Hope

I've had lots of pets over the years, known many other animals familiarly too. All those cows and chickens and ducks that my farmer relatives kept and those wild critturs I've been able to identify as acquaintances have made their impressions on me. All of them exhibited to my satisfaction lots of characteristics we tend to think of as "human". They want, they love, they hate, they defend, they are loyal, and they love a good time (and I am quite sure a simple joke). I have also seen shame. What I have never seen, however, is hope. I have instead seen expectation,-but not hope. If as they say "all dogs go to heaven", then I believe it's because they cannot imagine any other alternative. To them life is everything.

 Now, all this leads me to a natural bit of pondering, to wit: How come we humans indulge ourselves in such a seeming excess of Hope. I mean. Really. Do we not have sufficient unsupportive evidence? And yet we do hope. I think, maybe, this is what sets us apart, as we of course would have it, but in this case perhaps we are not wrong. Let us say that I have never been as stalwart a patriot as my Yorkshire Terrier is a dog, but I always have the "hope" of being better. He on the other hand is confident. And that may be it. He has no doubt, and is therefore confident, while I, doubtful, must scrounge for confidence. Therefore it must be human to be uncertain.

 Let us then be wary of humans who are certain. They may be flying false colors.

Pirate!

Sa-lute,
Daddy

The Guns of December

It is only eleven days 'til Christmas.  Couldn't we get to that at least?  What made some twit's madness so important that twenty children and six adults had to miss Santa, miss whatever they were looking forward to?  Like life. What couldn't have waited?  How about: "I'll let everybody have a good time before I kill them". Wouldn't that be an expression of superiority? 
I think we all know that crazy doesn't give a damn.  What we don't know is why.  I believe we have gotten to the point where "why" is the most important question.

Let's start with what everybody thinks:  Guns are expressions of our independence.  Bad guys misuse guns. Guns are not evil in themselves.

Okay, what is going on when some 20 year old legally buys guns and ammo and uses it to shoot up an elementary school?  It stops being a matter of philosophy.  That's what's going on.  You can't keep going on about the bill of rights when idiots are being given the right to do whatever they think God is telling them to do.

In fairness, that's if they actually blame it on God.

But on the other hand it shouldn't matter.

It's a shame that some of the kids we raise turn out to be evil.  What we need is a way to identify them before they start killing.

In a way the NRA is right.  It ain't the guns so much as the crazy evils that have legal access to them.  Can we maybe look at this?

God love all you people in Connecticut who have been hurt.

Regards,
Daddy