Live on... recklessly

I'm in NYC for the weekend. It's raining. There's a terrorist threat. The Republicans must still be in power.

I'm writing this on an Apple computer, so I'm reluctant to try to make such leaps and bounds as to create links or show pictures. Please bear with me for the time being.

Earlier this week, I read an article in Newsweek about Ashley Smith. She was the woman who held an escaped convict at bay by reading from "The Purpose Driven Life" to him some several months ago. Now she has a book release, "Unlikely Angel." She makes no secret about the fact that she has had a questionable past. She does not think of herself as a hero.

When the story first broke (being a bookstore jockey that I've been), some twelve billion people bought "the Purpose Driven Life" because they realized that it was the way of changing their own murderous lives around.

A Newsweek article of Oct. 10 "An Angel's Dirty Secret" explained that when the convict, Brian Nichols, held her hostage, he asked for pot and she gave him Crystal Meth.

CRYSTAL METH!!!

He calmed down after he smoked it and was suddenly open to whatever the hell she told him. Is it surprising? At the time of the original story, yes. Now that we know that there were drugs involved, not so much.

I don't want to downplay the importance of what Ms Smith did. Sure, she gave him drugs, then read him from a book that had a philosophy of living, and her own life at least, if not the lives of others we will never know, were saved. But when the implications of a possible Christian Miracle being involved are brought to light, I'm afraid I can't buy into it.

Life goes forward, tragically sometimes. People live on, recklessly too often. Luckily, even the most likely to hurt others have occasion to think of themselves of being part of something greater than themselves. I realize this idea puts a cramp in the desire of those who prefer capital punishment over life in prison, but humans are all made of the same stock. We all have the same capability to lie, cheat, steal, and worse, as anyone else. The greatest difference is that each person has a unique history.

So What? Didn't anybody ever see "Trading Places" with Eddie Murphy and Dan Akroyd? We all get excited when we see a young Jamie Lee Curtis topless... that is, um, I mean... being poor or rich, we are all capable of some brilliant or horrible acts. No matter what Mr Bennet says, race has nothing to do with it.

It's wonderful that Ms Smith and Mr Nichols have weekly phone calls for prayer sessions. Perhaps they are both destined to prefer the beauty in life over the pain. One could only hope. But a realistic approach to the reasons for their new paths is prefered, as far as I am concerned. If a religious path is most convienient, so be it. But sometimes some more basic, human situations are just as worthy of so much deeply felt contemplation.

What am I trying to say by all of this? Keep Intelligent Design Out of My Schools! Move it, Lard Ass!!

Oh, yeah. And NYC is beautiful, even in the rain.