Spaaaaaace Cadet!
Posted on 06/18/2002 6:28:52 AM PDT by KMC1
Once the blaze that is now consuming the Colorado landscape got rolling a little question popped into my mind. It almost always does when I hear of these horrible disasters. "How did it start?" I'm always interested in the origins of things. How did Hitler come to power? How did Clinton get elected twice? How does my wallet seem to empty faster than it seems to fill? You get the idea...
I've often heard of those mysterious fires that just seem to begin out of nothing. I guess what happens is the conditions get so dry that one day given the right prism of light a ray of sunshine will turn the dry underbrush in to kindling and before you know it 6000 acres burn uncontrollably. I had wondered what the story was on this fire. Some days the news would report that the fire was only ten miles from Denver and moving at a pace of three miles per hour. "Poor Denver," I would think to myself. But somehow the city has avoided the scalding that a fire of this size would sure to visit upon it.
A week ago many in the U.S. Forest service were praising an 18 year veteran by the name of Terry Barton. She supposedly was the first on the scene and had heroically tried to douse the fire with dirt but it sprang out of control way too quickly and now 5400 people have been evacuated, 30 homes have been lost, and the fire has spread to a width of more than 100,000 acres in scope.
A week later many in the area are now looking at Ms. Barton with a great deal of anger and hatred.
Much of it is justified. Foolish decisions get people in trouble everyday. They aren't bad people to the core, they just made a strangely and profoundly bad decision. Such is the case with Ms. Barton. To burn the letter that she went up there to destroy and not be prepared to extinguish her flame, was a bad decision. To lie about it to federal investigators afterwards was yet another foolish choice. But I am convinced that there is much more to this story than meets the eye. And sure enough news reports out early this week are backing my hunch.
In Monday's Associated Press report that discusses this latest news John Barton, Terry's """Husband""" is quoted. The AP reporter makes him sound darn near saintly: "John said (just imagine the Walter Cronkite like delivery) that while he was not living at home with Terry and their two teenage daughters, he had visited last week to be with the girls while Terry worked the fire."
Well yippee for him, let's buy him a drink and name him Dad of the year. COME ON!
Where was this guy? The fact that he had to "visit" not only indicates that he does not live in the same house as his wife and his daughters, but that he has to travel some distance to even get there. In other words, he doesn't live in their city. In other words he is not involved in their lives. Oh sure he may "visit" on occasion. Maybe he even pays to have his offspring come and "visit" him. But what is the real story here?
Terry went to the woods that day heart-broken and deeply depressed. She carried with her a letter that we now know came from the sperm donor of her children. We now know that whatever the contents of that letter had in it, that it was deeply distressing - so much so that Terry wanted it gone. Now who among us has never once in our lives hurt so much that we lose temporary focus of where we are and tragically sometimes what we are doing. I certainly have. I have hurt so bad I felt like the world around me was literally falling in on top of me and could not have answered a rational question at that moment. What causes this?
Yeah John, what was in your letter? Was it a confession so you could feel better about a mistress? Was it the proclamation that you had just finally given up hope and were filing for divorce? Why was it John that you were the one - NOT LIVING with the wife and kids? Had you not disciplined yourself to stay near to your commitments that you made before God and man? Had you decided that after you left her with the responsibility of raising the two children you had helped her bring into the world that you needed to improve your golf score, or your business' bottom line, or you just had to see your flusy one last time? What was in your letter John? Were you confessing that you decided that you were 'too confused' about your future together or some other lame non-reason? Had married life gotten you down but you weren't the type that was gonna let it get you down - so your answer is the corvette, the unbuttoned silk shirt and the medallion around the neck, while reliving Steve Martin and Dan Ackroyd's "two wild and crazy guys?" What was in your letter John, did you have an addiction that crowded out the love your wife, and your two daughters? Does the drink go down easy? Does the needle hurt so good? Or do you sniff your way from one day to the next?
Whatever it was, it not only was so painful that your wife felt that she must burn it. But the message of that letter, whatever it contained, lit the fire of hell to half a state.
Now I'm sure you'll get custody of your daughters, not that you truly cared about them before all of this. Maybe you'll even get to write a book or sell movie rights to tell the story of being the guy who was married to the firestarter. But when you lay awake in your bed each night, when the next time you smell the scent of burning embers, when your daughters ask you, "Daddy what was in that letter you sent to Mom?" What will your answer be?
Will you at that moment wish you had been the "kind of man that every man should be?"
Will we?
Contact Kevin at: kmc@wyll.com
Why didn't he go dig up some solid information on this marriage before vomiting his own 'issues' all over the page?
Perhaps he was at a loss for time after a multi-day binge on crystal meth or had his hands too full sodomizing puppies to do any research....Hmmm, I guess we'll just have to speculate.
LOL... Poor poor Terry. What a load of BS. There was no letter involved in this fire it is just a ploy to get sympathy from bleeding heart idiots, like the author of this article.
Blame the husband whom you don't know anything about, yeah, you moron!
Leni
Agreed. Here's another example of fine writing:
A week later many in the area are now looking at Ms. Barton with a great deal of anger and hatred.
Much of it is justified.
Much of it is justified? Exactly which part is not justified? Typical, touchy-feely, lazy modern journalism. (Pardon the use of redundant adjectives in conjunction with the term "journalism".)
I guess the stupid author can really unload on the husband now that we know the feds think poor, poor Terri set the fire on purpose!
By all means yes, let's absolve Ms. Barton of all responsibility for her actions. After all, it was that mean old John that REALLY caused this incident. From the moment Ms. Barton opened the letter, the wheels were set in motion, the result a foregone conclusion . . .
Someday, I might anger my wife. I guess I'd better shoot myself now, before things get out of hand . . .
Just because her incompetence was exaggerated by her hyper-emotional state does not mean that she does not deserve the jail time, fines, firing and public humiliation that she so richly deserves. Why do you need to pour hyperbolic mischaracterizations about her estranged husband (who you know nothing about)? What does that say about you?
(On a side note: maybe her husband finally realized what an unstable, self-centered, incompetent, hyper-emotional, and unsafe woman he married, and got away as quickly as possible... before he woke up on fire himself, possibly? How's THAT for making assumptions about someone we don't even know?)
You and me both.
More often in these scenarios, a fire is purposely started to be put out by the brave hero/heroine. These stories are legion in volunteer fire departments across America.
I'm also aware of the large number of ecoterrorists that have infiltrated our Natural Resources departments across America. I think of the Lynx hair scam and others, then wonder if there was an agenda related to these forests. Perhaps an out of control camp fire would be motivation to close these forests to the public, etc.
Regardless, the fault lies with her, not the husband.
Take a look at this article in the Rocky Mountain News. http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/state/article/0,1299,DRMN_21_1214863,00.html
Only Federal Fire Fighters Can Start Seriously Huge Raging Infernos, By Breaking The Same Laws They Enforce Against The Rest Of Us
As for this article, I was just waiting for some radical feminist to blame the whole thing on the husband. It's all man's fault. Everthing is men's fault.
Oh...puke.
-archy-/-
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