Nuclear Apathy

In tonight's headlines . . . North Korea "has nuclear weapons on standby following U.N. sanctions." (Full disclosure dictates that I say I didn't actually watch the news; I get alerts on my phone.) I'm pretty sure this isn't the first time that the crazy N.K. leader has taken this step, and it's hard to say whether he'll follow through. My guess is not. I don't think he has a death wish, and a strike against virtually anywhere would lead to mutual destruction. But it did get me thinking. (My post title is the name of a song from the seventies. The band, Crack the Sky, was from Baltimore and had a good following there. They put out several albums -- the one with this song was called Safety in Numbers -- but I'm not sure how much national attention they got. Just a little music trivia for you.)

If nuclear weapons were heading for us, would you want to know? I'm not sure I would. What good would it do to know? If I'm going to be annihilated, I'd probably prefer that it be swift and unexpected. This also makes me think of the training exercise that asks, If you had six months left to live, what would you do? [Wait for answers, or at least for trainees to think about an answer.] Why aren't you doing that now? Of course, most people would say that money prevents them from doing what they really want to. I don't think that's usually the case. I think people are afraid to do what they really want to or, like me and others I know, haven't quite figured out yet what that is. Putting a timeframe on it helps to come up with what's important, but the reality is that none of us ever knows how much time we have left. So, really, why aren't we doing those important things now?

I have places I'd like to visit, but that's not so important. When I'm gone, it won't matter. What is important to me -- although it may not matter either if there is a mass nuclear attack and everyone is gone -- is that the people I care most about know how I feel about them. With or without world destruction, whether it matters or not, I'll just keep making sure they do know.