involved was collateral damage to his rage.

They're dead. He's dead. What did it prove? Why? As disturbing, sad, and painful as these days are, the human heart is a very resilient organ. The survivors and the friends and families of the deceased will move on. Live. And cope with the tragedy and loss. He will become a statistic. His fifteen minutes will fade and he will become a statistic.

So what was the point?

The senselessness of it all is what upsets me most. Do I ever want to be able to understand something like this?

The cynic in me asks: Where will you be? What will you be doing? when this happens again?

The imagined enemy. I remember reading Notes from Underground, where the narrator speaks of a great offense that the alleged offender is completely unaware of. The narrator imagines conflict where it is only coincidence. The narrator needs conflict to justify living, so he dramaticizes an accidental bump in a crowd into the greatest injustice and insult.

I am infuriated by the killer's insistance of "victimization." He takes no responsibility for his actions (including his own suicide). He hid behind the persona, Ishmael Ax. Being victimized (perceived or not) does not justify victimizing others. Revenge makes for a nice story vehicle but is ineffective as a solution to any real world problems.

Dumb Daddy

I've been an "Idiot Dad" more than once. More than once I have convinced myself of a truth just to be proven otherwise. More than once, I had made up my mind before I heard the whole story.

This happens most with my eldest simply because he is the eldest and the way we interact is booby trapped with opportunities for me to jump to poor conclusions.

It happened last Saturday. I got upset at him because he didn't finish his breakfast. I scolded him for not finishing his food. Eating is an issue with him. Where his younger brother has a healthy appetite, it is rare for my eldest to ever want to eat anything (including the sweets that other parents complain about).

Still angry, I asked him to brush his teeth and get dressed. We had a dentist appointment that morning. We walked quickly to the subway station in silence. On the train ride, I stopped being angry and spoke to him about why I was angry and why it is important that he eats his meals. The remainder of the morning was fine after that. He didn't even wince as the dentist cleaned his teeth and he entertained himself quietly as he waited through my teeth cleaning.

I knew something was wrong when he said he wanted to go home. Usually we spend the latter part of the morning together after our dentist appointment. We window shop, visit the nearby comic book store, go out to eat, some times even a movie. This time, he just wanted to go home. When we got home I realized why - he had developed a temperature since getting out of bed. That was what probably made him eat even less than he normally does!

I am an idiot! I should have known. The signs were there but for one reason or another I was OK with my conclusion that he was just being difficult about eating his breakfast. I didn't think that he was out at the playground the day before. It was unusually warm. The temperature dropped that evening. We left the window open. He caught a chill. I didn't dress him warm enough the morning of the dentist appointment. His chill blew up into a fever.

I am an Idiot Dad and not only did my eldest suffer for a week with a cough and fever, my youngest caught the bug too. I did too. I am even more of an idiot because after the first time I didn't listen to my eldest, I swore I would not do it again.

(I will tell you about how I became an idiot in another post).