I wonder if all parents experience the awe, this unimaginable complexity and mysterious unfolding? How is it possible? The union of two cells explode and become Carly Elizabeth; heart beating, ten fingers and ten toes, deep gray-blue eyes, sensing, learning, changing every moment, never to be quite the same again, like all the stars and the sky, and just like you and me. Surely every parent must, in their own way.

By some measure violence is down. The sensational home run violence, mass shootings are up, along with the exponential increase of SWAT teams using military armaments and shock-and-awe tactics against living room poker games.

The less bonded we feel to other human beings, nature and the environment the more likely we are to feel defensive and in a completely industrial, virtual, technological society, the quicker we reach for that .38 tucked under the pillow.