1000 Small Sorrows

     When a loss first happens, there is big sorrow, a time of great grieving, but most of the grief happens in small, daily doses. A few weeks ago I lost my granddaughter, McKenzie, not to death, but when my son and her mother broke up. I cried. . . hard. . . a couple times. But now I have reached the phase of small sorrows:

• seeing her picture on the wall and wondering if I will ever see her again
• looking with longing at Woodland Park, where she loved to play 
• seeing the fruit roll ups she loved to eat in the cupboard
• finding the playdough we made together in the crayon box 
• driving past the part of town where she lives
• finding out her mother did not let her continue dance lessons I paid for
• hearing the music from "Frozen"
• seeing the blue shirt I bought for her birthday and never got to give her
• realizing we will not be going to the swimming pool or lake together this summer
• wondering how McKenzie is dealing with her feelings with fewer coping skills
• . . .

     These are the 1000 small sorrows that heal my grief on a daily basis. But it doesn't feel like healing. It feels like reopening a wound.

My Heart Finds a Way

      I have been waiting for this poem to come for the three weeks since my son and his fiance broke up. Poetry has been my outlet for emotion for many years now, and I knew eventually I would be able to express my sorrow over losing my granddaughter.

 My Heart Finds a Way

You were just a stranger when you came into my life,

but as welcome as a blue skied day,

you would be my grandchild when my son married your mom,

so I loved you, my heart found a way.

Just a smiling stranger, when you first came to my house

I looked on as you and momma played.

Before long us blued-eyed gals were giggling side by side.

We’d become friends, our hearts found a way.

But your mother did not become my son’s wife

and they both have walked away,

leaving me no place to be a grandmother to you.

Can I let go? My heart must find a way.

Though I always knew this day might come

and parting was the price we would pay,

still it’s not as costly as holding back on love.

I can’t see you, but you’re in my heart to stay.

There are many things in life that we cannot control--

my mind says goodbye, but my heart says stay.

I am not a stranger to the grief that tears me now.

I am waiting for my heart to find a way.

Doesn't It Make More Sense?

     I believe the biggest logical fallacy of our time is that correlation equals causation. A simple example of this is that most murderers are right handed. This is because most people are right handed, not because being right handed drives people to murder. There are a plethora of studies linking one thing to another, each implying that whatever their particular emphasis is significantly influences a behavior or condition. A recent example of this has been our governor's push for preschool education, citing a study showing children who attend preschool are less likely to become criminals later in life. But doesn't it make more sense that since most preschools now are private pay, the parents willing to invest in paying for preschool are also more involved in every other area of their child's development? Involved parents are less likely to raise criminals. The same argument applies to why I have noticed more overweight students in the public school choir than in the Christian school. Parents willing to sacrifice that much because they care what goes into their children's minds also care what goes into their bodies. Christian school doesn't make you slim. Here are a few other examples.

     Antidepressants now come with a warning about increased risk of suicide, especially in young people. But doesn't it make more sense that since virtually all suicides are committed by depressed people, and that depressed people are more likely to be taking antidepressants, the suicides are linked to the depression, not the meds. This is especially true for young people who would be unlikely to need antidepressants for the other health conditions they are sometimes used to treat in adults.

     At the 2012 primaries, a lot of Democrats voted Republican for the first time and chose fairly liberal candidates. This fueled theories that the Democrats were conspiring to get bad Republican candidates on the November ballot. But doesn't it make more sense that Democrats, unhappy with their party over Obamacare cramming, voted for Republicans most like the Democrats they had previously chosen.

     If you search the internet, you will find studies linking being overweight and/or diabetes to consumption of french fries/soda/wheat/doughnuts/you name it. But doesn't it make more sense that these things are single elements of a generally unhealthy lifestyle rather than causes themselves.

     Between the general misunderstanding of the relationship of correlation versus cause, the biases of study sponsors and/or those of the researchers themselves, the information age has become the misinformation age, of which sloppy journalism is just one of the signs. I don't have studies to verify my conclusions, but doesn't it just make sense?

   

Kaarmalizing Iran

     Any western Montanan who has not been living under a rock for the past year should recognize the name Marcus Kaarma. He is the man who shot and killed a 17 year old German exchange student who was burglarizing, aka garage hopping, his garage. I do not intend to retry the case, but I think the part most would agree on is that the disliked, neighborhood nut overreacted when he killed a likeable, neighborhood teenager for burglary. I think it is a good illustration of the deal our president is trying to broker with nuclear Iran. Iran is the nutty, unstable neighbor in the Middle Eastern neighborhood. Lifting sanctions against Iran would be like helping Marcus Kaarma make a better living knowing he would use some of that money to buy more guns and ammunition. Even if Kaarma promised that this time he would not use the weapons to kill anybody, most people would know that the word of the neighborhood nut isn't worth very much. It would mean especially little to the next door neighbor, in Iran's case, Israel, if Kaarma had repeatedly expressed the desire to wipe them out. These Israeli next door neighbors are not garage hopping, they are on their own property, minding their own business. And we clueless buttinskys, led by President Neville Chamberlain, are parking a weapons welcome wagon in their driveway. Kaarma reaped his karma when he went to prison for murder and, if our president has his way, we will reap ours.