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Bad things happen!
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Bad things happen to everyone. However, at my age, I'm taking a different perspective about the news. With the internet, we hear about very bad things every day. I can think of several this week, a recent train wreck, a major earthquake, and on a USA scale, a baby killed by a stray bullet from a street fight, and a three year old child who found his grandfather's loaded gun and accidentally killed his six year old sister. Those stories are horrible and affected some individuals in very bad ways.
However, I can't spend my life thinking about the bad things that happen every day. Why? Earth has billions of people. I've always heard that every second two people die and three are born. In a good way, that means that someone in my town is probably happily kissing his wife or her husband at this very moment even though it is 2 a.m.! Good and bad things are going to happen. Someone, somewhere, right now is very mad at his wife or her husband. Someone doesn't know that in the next hour they will die in a car accident. In fact, rumor has it that someone died by getting hit by a meteor this week! Bad things happen.
My point of view? While it is good to know of what is going on in the world and which country is too aggressive (often my home country, the USA, I'm sad to say), I can't lose sleep over the really stupid things some people do, or even natural disasters. Yes, a few people were killed in an avalanche this week. But I don't know them and that disaster will probably not affect me at all and most of you. Last year, some two year old child in a store in the northern US reached into his mother's purse and probably without picking it up, pulled the trigger on a gun, shooting both his mother and father with the same bullet! I can't cure everyone's stupidity (fortunately both parents and the mother's unborn baby survived, last I heard).
Bad things happen. But I don't have to try to concentrate on each one of them. If I did, I would constantly be as worried as some of you are right NOW about something in your life. But I can do some things. Within the last hour, I talked with a young college student on QQ and encouraged her that life also has good things for her ahead (mine number is 2563613199, in case you are wondering). My four years of neck pain have improved with new treatment in the last three weeks. I have two papers to edit tomorrow and I'm not sure I can make it happen on time. But I can't go crazy because some idiot left a loaded gun where a child could find it or because a tire on someone's car came apart unexpectedly causing a terrible crash. The things I can't control? I need to let someone else worry about.
It is much like marriage and relationships. You can't change your girl/boy friend or your husband/wife. You can only change yourself. I wasn't on the bus that crashed, terrible as the accident was. I don't and will never own a gun, so I can sleep with grandchildren in the house and not worry. But I can't control what you do. I have a hard enough time controlling what I can do. Bad things happen. But I don't have to dwell on those that will never affect me. Yes, I worry about what is happening in Syria. But I have no control over it. So, I can sleep without worrying about it.
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Post comment Comment (4 replies)
- Reply sunnyv
- I have to say that all those bad things happening is not only affecting you. It is affects almost everybody. Obama said USA is still the world's most powerful country. May be he is right, but with thing going the way they are, US may lose that status soon. US has turned from a energetic and influential country to one of violence, suppression, inequality and injustice. Almost everyday, there are cases of gun violence and there are mass shootings frequently. People are jittery and resort to firearms readily. Passing through US immigration and customs is a tense experience even for those who are law abiding and honest. Customs officers searched through my laptop without proper reason. They say, they have the power to do that, but the fact is that they can only search when there are reasonable suspicion of crime. In the end they only say it is ok, you can go now. There have been reports that a intimate photo of you and your wife can be classified as pornography and have you hauled before a court and the judges believe whatever those so called officers say. US is becoming a police state and there are so many cases of unjustified shootings. Gun violence have spread to Canada, Europe and other countries.
Now the presidential election is coming up and if US vote for Donald Trump to be president, then that would be all hell loose. President Bush damaged US beyond repair and Trump is going to make it much worse. The way things are going, I am really worried about the US.
There are so many natural disasters caused by global warming. There is almost no winter in Asia while in America, it is snowing heavily. Our previous generations had to deal with war and revolution, but we have to deal with all these man made adversities. With things going the way they are, how can anyone live a secure and happy life?
- Reply sedgehead
- I agree to a great extent. I'm not saying those things don't influence me. I just try to not concentrate on all of them all the time. Another example? From about 1975 to 1985 I did not own a TV and rarely watched it. One day, at a customer's home, a TV was on (and mute) and I watched silently while waiting for my customer, without thinking. On TV two men were talking in a cemetery. Suddenly, one pulls a gun and shoots the other. I was shocked in two ways. "This is entertainment?" I thought. "And a few years ago, I could have considered this normal?"
We have become hardened to the world. Two years ago, my wife and I decided TV was useless. We do use our computers to watch some things, but I've not seen a TV advertisement with sound in years.
I totally agree that Bush did horrific damage with his, "If you are not with us you are for the terrorists," statement. It sounded very dictatorial to me, Hitler-ish. Trump is even more brazen, choosing an entire religion (not Jews) and saying we have to watch them more carefully.
One aspect of my blog I forgot to add: age. I'm 64. My father died at age 84 (in 1999). Recently, I've started saying, "In 50 years, it is unlikely to matter to me any more," and "I want to buy things (cars, appliances, a new roof for my house (bought in 2013)) that will outlive me." Really, while it will matter to my children and grandchildren, the older I get the less it will matter to me personally (and in 200 years to them).
That is, I can do some things about all the bad things in the world, but I can't control them all. And the older I get, the less they will matter. At age 84, should I be privileged to live that long, I probably will be unaffected by things that happen thousands of miles away, and may even be unaware of them. Life changes and priorities change. I complained to congress for years about spending too much money. Their solution to the financial crisis? Spending trillions! Ha! So, I no longer worry about it. I've done everything I can to fix it. It is out of my hands. The older I get, the less control I will have!
- Reply teadrinking
- You have given the deep thought of those bad things. Uncle Sam is now still the one dominating the world. There are also some other powers now in growth.
When I saw those tragedies, I feel sorry. Such a feeling deepens as the growth of my age. I often think it would be wonderful that we can live in the good world without any troubles. NO wars, no discriminations, no starvations, and others which bring us painful memories and hurts.
I do hope that we all can live well. Though it is hard, I still believe so. As long as we are here, the world is becoming and being influenced by us.
