Thursday, February 15, 2018

What to do, what to do


I don’t know.

Every bit of the current moral crisis comes down to individual responsibility.

We cannot legislate away guns, shootings, the NRA, a moment of silence. I did have a brief mental image of our legislators taking a knee.

I am too old to see the end of irresponsibility, selfishness,  or the sense of the greater good, social responsibility.

I was very young, holding my grandmother’s hand. Probably lifted up the steps of the trolley. We sat in the last row of seats. I heard my grandmother sharply say, “Mother, look to your child!” I don’t know what the child needed, but my grandmother refocused a parent’s attention.

Parent and child. The beginning. Personal responsibility. The middle. The social contract. The end.

Were we ever decent? I don’t know. A few ideological fellows founded a nation still out of control. Few voted. Many rebelled. Shay’s Rebellion of four thousand crushed, but the Constitutional Convention resulted.

The carnage we have experienced must end, or it will result in the confiscation of all guns, by the army of a dictator, to protect itself. That’s the next to the last worst scenario I can imagine. The number of endings I can put forth doesn’t matter.


Individual responsibility matters. It is the beginning. Parent, help your child. Neighbor, help your neighbor. Voter, exercise your right and responsibility. Legislators, open debate. America, figure this out.


I thought I would add my symbols of endurance, the lamb, the toad and piggy.



I certainly did not expect to find them crumbling, too, after the winter snow. Well, that's 29 years.



 Pictures when the flowers come up, and there will be nasturtiums for Pig.

32 comments:

  1. Pig is my favorite. He has an air of expectation. Looking forward to nasturtiums.

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  2. We need not try to legislate the total removal of arms from citizens. That is a protection we deserve. However none of us need assault rifles. They are designed to do as much damage as possible not to protect. Common sense is needed here.The NRA believes we should have whatever arms catch our fancy with no restrictions whatsoever. Some people believe we should not be allowed any arms for any reason. There is a middle ground somewhere that will both satisfy the Second Amendment and keep us safe. Why must the extreme always be the only answer?

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  3. Well, there is nothing worse than the Holocaust during WWII.

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  4. We need to get the mental health net back that Reagan destroyed in the 80's and ban assault weapons. We were kinder once upon a time. Common civility has disappeared. Hollywood has betrayed us and tv is as bad, can hardly watch it.

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  5. Hari OM
    One is beyond being shocked - and that stinks. We who do not have such freedom of weapons can only shake our heads at the country which permits it. Not that we are immune to violence - but here it is knives. Still bad. Just not 'mass'. My heart aches for America.

    Meanwhile, to those little parts of America where I have set foot and left a little of that heart, I send Love.

    I'd send Pig et al some cement, but customs might get nervous... YAM xx

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  6. I am looking forward to the pictures of the flowers. Beyond that, you know what I think. Never give up. Don't listen to those who are jealous, hateful, who would kick us when we are down. Something's happening here. Something important.

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  7. A friend in the States blogged recently that mental health issues should be treated as just another illnesses, ie chickenpox. Then that she is speechless after the latest shootings. If you are not in a stable state of mind you should definitely not be allowed to handle guns, if you have chickenpox perhaps you should.

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  8. I don't know the answer, but I do know those kids will never be kids again. Maybe that will be the generation that will start to make change happen.

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  9. Here in the UK there seems to be diminishing emphasis on responsibility and increasing emphasis on rights and entitlement. People demand that their individual needs be satisfied and don't care how that might affect other people.

    When that's added to mental health issues the results can be shocking. It's extraordinary that Cruz was a member of a white supremacist group, had mental health issues, was seen as dangerous by other students, and yet this mass shooting could still not be prevented.

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  10. The sense of shock is great over here in the UK too Joaanne. I was horrified to hear that it is the eighteenth shooting in school this year.

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    1. Eighteenth school shooting in a year that is not even eight weeks old? That's horrifying.

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  11. Unbelievable again. And still no effort to prevent such events!

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  12. I'm afraid that money...and big business...talks.
    Sense and reason doesn't have enough weight.

    The animals have lasted well,love the pig!

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  13. I like that you called voting a responsibility and not just a right. I don't know what the answers are either, but I hope someone figures them out soon.

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  14. Our children can not go to school free of fear. What does that say about us.

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  15. We have figured our reasonable gone control without resorting to bans and restrictions. We have also figured out how to have a reasonable, single payer health care system. Most contries have. There’s something not right down there.

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  16. We have to get the NRA out of politics, and institute reasonable gun control. Enough.

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  17. perhaps it's time to start lifting lamb, toad and piggy each year before the snow and store them safely. Get the crumbling bottoms repaired too. I don't know how, but it seems like a good idea. As for the rest, I can't help with any of that. I wish I could.

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  18. we have reasonable gun control, but still I wonder how a kid 19 can buy a gun but not a beer, hum; perhaps we need metal detectors in schools, we have them in court houses, we can afford that in schools. Sad a kid who lost both of his adoptive parents and had no one in his arena to help him, no one to talk to or to confide in. Then again perhaps someone who brags about killing rats with a gun might already be on a path to evil and not able to be helped by conventional means. Violence is portrayed in every facet of our lives, movies, games, we need to reach out to all surrounding us, neighbor, friend, enemy, acquaintance, because that is the only thing which I think might make a difference to anyone single person today, tomorrow and the next day. I think we need more family meals at the dinner table, more one on one talks without a phone, more outdoor activities. Our society has progressed exponentially into the realm of impersonal cyber activities and has not advanced emotionally or morally with the same social fervor or intellectual maturation to balance all the violence virtual or real which we see in our collective everyday lives. We need to balance the impersonal and violence depicted in every facet of our lives with the reality of our genuine and beautiful lives well lived and supported among our human relatives, friends, and neighbors. Just the other day I was thinking I wanted to see the movie Peter Rabbit and then I heard about the blackberries and bullying, oh brother, I just want to return to simple childhood dreams and aspirations; I want to return to Kindness, we all need more kindness and genuine human contact in our lives. Otherwise we are just programmable robots.

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    1. no we do not. these weapons should not be allowed and background checks are only required for gun stores. all you need is money to buy a gun at a gun show or from an individual or at an estate sale. Trump has voided the restrictions against the mentally ill buying guns. our teenagers can buy an AR-15. this is not reasonable.

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  19. The unified will of government would be a start.

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  20. In the home no child should ever be taught that it is ok to hate nor should they ever overhear such talk from behind the door nor should they hear that it is somebody else's fault.

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  21. Like all the horrible incidents that happen in this country, the story of this horrendous loss of children’s lives will be pushed to the back page after the first victim is buried. We express outrage, nothing is done, and we move on - till the next time. Another day in America.

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    1. I wish I could say you are wrong. We have reached the limit this time. I still hold hope. A hope based on very little evidence of action.

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  22. It would be great start to just have a public discussion without name calling, deflections, and slogans. One side carry on about guns and gun laws with little or no knowledge of the subject. One side carry on about the constitution with little or no knowledge of it's meaning.
    The best solution would be to change our gun culture but nobody controls culture. Unfortunately it only takes a very few people who have no decent reason to have access to guns to be dangerous.

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  23. The right to bear arms is a legal right and not a moral right. If a person knew their child or grandchild would be next would they be willing to give up their guns for the good of society and our children?

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  24. It would be wonderful if gun violence could be controlled by all parents being good parents. Unfortunately, not everybody in America are perfect parents or perfect people. This is why we have seat belts in all cars, why smoking is no longer permitted in enclosed public areas, why certain drugs are outlawed, etc. But we can have guns that kill others.

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  25. I do not understand why other countries have gun control and we cannot figure out how to do it.

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