Horrific

I don’t intend to sleep ever again. Just in case ya’ll are wondering why I’m so cranky.

I think I had it right in early 2002 when I stopped listening to, watching, or reading the news. At the time my brother was overseas and one morning I awoke to news of a helicopter crash in Afghanistan and that was the end of my relationship with the news media. Sure, I was woefully ignorant of the world around me, but ignorance was bliss. Since then, I’ve returned to a fairly regular routine of reading CBC online and watching the occasional newscast. But, aside from being well-informed about just how awful the world is, reading the news has no benefits. Over the last couple of days there have been two especially brutal stories that just leave me feeling ill and thinking that a news moratorium might benefit me immensely. Everything about these stories makes me want to hide out in a couch-cushion-and-bed-sheet fort with my favourite stuffed animal circa 1989 (Share Bear Care Bear) and never, ever grow up to the reality of our world.

The first was this story about a man who attacked a woman in her home here in Edmonton. You know, for all my complaining about crime in Edmonton, I’ve never really felt unsafe here. But then this story comes along and freaks me out. This guy broke into his neighbour’s apartment through the balcony after a night of drinking and drugs, and held her captive for hours. (I check to make sure my balcony doors are locked, like, five times a day now, and I live on the 11th floor). He’s claiming his mental condition is to blame, but when the woman was able to call 911 for help, he calmly told the operator it was a crank call. Holy god, that is the most frightening aspect I think. Imagine what she went through to make it to a phone and get through to help, only to have him do that (911 resonded anyway, however). Also, he apparently bet his friends that he could “break into the woman’s condo and rape and kill her.” I don’t care how drunk you are, when your friend with supposed mental problems starts talking like that, you lock him in a room or something. The guy is currently on trial, but that seems like small consolation.

The second story appeared this morning. I told Kimmy that is was unbelievable and she questioned that, and we agreed that it should be unbelievable but somehow it isn’t. The headline says it all, “Man decapitates passenger aboard Greyhound bus in Manitoba: witnesses.” And a little detail I just now noticed: the bus was coming from Edmonton. Of course. The article reads like something written by George Romero. I’ve been thinking about it too much already today. It’s too disturbing to discuss any more.

How shall I spend my time, not that I can no longer sleep, or read CBC?