Why Bad Things Happen

So far I have been having a very nice Sunday, despite the fact that I can't see all that well and won't be able to really until after June 11 when they fix my botched cataract procedure--okay, not botched, it happens to 30% of patients--except for the knowledge that yesterday, at least 2,100 people were taken out by the hand of God in one fell swoop. Actually, several fell swoops, since the earthquake in Nepal also caused an avalanche and then a giant aftershock today.

So you don't believe in God, eh? Well then, Mother Nature is a bitch. Call it what you will, of those victims, some of them were surely innocent and did not deserve to die in that way. Perhaps among them were evil-doers the world is better off without, but now we'll never know.

As always when something like this happens, I am reminded of that high school English staple, Thornton Wilder's 1928 Pulitzer Prize-winning "The Bridge of San Luis Rey." Wilder wrote of a Franciscan monk who witnesses the tragic collapse of a rope bridge in Peru, and then spends years delving into the lives of the individual victims seeking a cosmic reason for their untimely deaths. The book is somewhat boring, even if you read it again long after high school as I did, so I'll just tell you the reason: There's no reason.