Soon we will all be gone. All of us die. There is a comfort in that I think.

Blackhawk helicopters flew low over my house this morning. Our Appointed Executive is visiting to stump for the governor of Florida. It is reassuring that they have such powerful weapons to back up their campaign. I'm sure that the election will go well for the younger Bush. Even if he lost, the Appointed one would give him a nice appointment as Reagan did for Bob Martinez.

But we all die. Too soon for many, like the brothers Bush who have a purpose to serve, or Paul Wellstone who died in another freak accident. It was too soon for my friend Monica Joseph, who died in 1998 just before Halloween, and too soon also for my son Owen Wheeler who died the week of thanks giving.

Monica never reached her goal. She studied jewelry at Pinellas Voc-Tech. Even after surgeries and chemotherapy she did not give up on her goal. I have some of her tools now. Just the old worn rawhide hammer and a few other battered implements left after her other friends snapped up the gems, the precious metals and the power tools. I made twelve bracelets this summer, pounding the metal hard with that old hammer.

Monica used to hate Michael Moore because she grew up in Flint, Michigan. She thought he portrayed the poverty in order to mock the residents. "It's not fair," she would say, "Those people lost their jobs."

But we will all die soon. Not because we want to or because we mixed arsenic with our drinking water or because so many people want us dead. We will die because that is what life does; it ends. The Buddhists and the Christians and the Muslims, with their visions of paradise and rebirth have something to hold onto for strength, but all those faiths admit one truth; we die. Was it Emily Dickinson who said "Parting is all we Know of Heaven and all we need of Hell?"

Please drive safely, and for God's sake PUT THOSE GUNS AWAY! It will all be over soon enough. Thanks for listening.