Unless you are a news junkie or live in the Northwest, you may not know about these two events. Regardless, it has been a tough time out here.
On Nov. 28, a 41-year-old woman with a history of strange and violent nature committed suicide in a large park here in Grays Harbor. Before she took her own life by swallowing perscription drugs, she brutally stabbed and killed a 4-year-old boy she was babysitting. Police said that the boy didn't die quickly, because there was proof that he tried to drag himself down a pathway near the park's popular tennis courts. Also, the horrific nature of his death made many hardened police officers on the scene weep openly.
It is now believed that the woman, who is only suspected of killing the boy (kind of weird since she was found a ways away from the boy, was taking care of him, according to his mother, and the knife used in the killing was found nearby), suffered from methamphetamine-induced psychosis, had been convicted of killing a neighbor's dog because she believed the dog was Satan and tried to kill her own cat by freezing it in her freezer because she thought (all together now) she believed the cat was Satan.
We don't know the mother's story, yet. The father? Hasn't been around and hasn't seen the boy in years.
When I read the story the next morning, I cried.
Earlier in the week, a mild-mannered high school freshman was expelled after a councelor found out that the boy had a "slaughter list" and that some of his classmates were scared of him because they were on the list. A list of 50 names were found and the boy has been charged with felony harassment and gross misdemeanor intimidation.
The family has been trying to get the boy help for his mental problems, but local and state agencies have denied them. They couldn't afford private counceling, so... they were stuck and were doing the best they could. And they were just as shocked as everyone else when the list was discovered.
What is this world coming to? For two families, one mourning the death of a small boy and another questioning themselves as to why their son wrote the list, this holiday season will be nothing short of agonizing. To the families whose children were on the freshman's list, they're thankful nothing happened. But my heart grieves for that little boy. No one deserves that kind of an ending.
You'll have to excuse me if I'm a little grouchy. I like to believe — maybe to my detriment — that life is a zero-sum balance and that, in the end, life is fair. But it isn't fair that a family's cry for help went unanswered and that fate didn't intervene when a 4-year-old boy tried to crawl away for help.
It isn't fair, dammit... it isn't fair.