Requiem Aeternam Dona Eis, Domine

You spin; you twirl; you flit about,

possessed of trenchant style.

You dance the dance the others do,

far better by a mile.

And as you blithely dominate,

you condescend to smile

upon the fellow revelers you've

enchanted and beguiled.

They do not know; they cannot know;

and you are in denial:

For all your skill, and all your might,

your soul's been scarred by bile.

The tune once called, the others step,
so you quick to the tile.

Why is it that you've never asked

if dancing is worthwhile?

Sucked In: Women to Ranger School

"The U.S. Army is considering putting female soldiers through Ranger School"

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/17/us-usa-women-rangers-idUSBRE84G00820120517?feedType=RSS&feedName=domesticNews

With that, my "I don't talk politics; it's pointless" went right out the window.  I'm a hypocrite.  I've had several discussions/postings about the topic.

One such commenter, against the grain of "This is idiotic", stated:

"...that is the responce every time a system or program is considered for change to allow the entry of women. It is a position designed to bet on failure. I think that there are a few capable women who would prefer to bet on success.
With the military the way that it is today the roles of women are already blured. Women can command any number of units in combat areas and the current wars and number of women killed and wounded in combat demonstrate that the line has already been crossed. If a female MP goes to Ranger school and passes out she will be a better leader and the MP unit will benefit.
You use boxing as an example of a skill that will have to change. There are any number of martial arts other than boxing. I took classes for years and am a pretty big guy. One of my instructors, and co-owner of the school was a woman who could whup ass with the best of them.
BTW, I can assure you that when the day comes that a woman can run and throw like Eli Manning, some team will pick her up. Is there a rule in the NBA, MLB, or NFL that bars women?"

Who's the more foolish, the fool or the fool who argues with him?  I get it. I'm aware.  That's my typical position.

But, however

Proverbs 26:4-5 "Do not answer a fool according to his folly, or you yourself will be just like him. Answer a fool according to his folly, or he will be wise in his."  

For which I found the rather brilliant paraphrase "So: It is unwise to argue with a fool at his own level and recognize his own foolish suppositions, but it is good sometimes to refute him soundly, lest his foolishness seem to be confirmed by your silence."  http://www.bibletools.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/bible.show/sVerseID/17146/eVerseID/17147#ixzz1vDhpoANc

So off I went:

"...that is a beautiful, lofty position and one that has been propounded by such heralded minds as Plato. The problem is that it's beautiful in theory and not reality. You speak of the Righteous Amazon [let's call her Camilla (Virgil's Aeneid) to keep with classical concept since the idea is nearly two thousand years old] who will break the mold and not only be on the same field as men but lead and possibly dominate. You say "when the day comes that a woman can run and throw like Eli Manning, some team will pick her up". Quite right, but I wouldn't bet my paycheck on that being likely.

To keep with the metaphor, I say that there are 32 teams in the NFL and there are 53 roster spots. That's 1696 possible positions. If she made a team she would represent, of course, not the vanguard of an onslaught of dominant women players, but an oddity, a statistical aberration, a commendable and impressive one to be sure, but an outlier nonetheless. She, alone, would be not 1% of the NFL, nor a tenth of 1%. She would represent .05%.

And that's saying she plays the premier position (QB). Little girls can play football, and have. The crucible of reality has, and will, dictate that no, they will not be quarterbacks. When they have played against men, and they have, they play kickers typically. Why? That's where their obvious physical limitations hold them back least. IF a woman made an NFL team, I'd bet solid money she will be a kicker or punter.

IF that woman punter or kicker achieves the highest level (NFL) she will be a specimen and a sight to see, but she'll still be a kicker or punter and still represent .05%. No one, and I mean NO ONE with any sense is gonna tell you the kicker is the Acme of NFL Athletes. A kicker can be a hell of an athlete, yes. He/she can do a billionty pushups and walk on his/her hands for hours and at the end of the day he's/she's a sight to see at 195lbs. And yet football requires so, so, so much more. That's why kickers and punters don't get drafted first (other than Sebastian Janikowski, who looks like a lineman, coincidentally). Merely being an impressive specimen ain't enough. You need to also fit in the game.

THEREIN lies the problem with your Camilla theory. The NFL, of course, is not the Army, but it's an easier stand-in. Instead of a spectator sport that ultimately can vanish and not truly cause a problem, we're talking about the Army. The Army that is not a social concept. The Army that is not a "We Can Do It!" jingo-istic application.

We're talking about the people, men, who will face death and deal in it. The army, men, who protect the rest of us so that we can watch silly spectator sports that might one day, theoretically, have a woman compete with hundreds of men. This is not to be considered intellectually. Killing is not an intellectual exercise. Viscera, guts, brains, severed limbs, intestines, feces, urine, screaming agony. That's the bottom line of the Army. Common sense, reality, and history, not beautiful, lofty theory, have proven as much.

And yet, women have and will continue to face combat and succeed. This is not to be ignored or played down. We do have female warriors and thank God we do. With non-linear combat now a part of modern combat and one that will be for the foreseeable future, we will see a female Medal of Honor recipient (and not a PC one, but a deserved one). I stand by that.

When women have been in combat in the US, it has not been on purpose. It has been a coincidence of circumstance. "Our supply convoy got ambushed and the female driver exited her vehicle, laid down suppressive fire while her fellow soldiers found cover, and..." That story and it's ilk have happened repeatedly during the War on Terror. That's not to take away from what women have achieved. Well done. But it doesn't change the fact that it was unintended.

Rangers and infantry are not about coincidence, nor should they be. We don't put weaklings in the infantry (well we do, but that's because the Army is a bureaucratic machine and has problems...the weak typically wash out). They're the tip of the spear, as it were, and we need/want/require the best. The Rangers represent the best of the best. No, they're not Special Forces (I think women much better, if still unlikely or unnecessary, candidates for Special Operations). They are Elite Infantry.

"Rangers lead the way." They are symbols. They are also a very real force. Outside of Ranger Qualified soldiers and officers, there are Ranger Battalions and/in the Ranger Regiment (75th). When we need the best of the best, we use them.

Ranger School is a gauntlet of physical hell. Men die at Ranger School. (My cousin's) case of losing 55lbs in just over 2 months isn't an outlier. That's about the norm. Ranger School is designed to break men, to push them past their limits. The men who get sent to Ranger School aren't plucked from the street. They are tough to begin with. I was an artilleryman. I tried to go to Ranger School and got hurt just doing the training to qualify for a slot (Caveat: I am in NO way pulling the "I'd have been a Ranger if I hadn't blown out my knee" excuse/lie that one will hear from time to time; I sincerely doubt I could have made it through had I even gotten there). I was a 22yo LT (6'2", 195lbs) in the best shape of my life and could not hack it.

For us, the United States, to upend our system of selecting those Titans for an implausible, hypothetical, truly miniscule number of women (probably singular, woman) is nothing short of abject foolishness.

To keep with your NFL metaphor it would be like saying that hypothetical female kicker should be able to compete for a Pro Bowl Middle Linebacker slot.

Of course (OF COURSE) the gentleman could not let that go as the final word.

"I have no problem being in league with Plato. You do know that my use of QB was just an example. The question remains: is there a rule in the NBA, NHL, MLB or NFL that bars women? I don't think so, and a woman who can cut the mustard will make the team. The ham-fisted analogy, was in response to Bill's reference to pro sports. It is a meritocracy and entertainment. The sport and the crowd must be fed.
I have heard your arguments and Bill's arguments that women were not capable in reference to the inclusion of all "minorities." I say, let them try and let them succeed or let them fail just like the significant percentage of men who don't make it. "

This time I kept it short:

"I say that just because one man might be able to run around the bases faster than a horse (might), you don't therefore put him in the Kentucky Derby."  

 

Goddam Politics (Us v. Them Is @#$!ing Childish)

A relative emailed me this recently:

"AJAX'S KIN"	7:49 PM (45 minutes ago)
to AJAX, "ANOTHER KINSMAN"

I don't usually pass political stuff on but this is alarming!

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "POLITICO"
Date: Sun, May 6, 2012 at 5:10 PM
Subject: Fw: New law just signed by the President
To:

Subject: New law just signed by the President

 YOU DON'T HAVE TO CHECK THIS OUT ON SNOPES - IT MADE FOX NEWS WHICH YOU CAN SEE THE VIDEO BY CLICKING ON BELOW!  PRETTY SCARY FOLKS!!! 

This is really frightening.  Why did I not know about this?   sneaked another one in on us.

New law makes it illegal to protest in Obama's presence

This  means that, wherever Obama is, you do not have a right to ask him anything you want to. His secret service can have you arrested, fined, and imprisoned for  more than a YEAR if you ask him something he doesn’t like. Sound like he’s more like Hitler than Lincoln to you?   

WATCH  AND BE AMAZED AT HIS LATEST ATTEMPT TO STAGE A TAKEOVER OF  AMERICA ...

Guess  you’ve probably heard about this, but sending it on anyway. It’s probably the  scariest thing this guy has done yet.

 Are you aware of this new law, signed by “Obama” in early March  2012?

http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=7SGWH3kirzg&vq=medium

 
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________

My (Ajax's) response:

It's only alarming if you take the news at face value, which I don't.  Here's the Library of Congress text of the bill:

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112hr347enr/pdf/BILLS-112hr347enr.pdf

In order to protest, it has long been established that you may need a permit and that those permits are typically freely given though with minor restrictions to location for security purposes.  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protest_permit)  That's to ensure "orderly" protest and so police and officials don't consider you a threat.  On the face of it, this bill does not violate that.

We'll go line by line by this bill for the relevant parts:

(a)Whoever,
(1)  knowingly enters or remains in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority to do so

 "restricted buildings or ground without lawful authority to do so".  Think about that couple who purposely crashed a White House dinner a few years ago for a publicity stunt.  They knew they were entering the White House and knew they weren't supposed to be there (http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Salahi-Special-78131427.html).  Surely, you can understand why the government wants to criminalize things like that.  Fines may not stop attention whores; time in prison will.  If you think those people are harmless, think about the distraction they can cause for the Secret Service that could open up the President or VP to assassins/danger.

(2) knowingly, and with intent to impede or disrupt the orderly conduct of Government business or official functions, engages in disorderly or disruptive conduct in, or within such proximity to, any restricted building or grounds when, or so that, such conduct, in fact, impedes or disrupts the orderly conduct of Government business or official functions;

This the one that journalists are using to play up the "Obama is EVIL and taking away our right to protest just because he doesn't want to hear dissent!" angle.  The only problem is that it has nothing to do with people disagreeing with the President.  It has to do with people making a scene at events where the President is.  At a town hall meeting, if someone wants to hold the President's feet to the fire when they are given the microphone, they are in no way "in fact" impeding or disrupting the function.  If the President's at a townhall meeting though, and someone who hasn't been given the microphone suddenly stands up and starts shouting at the President and his conduct is so egregious that the Secret Service has to intervene, well, yes, that person would be violating.  Free Speech does not allow you to endanger the President or VP.  Causing a scene out of context, again, would distract the Secret Service and open up the President or VP to assassins/danger.

(3) knowingly, and with the intent to impede or disrupt the orderly conduct of Government business or official functions, obstructs or impedes ingress or egress to or from any restricted building or grounds

What this will prevent is people knowingly blocking the president's (and VP's) ability to enter and exit his residence, which I'm fairly certain is illegal as it is (and should be), or places where he is speaking.  If our nations' enemies were able to foment protests that blocked evacuation or entry of the Pres or VP, then they would be easier targets for assassination.  Regardless of party, this is unacceptable.

or (4) knowingly engages in any act of physical violence against any person or property in any restricted building or grounds; or attempts or conspires to do so, shall be punished as provided

Surely this is straightforward.

_____________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________

There are only a handful of people that I've ever discussed my political affiliation with so this isn't a matter of me "siding" with the President.  Outside of Republican or Democrat, this bill is not akin to "Hitler" ramming anti-dissent legislation through.  The Republicans control the House.  They don't help Obama with squat if they don't want to.  This got passed because it's common damn sense and reasonable. 

If you hate Obama or hated Bush, good for you.  Stick with "@#$! that guy"; that's enough; people get that.  The only thing that happens when you try to pump up stuff like this to justify/class up your "@#$! that guy" and manufacture a controversy where there isn't one is that you're showing you don't really have any idea what you're talking about.

But then you'd be like most people I've met who are into politics, so what do I know?

Self-Assessment Time (For You Beautiful People, Not Me)

There's only one rule: Be honest. 

Suggested Time: As long as it takes.

If a blind man wouldn't enjoy being around you or like you as a human being, it's time to tone down the "I know I'm hot!" or take a shower (hell, maybe both just to be safe) and then shut the hell up and think of something actually intelligent or interesting to say other than the prodigious amounts of useless drivel that lazily falls out of your face.

I'm not blind, but what I would say to you, if I saw you out and about making an inadvertent ass out of yourself and being a walking advertisement for why I sometimes (just sometimes) fervently pray for zombie apocalypse or planet-wide sterility, is this:

"Hi, 'The Sexiest/Most Ripped Person Here!,' I'm 'The Smartest Guy in the Room!.'  However, because I'm relatively smart, I know I'm one of many 'The Smartest Guy(s) in the Room!' and probably not the only one in this particular room. What I'm saying is...tone down the arrogance. It's great that you're pretty/strong/tanned/particularly hump-worthy.  Go about your business, hang out with your friends, make them laugh by actually being funny, and stop dressing and strutting like an attention whore. 

"I promise, promise!, PROMISE! that human beings are not peacocks.  If you're not so bright, or super clever, that's okay; work on being nice.  Everyone likes nice (except weirdos).  We'll still see that you're hot.  If a hot person in normal clothes not making a scene is in a room of not-hot people also not making a scene, trust me, all the not-hot people will be aware of the one hottie. Painfully aware. Other hotties will too. 

"But get this...it works better for you to tone it down.  Really. 

"The people you're attracting with that aggravating, ignorant crap?  Complete and utter shitheads.  So if you're a hot guy wondering why you can't find a nice girl or you're hot chick who always seems to be attracting jerks, put two and two together.  There's a reason why annoying-ass, beautiful celebrities marry and divorce in record time. Think about it.

"Or, you know, remain completely and utterly un-self-aware.  Perhaps life will be roses for you in your obnoxious obliviousness.

"But I'll be rolling my eyes and wishing hateful things upon you and taking some small solace in the fact that, eventually, hot goes away and you'll be stuck having to put up with yourself, because no one else will."

Zombies- Problems & Solutions

The problem with Zombies is what the hell?

I'm practical. I really am.  If I wake up and there are zombies stumbling amok, I'm going to accept it.  It's not going to do me any good to yell at the Zombies,

"Hey, you make no sense.  You're decaying matter; you have no fluid coursing through your veins.  How the hell do your joints and muscles work without lubrication?"

I know people want zombies to be the living dead and think that 28 Days Later was not really a zombie movie since that was just sick people, but I think that's about the only way we'd ever see zombies for real.

That being said, the not-making-sense aspect of zombies also would be a key factor for me if it turned out there were in fact zombies.  "Okay. This shouldn't be happening, but it is.  The laws of science are out the window.  Time to propitiate  God."

I'd be pretty damn religious is what I'm saying.

Religious does not mean stupid though.

Viral or Wrath of God, the way to deal with zombies/survive are the same.

WEAPONS
BLADES- You're going to want a good blade.  I'd recommend a hatchet.  Yes, an ax might work well, but I think the length might be a problem.  You want to make sure you don't miss and that you have enough heft to get into the skull, which is why I like a hatchet/axe over a machete or sword.  The human skull is really damn hard.

I might even carry a spear too.  You laugh, but how the hell is zombie-ism transferred?  Lore has it that it comes from a bite, but I'm not taking the chance that it comes from a scratch if I don't have to.  Get a nice long spear and aim for the mouth.

It's important to have a stabbing weapon to go along with swinging weapons because if you get stuck in a contained area, say a hallway, you might not have the room to swing.  You know how much good an ax does you when you don't have room to swing it? Dick. That's how much good.

GUNS- There are many, many reasons to have the blade be the weapon of choice for Zombies.  First of all, no ammo, so you don't have to worry about running out and then being screwed.  So long as you have strength left, you can keep killin' zombies.  TV shows and books never ever talk about ammo.  Bullets are made out of lead.  Lead is damn heavy.  I wore 210 rounds of ammo on me in Iraq and that was a bitch.  210 rounds, by the way, is probably what you shot within the first 3 minutes of one of the Call of Duty games you played.  In real life, you are a hell of a lot more careful with your ammo because you don't want to be stuck in the middle of people/zombies trying to kill you with an empty gun.

You do need a gun though.  The blades will only work one with onesies and twosies coming at you.  You'd be idiotic to waste a bullet on a onesie or twosie.  First and foremost, guns will make noise and draw more zombies, so you don't want to use them if you don't have to.  Guns are when there isn't a swarm, but there are enough that you couldn't stab enough of them before they overwhelmed you.  You get in that situation, whip out the gun and blast an exit. Don't shoot all of them, just enough to get out of the bad situation.

I'd have two guns.  One would be a heavy revolver.  Those don't jam.  The problem is that they have six shots.  Reloading a revolver when zombies are coming at you is horrible.  That's why you use it as the trusty backup.  Always save the last bullet of the revolver for yourself.

You use the automatic primarily.  You can carry clips/magazines and kill way more and reload very quickly.  Don't be like Hollywood and just drop your empties on the ground.  An automatic without a magazine/clip is worse than a revolver.  Hell, it's probably worse than a sock with a sack of quarters in it.  Keep those empties for later.

Guns really aren't for zombies.  You need to make sure of your surroundings so that you don't have to get away from blades.  If there are, say, 10 zombies coming at you, see if you can get yourself to a position where they are coming at you from the same direction.  Get behind a door and stab them in the head one at a time as they try to come through or run down a hallway, turn around, and wait for them to come at you lined up and then stab, stab, stab.  Again, unless you have gotten yourself into a position where you absolutely have to use the gun, don't.  Guns are for the other human survivors roaming around competing with you for supplies and shelter.

FIRE- Unless your zombie apocalypse is one where God made zombies fireproof, fire will be your failsafe.  You have to think about zombies in numbers.  A few zombies, you can handle with a blade.  A few too many zombies and you need the gun.  A vast zombie horde of hundreds/thousands/millions?  You need fire.

Prep work is key to zombies.  You want to get somewhere that you can control/contain their numbers.  If you're going to have an above ground sanctuary (which I wouldn't but that's just me), then you need to funnel zombies towards you so you can manage them.   

The Walking Dead just had the survivors living on a farm.  A farm!  They know there's a zombie apocalypse and they just tra-la-la-la-la around like there's no issue.  You always have to think that the zombie horde is just over the horizon.  You have to work under the assumption that if one comes, you will not be able to escape and will have to fight it out to survive.  How the hell were they going to do that on that farm?

Fire.  Fire's how.  Well, fire and a shovel.  It would suck, but what you would do is dig a huge, huge ditch/moat around your sanctuary.  The dirt you took from the ground, you'd put on the sanctuary side so form a makeshift wall as well.  I'd reinforce that wall with logs so that if somehow the zombies crawled out of the ditch, they couldn't get up the logwall or tear through it.

Anyway, they shouldn't be able to crawl out because I would have set sticks and branches in that ditch.  I see the horde coming, I'm waiting as long as I can.  I'm waiting for them to come and fall in the ditch and get stuck in there in their thousands, then I'm spraying fuel on them and chucking a torch on them.  They're all packed in like sardines.  They'll go up nicely, and it should take long enough that more zombies will just keep packing into the inferno.

It'll smell like hell, but that's the best way to take care of a horde.

MOTHER EARTH
As I said, I sure wouldn't pick my sanctuary above ground if I didn't have to.  I'd find some bunker/cave system.  The key is that you want a defensible entrance where they can't overwhelm with numbers.  If you chose a castle, thinking you were safe, well, even if your walls are 40 feet high, if the zombie horde is big enough, they can just trample each other and slowly make a zombie ramp, at which point they pour over and you are screwed.  Yes, it would take a metric shit-ton of zombies for that, but, you know, you're supposed to think of these things.

I'd want a bunker with a door (steel) that was wide enough for a man.  I don't care if a million zombies are pushing the one at the door as much as they can, they're not pushing through that.  Sure, you're trapped, but you're safe.

That being said, while starving to death is not as sucky as being torn limb from limb and eaten alive, it still sucks.  That's why you must have a backup/escape tunnel.  That outdoor sanctuary surrounded by the fire ditch I told you about?  Yeah, you better be digging an escape tunnel there, for if the zombie horde is fireproof/attacks on a rainy week.  They manage to get over the walls, you don't want to be standing there holding your pecker and whistling dixie.  You want out.  Your shovel is going to be as important as your weapons.

PERFECT SANCTUARY
I know I said underground, but that's if I'm on connected land.  An island with a fresh water source would be great.  One with high cliffs would be best.  Bunkers/sanctuaries are great on mainland, but there's always a risk of running out of supplies.  On an island, you should be able to handle the smaller amount of zombies, if any.  Then you have the ocean to feed you.  Of course still dig your ditches and walls and whatnot, but food and water and wait for the zombie bodies to decompose to the point that they can't move.

Unless the angry God who made the zombies allows them to continue on as skeletons, or worse, zombie-ism transfers to sealife too.

In which place, you're probably in hell already and just don't know it. 

The Little Things in Life

So far, life has not turned out as I assumed.

I'm not sure why it would. I figured I'd be married (with children) and a professional success by now. But, what, exactly, have I done to further that end?  Yes, yes, I was an Army officer, and, yes, yes, I went to law school.  But I somehow thought competency and not butt-kissing was important in the one and that showing up as opposed to getting good grades was important in the other (to be fair, I did try for good grades, but As and I are like oil and water, so I quickly gave that up and rested on my race and gender and geographic good fortune).

Surely, loafing and being a southern white male would carry me through as it had for quite a many generations of my forebears (not true at all; they were quite impressive folks-ed).  As for marriage, all I've managed to do so far is occasionally date (usually) "unsettled" women.

So, here I am, a 32yo layabout, living in a ramshackle apartment with rats crawling in the walls . With two roommates, A and B.  No wife. No job.  Hell, my room isn't even my room; not really.  To get to it, I have to walk through B's room, which we partitioned off from the main part of his with a walkway girded by floor-to-ceiling curtains.

A warzone veteran and I live in another man's (basically) closet, a point that B never allows an opportunity pass to remind me.

That's my life right now.

So it was tonight that after a night of bar trivia (lost) and general malaise and the watching of unwatchable reality television ("Full Metal Jousting"!!!) that I trudged to my little fortress.

I was a trifle punchy though, indignant at the indecency of it all.

Standing in the pitch black of my walk-through, I paused, knowing my light-sleeping roommate was trying to ignore my clomp-clomp-clomping through a blocked-off sector of his room.  I waited just longer than should be acceptable.

And then I said in a breathy, sultry, seductive whisper,

"Tonight's the night, big fella!!!!"

And B, himself also in his thirties and unemployed and thoroughly disillusioned with the myths of success that we'd been brought up with, quietly and calmly responded in the silky pitch-black,

"I will $@#!in' kill you."

And good for him. Well done.  He hit the timing.  I set it up and he knocked it down.  The joke had been played and returned.  But, oh no, our banter had to continue.  We weren't done and it had to be followed through.

"Was that $@#! and kill me or $@#!ing kill me?  Because the difference is crucial," I asked, my lawyerly and classical training taking over and my need to know whether he meant a conjunction or a gerundive.

The beats were perfectly timed as I heard naught but the machete he keeps under his mattress ssshhhhhlllliiinnkkkkk!!!! as he pulled it out.

"Well, then. Good night," I said, gregariously and headed to my room.

"Good night," he muttered. And sssshhhhhhllllliiiinnnnkkk!!!! back it went.

It's shared misery that helps a man make it through troubling times; 'tis true.

Cormac McCarthy's "The Road": Disjointed Thoughts/Observations/Conundrums

Below are a list of my thoughts concerning the book.  They are not set in stone by any means.  I'm simply trying to process what I read and bounce around ideas so some of them are redundant/similar. If anyone has anything to contribute, please add a comment.

1.  The family at the end is a representation of what the father and son could have been?  Father says they're the good guys and they help, but he only helps others because of the son (how Christ redeems us in the face of the anger of the OT God/Father?).  As the kid says, "we talk a lot about helping and being the good guys but we never are." We never help. Man struck by lightning (ancient sign of God's displeasure).  The people in the basement.  The thief (Father' instinct is to punish/consign to death. The Son persuades forgiveness).  The old man with no name.

However, the family not only lets him come with them, they tracked him, sought him out.  Family is if they (Father and Son) chose goodness.  Thus, the other boy is his age, the woman exists because she didn't kill herself, the man is strong because he's not dying on the inside (coughing).  They also have a little girl.  The other little boy is the same age, so he was conceived prior to the disaster.  If the little girl is younger, than that means they conceived her after the catastrophe and she is therefore a very physical manifestation of hope.

2.  The fire is the pneuma, the breath, the holy ghost.  The living do carry it inside, particularly in a world that gets colder and colder.  The boy's breathing though it got shallow didn't fail.  The man's breath was failing him the entire time.  His fire was not pure.  That's why he recognized the goodness/godness of the boy.  The woman at the end confirms, "the breath of God was his breath yet though it pass from man to man through all of time." (Last spoken line of novel)

3.  The 2nd man made discussion about even helping the boy with his family.  So though he helped, he was reluctant, just like the father, though, like the father, he could be persuaded.  It took the woman for that though (because with no mother, the father could not be persuaded to help the other little boy though the son begged for it). For life to sustain, men's hardness must be softened by women's compassion? "They say women dream of danger to those in their care and men of danger to themselves." The 2nd man had no clue what the boy was talking about "the fire" but the woman knew.

4.  Hallucinating. Boy, I love me some hallucinating.  The dying father basically says, "Imagine me and I'll be there".  If the boy can imagine the father, then too can he imagine the family as they're his desires?  The kid's the only one who sees the other little boy earlier and the dog that he also sees may not be there (is a decoy to draw people in).  Before suicide, mother says "A person who had no one would be well advised to cobble together some passable ghost."

5.  Groups of four tend to be very dangerous.  The four walking ahead of the army.  The four (including a pregnant woman) following who eat the baby.  The four men they come across he must threaten with the pistol to get past. The family at the end though.

6.  Hope is not the point.  Love/Togetherness is the point. The beauty of the bond. The present. The moment.

7.  Was mother wrong (suicide)?  Was father wrong (survive)?

8.  The road is a symbolic path forward.  Like time.  No going back. Progress because there is no other option. It is only after they leave the ocean, head back inland that the father dies.  Regression is fatal. They must go to water. Water usually represents life, but it is devoid of life (ocean), all that really matters is the fire, the breath.  Rain and snow are deadly.  Significance of the fire/flare. See God.  Fire brought much death though.  Water used to bring life, then fire brought death, but water no longer brings life, while fire represents life now.  Purity of water important?  Water unspoiled, rain, the cistern found, the water from jugs in the bunker, all are healthy.  Bad water (affected by man) brings sickness.  In the unspoilt water lived the trout in all their mystery.

9.  Adam/Eve.  Fruit is important. Mentions eating fruit first beyond any other items routinely.  Makes mention when they're out of fruit. Apples.

10.  The Father. The Son. The fire (holy spirit) within.  The Son (NT) wants to save.  The father (OT) simply can't allow it.  The father dies and the son remains.  The father is replaced by a more nurturing, compassionate father figure. Repeatedly talks about God being dead or there being no God but the boy. First spoken line of the novel: "If he is not the word of God, God never spoke." "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."  There is no speech without breath/fire to fuel it.

11.  Three days with the dead father's body before the road forward again.  Three days of Christ's descent to hell? Or that after three days the redemption, the proof of the sacrifice is shown? Hallelujah! Christ is risen! Family finds him.


12.  Last thing the father says before he dies, "Goodness will find the little boy.  It always has.  It will again."