Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, July 11, 1994 TAG: 9407220036
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Monty S. Leitch
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The weather in which they worked was standard summer sultry: heavy-aired heat, held down by a waxy quicksilver sky. On and off it rained, and occasionally thunder growled; but, for the most part, the threats went unrealized.
The afternoon the cousins came to finish up, the sky was fairly clear. A little wind, and still the heat, but few visible clouds, and mostly silence. From my office, I could even hear the fellows' jokey chatter. "Nice guys," I was thinking, when - POP! The unmistakable sizzle of a lightning strike cracked the air.
I jumped back from my computer, caught my breath, and ran outside.
"Are you all right?" I called to the cousins.
Who, thank heavens, assured me that they were. But their faces were pale. Their hands quivered. "Looks like it struck the fence two or three places," one said. He pointed to locations in a circle around where he stood. "I saw it there, there, and there."
I suggested they finish up another day.
But, in fact, they'd already finished up. And so we went our separate ways, thinking our separate scary thoughts.
The other day, as I mowed under a heavy sky, a split of thunder jumped me right off the seat. I'd seen no lightning, but started looking for it then. And started, too, thinking about that afternoon when lightning had struck the fence.
Should I quit and go inside? Should I finish mowing later? Would the tires of the mower insulate me against a strike, as I've heard car tires will? And, if so, would they still be effective if my knees were touching - as they were - the metal body of the mower?
What, in short, was an acceptable level of risk in my situation?
I decided to keep mowing. Earlier in the afternoon I'd been talking to a friend who, in the middle of our conversation, had begun to pick at a small wound on her arm. "I've put NeoSporin on this place six or eight times," she said irritably. "It's silly, but I can't stop thinking about that flesh-eating bacteria."
It was just a little scab, a cut that ordinarily would have given no pause to any gardener. I had a similar cut on my arm.
"The chances of flesh-eating bacteria are pretty slim," I said, a fact I know she already recognized.
But once a threat has been named, once the lurid pictures have appeared right in front of your eyes, it can no longer be ignored. And once a threat can no longer be ignored, then acceptable levels of risk must be assessed.
These days, I feel like I'm dealing with more risks than necessary. And it makes me mad. The way "the news" keeps warning me, escalating my paranoia.
Flesh-eating bacteria, Lyme's disease, pedophiles enticing children via computer networks, salmonella in eggs, botulism in hamburgers, cancer-causing agents in everything else.
Of course these are genuine threats. But they aren't widespread threats. And that's an important distinction.
A magazine I used to like now carries several articles in every issue on security: why women should carry guns, for instance, and how to buy the best dead-bolts for your apartment. Twice in recent weeks while channel surfing, I've come upon talk shows on which the guests related their escapes from violent criminals. One woman told of thwarting a rapist by grabbing his privates - a method the show's "expert" recommended. "Have a plan!" he directed. "To survive, you must have a plan!"
Must I? Must I live in fear?
Of course reasonable caution is important. But shouldn't the emphasis rest on the "reasonable" rather than on the "caution"? After all, who can really predict where lightning will strike?
Monty S. Leitch is a Roanoke Times & World-News columnist.
by CNB