I have only a few vivid memories of my Noble School Elementary years, (1951-57), in Detroit, Michigan.  Of the most clearly defined, in both purposeful recall and randomly recurring dreams, are the FIRE and AIR RAID drills that were supposed to keep us safe(r) should either of those events transpire. Neither ever did, but the still-powerful emotion that accompanies those recollections is the fear of looming catastrophe.  I’m no psychologist, but I think that the preparation, the life lesson that there are things in the world to fear, for which we are better to be vigilant, outweighs the occasional nocturnal trauma.  Excessive timidity and OCD-like disorders can, of course, be stultifying, but awareness, precaution, looking both ways…good to practice and to pass along to our kids.

In the bigger picture of life on Earth, we have shirked organized safety drills, even when repeated hindsight shows us that thousands upon thousands of lives could have been saved from natural disasters by following common sense protocol.  Yet, as heartbreaking as the result of not fully heeding the potential wrath of Mother Nature, the greater horror of societies choosing to ignore history’s early-warning signs chronicled in print, on film, in art and song of the inhumanities we perpetrate one to the other is inexplicable.  The false sense of security that we, mostly-pampered, factually-challenged, globally-unaware Americans have lived with is fragile and the social and political tsunami headed our way is a mere Trumpian goose step from being the basis for the worst disaster movie of all time.  We are fools for standing by and merely waiting for it to happen.  The Mueller Report will not save us.  THIS IS NOT A DRILL!