Bryan Strawser

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Deep Thoughts

What could be…

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One of my favorite authors is Richard Bach. A run through of my blogging over the last four years will point you to many quotes from his works over the years. There’s probably been no other author that was more influential in my most contemplative years as a teenager as this man.

Bach wrote across two books of his belief, so to speak, in alternate worlds. I believe it was in “One” that he wrote of how everytime we reach a major decision in life.. our world splits in two.. The reality.. and the alternate…

In one world, we move on.. with the decision that we made, the choice locked, and the reality is…. well the reality of what we face.

In the other world, the alternate, the opposite is true.. and thus the world splits off and becomes…. the alternate… it goes on without you, so to speak…

And then, in our dreams, or our nightmares, and at other times, we get a glimpse of what could have been – but yet will never be.

Or could it…

In Memory

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It is not that these men are dead, but that they have so died…that they offered themselves willingly to death in a cause vital and dear to humanity; and what is more, a cause they comprehended as such, and looking at it, in all its bearings and its consequences, solemnly pledged to it all that they had and were…. This comprehension of the cause, his intelligent devotion, this deliberate dedication of themselves to duty, these deaths suffered in testimony of their loyalty, faith and love, make these men worthy of honor today, and these deaths equal to the lauded deaths of martyrs. Not merely that the cause was worthy but that they were worthy…. God grant to us that lesson of devotion and loyalty be not lost….

They gave their best for something held dearer than joy, something of good beyond their personal experience; the giving of which, in this world’s estimation, is of such cost that it cannot be justified by your understanding but only in your overpassing faith.

We do not live for self…. We are a part of a larger life, reaching before and after, judged not by deeds done in the body but deeds done in the soul. We wish to be remembered. Willing to die, we are not willing to be forgotten.

– Major General Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, 20th Maine, Memorial Day 1884, Brunswick, Maine

Lex: On Certainty

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Over at Neptunus Lex, Lex’s latest takes a shot across the bow that those that can’t seem to get past the last election:

Nothing do I see that clarifies for me any more than all of that which has gone before, the necessity of the fight, or how long it might last. How many more must die, or be maimed, before we come to the clearing at the end of the path. Everything points on to a grim slog, a painful task that needs being done. And this is only one theater, in a much larger, potentially generational struggle between the forces of modernity and those of reaction. And make no mistake – even as events in Lebanon, Syria, Israel/Palestine, Baghdad and even Saudi unfold in a direction which could scarcely have been imagined a few short years ago, the forces of reaction are not about to strike the tent and fade into the background. Their death struggles will be titanic, because for them, like for us, there is no turning back, no possibility of surrender.

But I am persuaded, and have been for a long time, of the necessity of taking the fight to the Salafist heartland. Of winning it there, by supplanting tyranny with hope.

[..]

But there are some out there that just can’t get over it, any of it. They can’t get the politics out of their head, even while brave soldiers engage in incredibleacts of heroism, and some of them make ultimate sacrifices. They can’t get over the fact that the last national election was nothing if not a judgment on all that went before, and a mandate on how to finish – even if it wasn’t a whole-hearted endorsement of the process. These folks are justso damned certain that the war’s Original Sin blots out any chance to salvage a righteous outcome. For these folks it’s all a part of some right wing plot to… do what? Ruin the country, I gather. Quite how, I’m never sure. Many of them evidently keep their fingers crossed hoping for bad news (payable in Iraqi and American lives) while stuffing their fingers in their ears whenever good news comes out. For these folks, and their despicable certainty, I have nothing but genial contempt – and much less patience than Smash.

I’m an impatient irritable bastard usually, so I’ll be even more impatient. I can’t even discuss the war anymore with the folks that Lex describes in his last paragraph – it’s not worth my time.

On Death

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The last few weeks of news have been filled with the saga of Terri Schiavo, that of her family, and of the bitter issue that divides us as a nation: How we choose to die.

I’d said little about this case in particular other than in private to the sidekick, family, and friends because I think that my position on issues involving an individual’s rights are pretty clear. As a Libertarian, and a general follower of what I believe to be conservatism, government has no business being involved in this matter. Let alone the House of Representatives, the Senate, the Governor of Florida, or the President of the United States.

Regardless of one may think of Michael Shiavo’s motives or desires – the law is the law is the law.

A trial court, having weighed the evidence, ruled that Ms. Schiavo would not have wanted to live in this condition. Trial courts are the finders of fact. Once they have decided, the appeals are about matters of law. And those courts – state and federal – at every level – have consistently ruled against her parents.

The harsh bitter reality of this situation is that Florida law reigns supreme in this case – and that law was followed.

We could stand around and debate emotion, theology, politics, or whatever poison of your choice. None of that matters. I’ll choose to believe that he pursued this course of action because he truly believed that this is what his wife would have wanted. I’d fight like hell to do the same.

While I am not a lawyer, I believe on the surface that the law passed by Congress to allow this case to be heard in the federal courts would not hold constitutional scrutiny. I just can’t remember reading that part of the Constitution which allows Congress to get involved in a case like this. It was a severe overreaching based an emotional appeal rather than any fact or understanding of the law.

It’s a shame. What should be a private matter between members of her family and their doctors is now on the national stage. It’s not what I would want for my family.

There’s a level of hypocrisy in this that I also find troubling, and one that I did not consider until this morning while waiting to board my flight for Los Angeles. It’s the religious right and the anti-abortion/pro-list movement that does not want her feeding tube to be removed – they would prefer that she live on. But that’s the same group that would prevent a person’s doctor from relieving them from a painful death outlawing the ability for a physician to prescribe a lethal dose of drugs.

I do believe in the days ahead that we’ll see more conversation about the end of our days. We’ll see more living wills put into place. In fact, in talking with my parents last night, they have already printed out the forms and are having those discussions together. I hope that in the years ahead we see more laws like Oregon’s assisted suicide law which, under a tightly controlled set of circumstances, allows a doctor to prescribe a lethal dose of drugs to a terminally ill patient.

If we do indeed have a right to privacy, as the Supreme Court has ruled in Griswold and Roe, then isn’t the extension of that right the ability to have the death of our choice?

I believe it is. Hopefully, that’s the lesson that we’ll take away from all of this.

Was it not as in the old days?

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I just finished re-watching Ken Burn’s incredible series The Civil War – only appropriate since I’m slogging my way through Shelby Foote’s deep series on the war as well.

This quote, read by Shelby Foote at the end of The Civil War, is a fitting end:

“In time, even death itself might be abolished; who knows but it may be given to us after this life to meet again in the old quarters, to play chess and draughts, to get up soon to answer the morning role call, to fall in at the tap of the drum for drill and dress parade, and again to hastily don our war gear while the monotonous patter of the long roll summons to battle.

Who knows but again the old flags, ragged and torn, snapping in the wind, may face each other and flutter, pursuing and pursued, while the cries of victory fill a summer day? And after the battle, then the slain and wounded will arise, and all will meet together under the two flags, all sound and well, and there will be talking and laughter and cheers, and all will say, Did it not seem real? Was it not as in the old days?”

— Sergeant Berry Benson, Army of Northern Virginia, 1880

So?

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Where, indeed, does life begin?

Somewhere, out there, between what is, and what will be… is that it?

Or is it somewhere between the wild pregnant worlds between what is, what was, and what willl be?

Sure I am, I am not.

But thus, challenged, am I. Today, tonight, this morning,….

Illusions

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Every person, all the events of your life,
are there because you have drawn them there.

What you choose to do with them is up to you.

– Richard Bach