When I was a child, my mother taught me a prayer: "There are four corners on this bed, there are four angels around this spread; Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, God bless this bed that I lay on." When she would tuck me in, that little prayer gave me confidence in something--even when I was a small child in a town with a mine fire. I would then fall asleep gazing up at a painting of Winnie the Pooh on my wall... Winnie the Pooh was on the edge of a path with a gray sky.. It was a calming picture..

Life isn't always calm. But I can always shift focus on that painting mentally even until today.. Innocence .. Youth.

Fast forward, I am 28. Years of growing up can make you lose your focus on that journey from the little boy in the burning town ..

And it's always the Christmas season.. Increasingly through life I get a little more like "the grinch" ..

x x x

This week, just a tad bit more than other weeks, I lost confidence in human beings. A few events of an unfortunate nature made me scratch my head in disbelief, cringe in sickness, and get angry in sadness. How can a human being filled with decency and self confidence completely throw all of that in the heaping trash can of embarrassment? How can someone filled with intelligence act in a way that forever can destroy? Someone that lived 58 years of life building a reputation, all to simply give it away to the demons that filled his body?

It's amazing how fast you can destroy something. Something that was built up over a lifetime can turn into dust in the wind, wisping away in a breeze. x x x

Dust in the wind.. On this date, December 7, 1941, another generation was completely changed in sudden fashion. Pearl Harbor was attacked by Japan without warning (I repeat, without warning). Troops on December 6, 1941, were going about their duty in Hawaii. At 7:55 am Sunday, December 7, Japanese warplanes killed 2,335 soldiers, 68 civilians, and damaged 21 ships, destroyed 188 aircraft, damaged 159 aircraft, and forever changed the nation when Franklin Roosevelt declared that America would enter World War II.

And now today, 67 years a few veterans are still around to tell the story of Pearl Harbor.. But the once bellowing tale is turning into a whisper. If you have the chance, listen to the story. Don't let history die with the aging soldiers around us..

x x x

I always think of this: The people that were killed during the Pearl Harbor attack, and on 9/11, have been frozen in time. They are still, in my mind, there. At that event.. on that day.. Pre-horror. They are still planning the later part of their day.. still thinking of what they will get for lunch that day.. Still worrying about the work they have to get done.. They died suddenly. Their horror may have even happened too quick for them to even determine what they were apart of.. And now, today, we the rest of the world has moved on from the tragic events on both days, their lives have been stopped and frozen .. Frozen..

x x x

And just in time for Christmas, some grand news hits the American consumer: Fears that our current economic plight may be worse than any other period since World War II .. In the defense of negativity, the news is pretty grim. The bleak jobs numbers are horrible: 1.91 million workers lost their job in 2008. And as reported yesterday on Schmuckraker, even Google called off its grand Christmas party in favor of smaller worker-planned events..

All the world's changing.. But nothing under the sun is new. It's all been done before..

But, what would the tech generation do during a Depression? How would the Net world react to dire economic times? That, perhaps, is one thing that has never been done before..

x x x

Through it all, though, the recklessness of man will shine through.. Like a priest on a nude beach, everything is getting weird....

BRYAN SMOLOCK SCHMUCKRAKER.COM SUNDAY DECEMBER 7 2008 9:30 AM EDT

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