By Mark Stoub
Watching our Catahoula-mix puppy, Goldie, run is a joy to behold. Sometimes we let her loose just for the sheer joy she gets from running as well as our joy in watching her. She stays pretty much in the yard so there is little danger in her getting loose. One day we did that and regretted the decision. She tried to get out of the front gate, but was going too fast, and caught her side on the latch that stuck out on that ancient gate; she ripped a six inch hole in her side. Luckily, it didn’t involve any vital organs, but the vets at the Kyle Animal Hospital – a fine place full of hard-working compassionate people – say that it will be weeks before she will totally heal. In the meantime she has an open wound that we doctor and clean every day.
I was thinking about that as I listened to the horrible news about the worst mass shooting in American history. Fifty people died for no good reason, and again the nation mourns a craven act of wanton violence. In a collective cry of pain and rage the whole nation ought to ask, “When will the violence stop?” How can the richest, most powerful and freest country on the face of the earth survive in the face of this painful reality?
