5 Weeks

I have been quiet these past five weeks. My life has not been quiet, there have been birthdays, out of town visitors, work, girls nights, all the usual yet I have been quiet here. There is a reason, one I can't really explain except to say that I know when it is time to blog, time to share with the world and I haven't had that moment of knowing until just now.

With my current placement as an art teacher I find that I have more free time on my hands than I would like. I have the internet in my classroom so I spend more time now than ever before staying abreast of the news cycle. I am an avid LA Times and CNN reader now, I read everything they post. This week has been difficult in the news with the Fort Hood shootings and the appeal of the D.C. Sniper for his life to be spared. It wasn't, a short while ago John Allen Muhammed was given a lethal injection.

I in no way want to start a death penalty debate with anyone so please do not misunderstand me, I am very aware of the pain that this man brought to a city, a nation. I was there with everyone, watching as law enforcement was helpless to stop the killing, I was there watching as the men responsible were arrested and everyone breathed easier if only for a moment. I do not understand what motivates someone to kill innocent people. I only know that this man caused undo pain and suffering to countless people through his actions. Was it right for the justice system to sentence him to death. I don't know. I do know that I felt sadness when I read the headline declaring his death tonight. I won't apologize for that sadness. What I know is that another person is dead tonight - wrong or right someone else has died. Added to the people who were shot in TX and Florida in the past week it is another death stacked on.

As I sit here I am reminded of something that I read quite sometime ago "All men and women whom I have faced at that final moment convince me that in what I have done I have not prevented a single murder" A statement by Britain's last hangman, Albert Peirrepoint. I do not feel that the death penalty saves lives. More people are killed today than ever before despite the death penalty.

I pray for John Allen Muhammed, for his family and the families of those whom he killed. I pray for those investigating the Fort Hood shootings and all of the families that feel a little less secure in their fortress tonight. I pray for the justice system and that decisions are made in fair, non-biased ways. I pray for our nation - that we can find peace among the war that wages and I pray for myself - that I can trust in God, his timing and be made whole in his spirit.

"Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: You don't give up." ~ Anne Lamott

So here's to not giving up today, tomorrow and the day after that. Hope. Sometimes it's all we have, knowing that makes my heart a bit lighter tonight.