EMP

It's been a threat for more than twenty-years; an Electro Magnetic Pulse could shut down- hospitals, financial and transportation systems, the Internet, water and electrical grids.

I read a powerful novel by Nelson DeMille,"The Talbot Odyssey." He researches meticulously, and produces page-turning bestsellers, year after year. A massive, continent-destroying EMP was the threat hanging over the country in his book. The hero and heroine were on the verge of not being able to stop it. But, they did. For me, it wasn't a happy ending -- DeMille established that the EMP thing could happen.

Well, now it's in the news. Is it fear-mongering, or a real threat? A major foundation and a Congressman got the Pentagon to commission the Navy to study how to protect the fleet from such an attack.

What does a New Yorker do with fears added on top of fears? List them: I haven't forgotten the scenarios -- someone poisons our water; pumps poison Sarin gas in the New York subways; another Timothy McVey attacks on Wall street; another 9-11.

A young child is stunned, shocked, frightened when death enters his sphere -- a pet, a plant, a relative, gets sick and dies. And like the leaves on the ground that he can kick aside, or leaves the wind scatters -- though there's sunshine, new things to do, colorful things all around -- the fact of death is forever remembered, in the same way birthdays, time passing is a fact of life that grows, gets larger, more menacing every week, month, year.

So ...EMP ...

I looked up How to build an EMP bomb.

There were a lot of diagrams,
complicated, detailed information.
It's dangerous to build.
With supplies and tools,
you could build it for $400.

I couldn't do it, aside from the fact that I wouldn't -- it's an unacceptable, inconceivable thought. I don't personally know anyone who could. But, a nut, a mad man or woman could gain access to the button to push, to activate a home-built, EMB bomb.

Here's my private inner thought: At the end of MY life which IS approaching, I know that the bad thing will happen. And, I've figured out that the "bad" thing is already within me -- the frailty, wrong habit, disease, or the failure of a vital organ is ticking away, without my awareness of the tick-tick-ticking.

Okay. Like a child, I do better with fears, kicking , blowing, scattering them aside.

EMP is on the list. It wasn't really, already there. It's there now.

What will be, will be. I can't sing Que Sera like Doris Day, but I'm turning the page with the list, and doing my work.