First of all,  I am not being compensated in any way for this piece, nor is it anyone’s opinion by my own.  I know that most people will not agree with it – and I respect that – but feel that I want to comment on these issues.

My heart is saddened that a teenager died,  and I want to cry with his mother and father and hold them up in prayer.   I think they know and understand that stuff happens in this world that isn’t always fair.   Just look around.  And in this case,  certainly Trayvon life was just really beginning.

Kudo’s to the 6 jurors who were able to cut through the misinformation in the media for all these months and still hold onto their integrity and decide this case based on the evidence presented to them. 

Shame on Al Sharpton and all the others who tried to influence their decision with demonstrations and other inappropriate behavior just to stir up the people of this country.  

Kudo’s to the lawyers on both sides who found 6 people who could look past all of that to the facts of the case and decide without the pressure of all of that misinformation.

From the start of this unfortunate event (and I do mean that sincerely), and all along the way from the tapes of the 911 call  which were “edited” before the news outlets even started playing them, to the end with rallies and other things — this wasn’t about race and it wasn’t about guns.

In the end — because of the way the events unfolded —  the way both “players” in this drama presented themselves, acted and interacted — it really was about being in a situation and making a decision about how to defend yourself.   Trayvon could acted differently, George could have acted differently, but neither of them did.  They did as their personalities directed them that fateful day and they ended up in a fight that ended in a death. 

From the beginning the Florida Prosecutor was correct in not arresting George Zimmerman.  He weighed the case and determined that there wasn’t a reason for it.  Both self defense and the Florida Stand Your Ground Law were on George’s side –but Al Sharpton had other ideas.  Ideas about pushing all the buttons he had available to him to make it about race and about guns and about all the things it was never about from the start.  He purposely and willfully incited people across this country with misinformation.  Information that was specifically designed to incite strong feelings for poor Trayvon, and hatred for George Zimmerman, while he pursued his agenda, got TV time and recognition for pushing his view of  justice.

But still a young boy died that day.  That part will never go away.  I honestly don’t think anyone ever wants that to happen.

I have a concealed carry license, and I have taken at least 8 gun courses, including some in tactical training.  I wasn’t fond of guns from a young age — and my dad was a pistol champion.  But there came a time in my own personal life, that I had several individuals try to break into my home and I thought I needed to know and learn and carry for my own self defense.  The courses were sometimes hard,  and there were tests both in shooting accuracy and in knowledge of the laws regarding firearms.  There was training on how to try to disarm another person and what to do if someone tries to disarm you.  One of the things that sticks out in my mind (because they drilled it into us)  is that if you shoot anyone be prepared to be arrested, charged and having to pay a minimum of $250,000.  But the directive always was,  if you are in fear for your life (and that “line” will differ for everyone) and you feel the need to use your firearm, shoot to kill.  

As a woman, we were instructed that could shoot a man coming at us at a distance of probably 5 ft – 10 ft, with or without a weapon and still conclude we were in fear of our life and that we had shot in self defense.   You cannot wait for someone to be in an actual physical confrontation with you, or to have wounded you first before you shoot… It’s not “if you are harmed you can harm back” – it is if you fear for your own life.

With men, it’s a little different, most of them can hold their own (or think they can)  even in a bit of a physical confrontation, but no one says you have to let someone hit you, knock you down, bang your head on the ground before you shoot them in self defense.  You just don’t know what the other person is capable of – and if they too have a weapon (knife, gun, etc) that they plan on using on you.

This really is just basic information.  Each case of self defense is different.  It needs to be weighed on it’s own scale to determine the outcome.  However, if someone of any color, of any gender, or any size or nationality, or even any age,  were beating my head on the ground,  I might feel the fear at some point that would cause me to use my weapon.  You might prefer that I didn’t because that person is young, or of a certain color, or certainly could not have killed me – but they are attacking me, and I do have a right to defend myself.  If you aren’t there, you don’t know, you don’t feel the emotions, or know the actual extent of it — therefore you cannot be judge and jury.

Sinkholes are scary, unpredictable, and so annoying. You just never know when one might happen or where. And while there are certain places where they are “more likely” to occur, thousands occur each year, and they are increasing in frequency.

Geologists estimate that approximately 10% of the Earth’s surface has the potential to be prone to sinkholes. The cause is sometimes different in each case and while some are naturally caused, others aren’t. Things like sandy or loose soil, abandoned mines, fracking, new construction, acidic groundwater, aged and leaking water pipes as well as other causes are adding to their numbers. Anytime the support system under the ground breaks down or if the weight of the land surface changes, underground collapses (and then sinkholes) can be triggered.

They are common in some places like Florida or Guatemala, but they have been occurring with regular frequency in other US states as well as in Venezuela and China.

The one that just happened last week in Florida where a man apparently lost his life (I use the word “apparently” because I read they are not going to try and recover his body) was caused by water erosion of the bedrock below the land surface of their house. It is unusual for there to be loss of life with sinkholes.

This would actually be the perfect way to “disappear off the face of the earth.” I know you are thinking, how cruel, a man lost his life after all.

But seriously, they put mementos into that approximately 60 ft. deep hole and then dumped in gravel to fill it in. It was determined that the ground around the hole was too unstable to attempt a rescue, or “recovery” attempt. I understand that we don’t want to put any more lives in danger. I know it’s unstable, but I also feel like if they could bring a dump truck full of stone and equipment to knock down the rest of the house… couldn’t they try more than just lowering a microphone and video equipment to find any signs of life. Or to be sure he was dead? I guess not. The sinkhole occurred Thursday night and by Friday afternoon, they presumed that Jeffrey was dead.

And therein lies the perfect start for a novel.

Who would have thought a straight line wind system coming from the Midwest, and generated, fueled and propelled by the high temperatures and humidity could cause so many issues.  They can be as powerful and deadly as tornadoes.

As I write this, 2 days after the incident occurred suddenly and violently, we are still without power. The wind hit like someone had turned on a switch, and a powerful one at that. The first indication was the wind, which came on suddenly, and sounded loud and violent.  When we saw it was bending the 60-80 ft. tall trees I have on my property, we headed for the basement.

The basement was for shelter not only the storm but also the rain, lightning and thunder which followed those winds. The winds reached 71 miles an hour (anything over 58 mph is considered severe) at Dulles International Airport and that’s just short of a hurricane velocity (Category 1 hurricane starts at 75mph). I knew this was incident was possible, only because for some reason I turned on the 6PM news that night. I don’t usually do that.  And I admit I was struggling to fully understand what they meant by a fast and dangerous “straight line wind” headed our way. Now I know.

Not only are we still without power, but we are without internet service as well. This also means no television service and no phone service for those who have the bundled services with the cable company. Many of the phone towers for wireless service have been down or out for one reason or another. Some of the 911 phone lines are not operating at all, traffic lights aren’t working and as of last night I heard that at least 7 people have been killed locally by storm related injuries.  Trees and pole damage is obvious, but most can’t access any information about what’s going on without power.  Ice is hard to find and at a premium cash price because even credit card processors aren’t available for charges.  The ATM’s aren’t working and neither are lots of gas stations because they cannot pump the gas out of the ground without power.  The destruction is not 100% in our area, but it is widespread  with random pockets of homes and businesses not only without power but also damaged.  Even the National Guard has been activated.

When this happened Friday night, no one thought it would take at least into Monday or Tuesday to restore power to our area. However, the electric companies are reporting many electric poles have been snapped in half. Replacing a telephone/electricity pole and moving the wires from one to the other, I am told, takes a normal crew half a day, and they have to find the broken ones first. The other reason  we’ve been told for the delay is that many of the crews could not be reached by phone to even know they should come in and work the weekend.

Usually since we have a whole house generator, our household weathers these outages with nary a concern. We function normally and conveniently and go about our daily lives. The cable service and internet hasn’t ever before been out for this long. I am glad that we purchased and installed that generator in 1999, as that generator as it has helped us in winter and in summer with power outage incidents. It’s still a wonderful help, it’s just that without the internet or phone service it’s a very different existence.

Life isn’t “normal” any longer and it makes me wonder – if the sun spots cut off or destroy the satellites, or any other incident for that matter, how prepared are we really to be cut off from the internet and that interaction with “the world”?

UPDATE:  07/02/12 – our internet and power is back on at home, but not at work.  Without internet, our business cannot process our orders, or do our shipping tags for UPS or USPS.  Worse, we cannot get through to the internet provider as all we get is a busy signal on the phone. Thirty minutes of “storm”, three plus days to recover.

UPDATE 2 : 07/03/12 – we have internet at work!  However the news is reporting that some residents won’t have power till this weekend.  Crews have come from as far away as Canada to help restore power.  Washington DC has even sent buses to neighborhoods without power that will just sit there with their air conditioning on to help with the heat.  It’s hot today, but it’s going to continue to be hot throughout the week.  The last time this happened in this area was 1980 – and it proved that the basic underlying power grid isn’t engineered to handle this type of weather event.