The Will. As in losing mine to live.

PLEASE do not call a suicide hotline on me! Today's title comes from volume three of the Image Comics series Saga (ISBN 9781607069317, chapters thirteen to eighteen) and "The Will" in this context is not a philosophical conception but rather one of the bounty hunters ("freelancers") hunting down Marko and Alana -- each of a warring race that's drawn the galaxy into their fight -- and their half-breed child Hazel. Pretty much this whole selection has their family and, I don't know, a potential family among The Will, Gwendolyn, another of Marko's race, and a liberated slave girl ...


Hush. Let me geek out.


... who all meet on the planet Quietus and meet an author who clandestinely inspired them (the first group, and in a way the second) to be together. And since this story continues, I expect ... ok, honestly, with an intelligence agent dropping a hint like you read in chapter sixteen, that Alana's whole marriage to Marko is part of a tremendous deep-cover espionage assignment, I don't know what to expect. And unlike The Will and Gwendolyn and Sophie (the former Slave Girl's finally given a name), I don't have a Lying Cat to tell me who I should believe.


I wish I could tell you more, but I'm not exaggerating when I say that trillions of lives are at stake.


Last night after work I got to go to our Bible study of Galatians and James at church, the one that I've been missing since I handled co-den leader duties with Jeffrey's former Cub Scout troop. I was mad at him about that for a while, and maybe I'm still smoldering a little. But the seventeen of us at church last night had an excellent time ending Paul's letter and starting out James, balancing faith and works. Sunday afternoon I was there to here several church members' presentation on a recent mission trip they'd taken to El Salvador helping build a house with Habitat for Humanity.


It's those stories with no sides that worry them.   


So I got Sarah and Jeffrey at Robert and Sharon's (Martha's parents') house after Bible study last night and got them home and let them go to bed -- Sarah especially -- in one of her moody states without hugging and telling them I love them. I hate being the bad parent, but I'm not going to force someone to notice me. Interesting thing yesterday, though; Jeffrey's class got a visit from Minot's mayor in response to some letters they'd written suggesting improvements to the city, and he said he heard you can BE mayor when you're eighteen! (When you can vote, logical enough.)


That might be what you think you remember. But if you really concentrate, what did you actually see?


Saw something of O'Brien's interrogation of Winston in 1984 in that line. Election Day in the United States is eight months from yesterday, and it's hard to find people who have much good to say about any major candidate right now. I was at Gideon's Trumpet on Main Street before work today (across from several Monday night burglaries, shame) and Kay the owner there recalled a point a child made regarding a recent debate: if we're being taught not to bully, then why are all these people running for President -- or at least their party's nomination right now -- doing so to each other?


And risk having our brains technically exploded?


David