“Affirm Life”

I cried this morning while watching footage of the tornado in Oklahoma. I usually don’t cry while watching the news.

Maybe it is because I’m a father. Maybe it is because I have been blogging a lot about peace and compassion.

I hugged my 3 year old tight when he woke up. I thought about those kids huddled down in Plaza Towers Elementary School. I envisioned hundreds of candles so easily put out by a firm breeze. I felt the powerlessness of the fathers and mothers as they watched the tornado head towards their children’s school.

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A Peace of Picasso

My first glimpse into the horrors of war did not come until after college. On a surf trip to the Basque Country of Spain, I asked a local friend what I should do since the waves were flat. He said I should go visit Guernica.

“Why would I go there?” I asked.

“It’s the city depicted in Picasso’s painting,” he said raising both his hands high in the air.

I had no idea what he was talking about. I never took art history at UC Santa Barbara. To tell the truth, all I really cared about as an undergrad was getting “some tasty waves and a cool buzz.”