Tag: suicide

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Sex Ed and the Senator

It was the sign. That’s what did it. That, plus this one kid I know…

Everything else was pretty innocuous. Like he intended. Without the sign, Senator Ron Muzzall’s Legislative Review might have earned no more than a quick once-over on its way to the recycle bin.

But there was the sign. And then there was the email.

Ron Muzzall is a Republican serving Washington State’s District 10, appointed in 2019 when his elected predecessor had to step down. Seems like a decent guy. A Whidbey Island farmer and businessman, and a stand-up community member.

And Senator Muzzall thinks sex education grooms our children like a predator. Continue reading “Sex Ed and the Senator”

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No Off Ramp

Review of A Soldier’s Journal: Last Supper to No Goodbye


Why is this here? A book review about veterans, combat, and PTSD — on a blog about baseball and sex abuse? It all makes sense if you think about it. The trauma, the stress, the anxiety, depression, even the tragic suicides we see among our returning vets, follow the patterns seen in victims coping and healing from sexual abuse.

A psychologist or a scientist of any training might tell you: The human brain and nervous system form a network like a vast freeway system. A huge, interconnected, fractal-like web takes us wherever we want to go, however we want to get there, with endless choices of routes and where to enter and exit. And a healthy young brain revels, rejoices in the options the road map offers. Ons and offs abound. Freedom awaits. Continue reading “No Off Ramp”

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Too little too late, Mister Pope


It is I, Francis, your shepherd. Hear me, I have spoken.

Great news, Catholics. This week in pedophilia, your very own Pope Francis wrote you a nice letter. A letter too long coming, a letter strong on intention, a letter too weak on real-world action.

As reported by BBC, His Holiness penned the message after a sharp kick in the ass from the Attorney General of Pennsylvania, Continue reading “Too little too late, Mister Pope”

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Dear Aly Raisman’s mom…

Dear Lynn Raisman,

That interview blew us away. Not just Aly demanding to know why USA Gym continues to let her down, but the face-to-face with you… Sixty Minutes in your kitchen, millions of Americans peering at you as TV guests in your home, and you were so matter-of-fact. There was no rage there, no clawing at the camera demanding blood for what that man did to your daughter.

Where did you bury it? What little lockbox in your brain was holding all those thoughts in there, just for safekeeping? You had to stay proper. It was an interview, and you had to be honest, but you were still the hostess. And you’re still… well… you’re Lynn Raisman. You’re that lady…

Sweet, sensational, viral. Mom and dad can’t keep still while Aly Raisman competes. photo: Today Show, NBC

Continue reading “Dear Aly Raisman’s mom…”

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When the bottom drops out

“Baseball saved my life.”

The words on the page are a sucker punch to the senses, given the context.

We have this thing about sport being the savior. A mom swears it, no doubt, gymnastics kept her little girl from the wrong crowd. Football on the world’s dusty streets and ratty schoolyards keeps millions of kids out of trouble. And a 99-mph fastball steered Hideki Irabu clear of a violent end in the Japanese mafia.

Or so he believed. Hideki Irabu believed baseball saved his life.

Hideki Irabu is dead.

Continue reading “When the bottom drops out”

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The shrink who said I’d never write

Yeah, that’s the guy.

He was joking, of course.

And I took it that way. Just to be clear about that part. In fact we got a good laugh about it.

But the joking came after a lecture to a packed room full of writers about childhood trauma’s effect on our adult creative abilities. His premise, based on research, was that writing and other artistic pursuits help to maintain sanity for adults who experienced trauma as children. Continue reading “The shrink who said I’d never write”