I came home to a punch in the gut today, finding that someone who was for a while a good friend of mine that I lost touch with had committed suicide over the weekend.

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Her death would be a tragedy no matter what, since she was young and kind and funny and had a life ahead of her. But that it was a suicide makes it worse, for me at least, because it indicates the extent of her suffering. I feel deep sorrow that we lost touch, because even if it may have made no difference I wish I could have tried to help.

Hey chickyboo, sirista... Amanda Ferm's mother just died.

My thinking on this has, like most people's, evolved a lot over the last few years. It's fluttered through all sorts of feelings and emotions, through examinations of freedom of religion and whether profiling is helpful or not, through examinations of freedom of speech, through the questions of when, if ever, the ends justify the means. I feel clear on two points.

The first is an echo of things I've said before, that terrorism is a hateful thing, based on a system of values that deserves nothing but contempt. It's true, in some cases, that people turned to terrorism such as the Palestinians are often coming from extremely desperate circumstances, and have had everything taken from them. Or alternately, the Israelis (who I feel are equally guilty of mass civilian slaughter), who are trying to defend what they feel is their home in a sea of hostility and danger. We must have empathy for that, and lapses born of desperation should be expected. But they are not justified. But when we see hurtful systems of values being adopted elsewhere and being used to hurt us, I think it's essential to first examine our own behavior to look for our own ethical lapses. Where have we committed the same mistakes? Where have we invented our own? We must be sure we are acting faithfully on our own principles beforing accusing anyone else. And I think it's critical in fighting terrorists that we stand by our moral code. Abandoning free speech, abandoning right to trial, abandoning any of our own rights or the rights of others, which we assert are universal, kills the thing we seek to defend. I still believe something I said a time ago that when a person acts towards destruction of life, that person's life is forfeit. But that does not mean we should take it, and break our own code.

The second point concerns the loss, the hurt, the tremendous waste. There's a feature in the New York Times right now that talks about families who lost someone; apparently they did a profile 1 year after and have now done a second for many families. You can read a few, and they're interesting, but what's amazing and terrible is to see how many profiles they've done, and realize how small a fraction that is of all the people who were hurt by what happened. Have you seen Munich"? It's well-executed and very disturbing, and I highly recommend it. And after you see it, most probably you'll be moved to feel the way I do, that all this fighting is mostly a terrible waste. I think one always has to realize that whenever a person takes an action, they have from their point of view all the reason in the world to take that action, and from their perspective they are being reasonable, just, and caring. And it's terrible to think, isn't it, about some of the worldviews necessary for the actions we've seen in recent years, both from the Muslim extremists and from our own government. It's foolish to say we shouldn't defend ourselves, but equally foolish to do so in a way that wastes life and hurts our own cause.

It's to the point where I can barely listen to world news any more. I'm not sure what's to be done, other than vote and keep pushing the world with my own small strength in the direction I want it to go.

To be honest, the last week has been kind of overwhelming. There's getting into graduate school, which has given me unspeakable joy. There's my grandmother's death and the ensuing family drama, which I want to write about but not right now, which has given me sadness and anger. Ben heard from his first graduate school too today; he got into Penn, which is awesome. I have high hopes for my chances with Penn. We'll see.

Anyhow, notable events of the past week include:

( the portuguese restaurant )

( the rosicrucian egyptian museum )

( world of warcraft )

( russia: leningrad and east-west )

I really like this whole having-free-time thing. It's fun.

My conference proceedings paper is mostly done, being passed around the SNAP CCD group for editing. It's due Friday. Then I have to write the slightly longer paper for TNS, which will be pickier and more complete. So I'm working light this week, spending most of my time at home, studying for the physics GRE and taking occasional breaks for Farscape.

This reviewing isn't so bad... I don't mind learning the formulae so much now, it's just tedious and a bit high-pressure. I know that if I do badly, it'll be fine, but I'd rather go blasting into graduate admissions committee meetings (personified by my application, that is), guns blazing, completely ready. I feel like I have something to live up to now.

Isn't it funny how what bothers me most about my gran'dad dying is the feeling that I wanted to prove myself to him? I guess that right now I have this burning desire for vindication, especially to everyone who believe(d/s) in me. In terms of his life, he was very lucky. It's pretty cool, actually, he donated his body for science and it's rather good because he had that rare, aggressive cancer, sarcoma, and it will help them a lot to have more ways to study it.

I feel less prone to despair when bad things happen than I was a few months ago. I had a hard time picking myself up out of that 'everything that happens to me is horrible' mindset that I got into after grad school stuff in the spring, and it's like now I have a hard time getting myself into it. It's great. It doesn't mean I'll skip into the physics GRE, score very highly, and then frolic back outside, but it means I'm less freaked out about everything now. Which is relieving. I remember panic, despair, and being overwhelmed, and it's a lot easier to do all this stuff without them.

My gran'dad died this morning, in his sleep.

He lived a very long life, to 82, and was happy and exploring for nearly all of it. He wasn't in a lot of pain, never lost real control of his faculties, and went peacefully even though there was the potential for a long, drawn-out death.

He believed in me, in the most sincere way, and it hurt me to have to tell him when I didn't get into graduate school. When I daydreamed about telling people that I got in somewhere fantastic, I knew he would have been the most proud. I regret that he won't see that.