Look in the mirror

Mr. Carter lost his humanity when he took this shot and then immediately left the area. I believe that is why he killed himself.

These words are not in judgment of Kevin Carter, for every day I spend dollars on that which I do not need while children starve half a world away. Every day I complain because there is *nothing to eat* meaning, not just exactly what I'm hungry for.

So, this reminder is for me principally; look in the mirror, see this child, try to complain about ANYthing at all.

http://www.oxfamamerica.org/

http://www.mercycorps.org/

Blue Man Group on Global Warming

Your attention please. Thank you for choosing earth as your planetary vehicle. We hope you enjoy the many wonderful features of this planet, as you hurtle through the cosmos. Please note, that in the event of continued inaction in the face of global warming - your seat cushion can be used as a flotation device. Please take a moment to locate this planet's emergency exits. As you can see, there aren't any!

Nine Eleven

Today, on its 5th anniversary, we are supposed to be remembering the victims of 9/11. Have we at some point forgotten them? That attack, which was not the first on U.S. soil, nor the last, is seared into the brain of every American and it is to the advantage of our president and his party to make sure it stays there. What we need to keep our wits about; however is not the event, but the aftermath. The media excess, the political campaign buttons. The current administration used that event to plunge this country into chaos. We were divided, intentionally I firmly believe, and we now hate, not only the terrorists, but each other. We have watched our freedoms dwindle, our savings disappear, our already tarnished world reputation turn into ash. We have put our generation and our children's future generations into a debt that will last many lifetimes. We have made a place in history that will be derided for time eternal.

As for those who were lost? They behaved admirably or they didn't. They were lost and their friends and families suffered that loss. It was a horrific way to die, but there are many horrific ways to die. We are watching some of them daily. Leftover landmines that blow the limbs off children; starvation in unconscionable numbers; genocide that seems of little importance, occurring as it does in oil-poor regions of the world; eradicated disease (eradicated in countries that can afford it); famine; drought. Do we turn our attention to those atrocities, that terrorism? Nope, not media gold, not exciting politics.

But wow, that Bin Laden! As long as he remains alive, he will keep the political fires burning. That's why (does this make sense?): Let's have a war in Iraq!! Let's destroy Iraq! Let's rain terror down on the heads of tens of thousands of innocent men, women, and children who had NOTHING to do with 9/11. Let's destroy THEIR lives forever (doesn't that make US terrorists?).

Now they ask us to "remember the victims of 9/11." How could we not remember? WE are the victims of 9/11.

Blue Jay

He dropped a piece of thread on his way to the suet feeder out back. I didn't pay any attention as I was busy tying up a tall potato vine. Later on, I glanced down and saw something kind of purple and a little bit shiny and I still didn't pick it up. Then something about it caught my eye. It was familiar. I leaned over and looked. Turns out to be a thread over three feet long. It has shiny purple and turquoise bits of thread through it and is very distinctive and I know where I have seen it before. It's the thread I used to sew the quilt for my son's AIDs quilt panel. The panel was turned over to the Names Project in October 1996 and is stored there now with the other 45,000 panels, but that's another story really. What I am concerned about now is the thread.

All day long I have pondered that thread and each thought has led somewhere else, to a different subject with more questions. I will admit, for just a brief little while, the thought of why it showed up brought tears to my eyes, as there is no logical explanation for it. I do not use my sewing stuff very often, it has been possibly six months since I last opened the container. I never use it outdoors and that particular thread has only and will only ever be used on Ed's panel. There is a good rule of thumb I try to apply in cases like this, "don't look for answers where there are none."


So, I will mostly let it go. If there is a God, all questions will be answered in due time. Where the thread came from is so insignificant as to be almost laughable. There is, after all, the question of why a 31-year-old who had never harmed a soul gets to go through hell and then die. I presume God will answer that one also. The gut-tearing pain of those who love him will be answered or not. Does it really matter? Who are we to demand answers? Perhaps, I should say, to desire answers, for desire them we do. We want to know why and we have wanted to know for so long about so many things, that we have come to expect that there must be an answer.

Shortly before he died, by then a skeleton, almost not human, we were watching CNN - the shots of refugees trying to escape the genocide going on in their country and he said, "I am so ashamed." I thought briefly that he meant he had not raised his voice to protest this country's betrayal, but now I'm pretty sure he meant he was ashamed that he felt, perhaps for one second, afraid and sorry for his own death. It would have seemed to him selfish to be thinking of himself when there were those tens of thousands with nothing but hollow eyes and fear. He would have thought that then. He had entered into that space where all becomes clear. And I had not.

He said to me one day 3 or 4 months before he died, "I am not afraid to die." He looked at me and he said, "it is harder to lose someone you love than it is to die." For once in my life I understood instantly what was happening. He was trying to give me a gift with no strings attached, a gift I could carry with me until I reached my own grave, a gift I could choose to accept or let be. He attempted to alleviate my pain - this young man who was going through something unimaginable - he tried to leave me something priceless. And he did.

Eddie, I do not know who you were. But somehow, as every day unfolds in this life I have left, I think I have to thank my father for sending you. Surely you two conspired and I have messed it up horribly, or think I have. Will that someday too turn out to be something else entirely? Will I glimpse a clarity that will allow me to rest?

There go those questions again.

Previews of My New Home

When you saddle a horse, I think you wait till he takes a breath and then cinch him up. That's kind of the way I feel, like every time I take a breath, someone cinches up and there's that much less room to breathe. Pretty soon the turning around space won't be big enough to, well, turn around.

Black-headed Grosbeak

He is sitting there on top of the suet feeder - I am not much of a photographer; this guy deserves the best - he has a lovely voice and always sings a few notes when he arrives (to let me know he's here I think). His song reminds me of a poem, "...like a golden bell hung in my heart." It doesn't hurt that he is also a magnificent beauty. His mate has a lovely warble also, which I understand is common among the finches. She is not quite so brilliantly colored, her breast being more of a pastel shade of his bright tequila sunrise. His back is black with very bold white stripes and hers is more brown, sparrow colored, but she does have a very strong white stripe on her head. They are both about the size of a robin.

When I first saw this bird, I thought someone's parrot had escaped. Both he and his mate are somewhat elusive. While the nuthatches, chickadees, and woodpeckers don't seem to mind me being around, this bird prefers that I either stay very still or not come outside at all. They do not like sudden movements or noise. Still, I considered myself lucky to inch the screen door open and get this picture before he flew off. I lived here nearly two years before the Grosbeaks got bold enough to visit the bird feeders. Now I see them nearly every day. They are often the first birds in the very early morning and the last in the evening, with an occasional fly-by during the day to pluck a tasty morsel.

Why would anyone ever put a bird in a cage? It seems insanely cruel.

Ethics

"Ethics, too, are nothing but reverence for life. That is what gives me the fundamental principle of morality, namely, that good consists in maintaining, promoting, and enhancing life, and that destroying, injuring, and limiting life are evil." - Albert Schweitzer

"The true rule, in determining to embrace, or reject any thing, is not whether it have any evil in it; but whether it have more of evil, than of good. There are few things wholly evil, or wholly good. Almost every thing, especially of governmental policy, is an inseparable compound of the two; so that our best judgment of the preponderance between them is continually demanded." - Abraham Lincoln

Everyone has been accused of something they didn't do. Usually it happens when you're a kid, but it has happened to all of us once or more than once. It feels bad. Mostly because the louder you yell, the more it seems like maybe you DID do it. Remaining silent, refusing to dignify a false accusation is more honorable - at least it feels that way, but doesn't always exonerate.

I wonder though, might it be a bigger sin, a greater failing to NOT be accused of something you DID do?