More sorrow
Friends, it's raining here in central Kentucky this morning, which is probably contributing to my mood.
I am still so saddened by the recent events in Manchester, England. but I would add to that sentiment that it's powered by some family information. In the past year both of my granddaughters, aged 11 and 7, have attended pop concerts by performers not that different from Arianna Grande, whose show was marred by this senseless act of violence. So I have difficulty not thinking about this.
But it's becoming so much the norm, isn't it? Think about it: the TSA just announced a new pilot program where they'll more closely examine all kinds of things that they used to not look at specifically, like electronic devices larger than a cellphone. Regular visitors to this space will remember that it wasn't that long ago that I flew for business regularly, and became rather numb to the art of getting through security quickly and without needless delays. First the liquids, then the laptops, and now it looks like tablets and e-readers and portable gaming systems will be subject to added scrutiny.
My son and I attended a baseball game in Cincinnati recently, and I have to say that I was rather nonchalant about the need to pass through a metal detector when I arrived. That's just how things are now.
At one point in my life I was a voracious reader of certain authors' work, and the late Tom Clancy was at the top of the list. Clancy was the author of the Jack Ryan books, many of which have been turned into pretty good movies. In any case, both the novel and film versions of "The Sum of All Fears" centered around a terrorist plot to detonate a nuclear weapon at the Super Bowl (the movie did not refer to the game as that, given trademark issues and such). There were countless mentions in the book particularly about how such an attack would scar the psyche of our country. Another of Clancy's books, "Debt of Honor," ends with a rogue Japanese pilot deliberately crashing an airliner into the Capitol during a Presidential address.
Those are just the most evident examples of how this stuff is pervasive in our culture. And it's not that Western nations need to provide inspiration to those who would carry out such acts.
I agree with those in Manchester and Paris and Nice and London and Boston and other cities that the best thing we can all do is NOT allow such possibilities to prevent us from living our lives. So I plan to continue to do so, but with a more practiced eye toward what might be happening behind the scenes.
I am still so saddened by the recent events in Manchester, England. but I would add to that sentiment that it's powered by some family information. In the past year both of my granddaughters, aged 11 and 7, have attended pop concerts by performers not that different from Arianna Grande, whose show was marred by this senseless act of violence. So I have difficulty not thinking about this.
But it's becoming so much the norm, isn't it? Think about it: the TSA just announced a new pilot program where they'll more closely examine all kinds of things that they used to not look at specifically, like electronic devices larger than a cellphone. Regular visitors to this space will remember that it wasn't that long ago that I flew for business regularly, and became rather numb to the art of getting through security quickly and without needless delays. First the liquids, then the laptops, and now it looks like tablets and e-readers and portable gaming systems will be subject to added scrutiny.
My son and I attended a baseball game in Cincinnati recently, and I have to say that I was rather nonchalant about the need to pass through a metal detector when I arrived. That's just how things are now.
At one point in my life I was a voracious reader of certain authors' work, and the late Tom Clancy was at the top of the list. Clancy was the author of the Jack Ryan books, many of which have been turned into pretty good movies. In any case, both the novel and film versions of "The Sum of All Fears" centered around a terrorist plot to detonate a nuclear weapon at the Super Bowl (the movie did not refer to the game as that, given trademark issues and such). There were countless mentions in the book particularly about how such an attack would scar the psyche of our country. Another of Clancy's books, "Debt of Honor," ends with a rogue Japanese pilot deliberately crashing an airliner into the Capitol during a Presidential address.
Those are just the most evident examples of how this stuff is pervasive in our culture. And it's not that Western nations need to provide inspiration to those who would carry out such acts.
I agree with those in Manchester and Paris and Nice and London and Boston and other cities that the best thing we can all do is NOT allow such possibilities to prevent us from living our lives. So I plan to continue to do so, but with a more practiced eye toward what might be happening behind the scenes.
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