“To know you’re passing through Newtown, you’ll see the giant flag pole in the center of town.” That’s how a dear friend of mine for twenty years now first provided directions to his house a few miles south of there back around 1995. Another good friend of mine lives not far from Newtown. Both are school teachers, though not in today’s unfortunately infamous town.
******
Rocks are aligned just so, meaning that if you line it up so, you can roll for a few hundred feet on a pathway through the woods that barely touches dirt. I am smiling at the sight. The creativity is refreshing. My bike leans against a tree.
******
More than 500 humans have been killed in Chicago in 2012. Some 40,000 Zapatistas marched in complete silence across Chiapas on the day the Maya world supposedly died. Who is alive? Who is dead?
******
As I remember my history classes of middle and high school, the second amendment had something to do with protection from armed government entering your home. Since then, we have seen governments toppled through unarmed, peaceful resistance.
******
I am offline, nearly falling hard to the bed of rocks next to the pathway of rock. I am smiling still. The sky is blue.
******
In my understanding, the second amendment and third amendment are like cousins. What is the relevance today? Does our gun keep the soldier from bedding down under our roof? Do our taxes bed our country’s soldier down in the home of an Afghani or Somali? Whose right? Who’s right?
******
Arm the teachers. Disband teacher’s unions. Teachers aren’t qualified. Teachers only work nine months of the year.
******
Beyond the rock pathway, I sit by an Appalachian stream for a few minutes. Rhododendrons hang over the singing waterway. It’s a silent scene. A silent song? Yes.
