My therapy

Some smoke up, some head to the local waterhole for libation and conversation. I write.

Whatever you to work out the tensions of the week, be sure to do some of that this weekend and make the most distressing thing you do is take in the lousy sci-fi/horror flick of the week. I checked out "This is It" and shamelessly sang along with Michael Jackson and it felt so good. Oh, and avoid the news for a bit.

That said, I'm tapping this one out while riding the rails. Sadly, inspiration to write after ten days has been wrung out of the horrific events yesterday in fort hood. I'm not a soldier, but I've been kept in a room for hours on end waiting for a nearby act of insanity to pass. I'm not a mental health professional, but I make my living listening to people's problems and finding quick solutions. I've spent of my adult life trying to find meaning to existence through God while excluding as little as possible as I wander.
My life experiences tell me that this U.S. Army Major, who is frighteningly close to my age, chose to do what he did based on a series of decisions made that, metaphorically, painted himself into a corner where he felt the only way to ease the ache was through creating a whorl of violent chaos. The right question to ask is this: What happened in his life that led him down his path where nearly everyone would have exited the same path a few off-ramps ago.

Since tapping out the text above on Friday 11/6, the Major is now conscious. However, no work as to whether or not he'll be interviewed and, even if he is interviewed, what sort of "truth" will we hear about the situation at Fort Hood.

If you believe the media, he's a hop, skip and a jump from the 9/11/01 terrorists and he has gone from a faithful Muslim to an extremist.

I still believe this was more of a case of a mental health professional who was not taking his medications as he should have and, because the meds were not doing what they should have, he felt free to do what he wanted.

We should, of course, hang on for a bit until all of the facts are in and are spoon-fed to us.

Meanwhile, I baked up a batch of macaroni & cheese from scratch and passed it out to my co-workers. Nothing like eggs, butter, pasta and lots of cheese to siphon out the tension and anger.

And the tension/migraine headache I'm nursing, I'm sure, is yet another way of keeping my anger in check. Hard to be mad when your head's in a vice.