Why Did the Ostrich stick his head in the sand in the first place?

No one ever asks that.

We are too busy criticizing the ostrich for sticking his head in the sand
whenever confronted with trouble. Cutting himself off from the world around
him. No longer watching the news. Hoping the problem will simply go
away if he ignores it, and fails to acknowledge that there in fact, even is a
problem.

I quit watching the news recently.I used to watch it religiously.
Every evening watching the news was my way of connecting with the world
and disconnecting with my world. I found it a release from my every day. It
was a soothing respite. But not anymore.

The other night the news showed this moment in the basement of a hospital
in Gaza as they lifted a young three-year-old girl onto the operating table. She
looked exhausted, drained and depleted. But then the news camera
panned down her body to her knee where she had a giant clump of metal
shrapnel solidly embedded in her bloodied and obliterated knee. A large
bubble of blood plopped out from her wound in thick heavy clumps. A wound
of war that did not look like it belonged on a little girl. She was entirely conscious. She looked too exhausted to cry anymore. Instead, her eyes wandered
around the room wondering where she was, what happened and
what’s going on in her world.

There were no painkillers given to her. There were no drugs or any type of medications left in the crowded, besieged hospital. No way to put her under as they
operated to remove the shrapnel. Her face looked exhausted as if there wasn’t any power left in her defeated body to scream. Her world looked horrific.

I couldn’t take it anymore. Yes, I get the issues and see there are two sides to
this conflict. But seeing this three-year-old with a chunk of hot molten shrapnel in her
knee while I was comfortably sitting on my sofa watching TV was too much for me.
I am so sick of it all.

The politicians, the United Nations, the emissaries’ attempts at
diplomacy, the criminals, the good guys and the bad guys. They all seem
the same to me now. I have had it with them. I will no longer participate
with my attention to the TV where it shows in great detail the horrors men
inflict upon each other and upon this innocent three-year-old. A little girl, the age
of one of my granddaughters, who was probably playing hide-and-seek with
her sister in their bedroom upstairs; Or perhaps she was bouncing a ball in
the courtyard; Or watching a video on her mom’s cell phone-when suddenly,
there is an explosion, a flash of light and she is crippled for life.
I’m done. I quit.

I quit the world and I quit believing in good people anymore.
I hereby reject the world and world events. I cannot care enough to hope nor
care enough to hate. The world of human events has upset me so
much for the last time. Something about what is going on now has revealed
to me how stupid and ignorant mankind is for the final time.
I hereby reject this world and its events.

When I was writing HUNT, I was stunned to see all the activity which took
place in hopes of avoiding the start of the Civil War. All of the attempts
obviously failed. So, I came up with my own version of history with a story which I
completely made up. And people are now writing me asking if HUNT was
based on a true story? Did this story really happen?
I tell them, no it did not. There was no idea or attempt like this in real life. Again, I
made it up.

I wish there was an idea for how to avoid a war. But there is not. In fact, my
writing HUNT was my attempt at imagining what it would be like if someone
had an idea that could avert a war. Perhaps I was just being a little too hopeful, as usual.

Now, I guess I will go back to sticking my head in the sand…At least, for today.