The Good, the Bad, and the Redemptive

Today I feel surrounded by death. There was another shooting, this time at a Cracker Barrel restaurant in Ohio. On the local news, there was a story about a New Hampshire police chief shot and killed during a drug raid. Four other police officers were also shot.

In the Trayvon Martin case yesterday, Trayvon's mother said that she thought the shooting was an accident, and Zimmerman needs to own up to that and apologize. That huge step in forgiveness and shared humanity was retracted later that day. Does anyone doubt a lawyer was involved in the retraction?

In the meantime, Zimmerman's new lawyer has a sense of the gravity of the case. The new lawyer is not pushing for bail immediately because he understands that Zimmerman needs to spend sometime in jail to assuage the local (or national?) sense that he's not paying any price. The lawyer is also not immediately asking for immunity for his client based on Florida's "Stand your ground" law.

We are better people when we don't grandstand on our rights, as though we (the small we) are the only ones who matter or who know what is correct. We are better people when we humbly acknowledge that we can make mistakes, sometimes horrible ones.

So, today, this story of Corey Booker, the mayor of Newark, New Jersey, floored me. I'm already in an emotional state, and I watched this video where he discusses how he and a detective ran into a neighbor's house, engulfed in fire, and Booker ran though the burning kitchen to save a woman sleeping in the back of the apartment. He carried her back through the flames and outside. She is alive, as is he, the detective, and the other residents.

I'm reminded of the fire fighters on 9/11, who entered the burning towers and were marching up the stairs to try to save those in the upper floors. People can be so fine and heroic. I hope I can do something today and something in my life that is as selfless as these people have done. Wish me luck.

People saving a motorcyclist from a fiery accident

 Photo credit: msnbc.msn.com

Practical note: You should have a fire extinguisher and you should know exactly where it is. This knowledge prevented my neighbor's stove fire from getting out of hand. She didn't know where her fire extinguisher was, but we did. Today, my family gets a quiz on where the extinguishers are. The only acceptable score on the quiz is 100%.