GRANDPA HAD THIS WAY ABOUT HIM

We're coming up on the 100th anniversary of the Titanic (April, 1912). An ocean catastrophe which has been the mother of hundred lessons. Perhaps the most recurring: (1) Humanity, even in all its technical glory, is still no match for the forces of nature (2) Human error, even when managed and contained, is still irrepressibly unavoidable (3) Icebergs, as enormous as they are, hide most of themselves out of sight.

Grandpa traveled that same sea route seven years later, taking his family to visit family in Italy. Their voyage encountered many of the same perils, but as my Mother always remembered, he had a Smith & Wesson with him, vowing, "I'll use this rather than let us die that way!"

They survived, and Grandpa never tired of repeating those lessons for the little kid at his knees:

* Ironically, that first one seems more rather than less relevant today. Today when you'd think our technology has grown so supreme. But while we can reach the moon and shoot for the stars, we simply have no answers for the tsunamis of the Pacific, the tornadoes of the Midwest, and the hurricanes of the Atlantic. This is when even the disbeliever has to give a nod to the Biblical tale about that infamous Tower of Babel. For it still seems we can grow only so tall before the crushing lessons of our limits. Limits our great minds still yearn to prodigiously defy, while quieter minds still accept as perfectly acceptable.

* Human error...? Well, our species has been passionately inclined to make errors ever since we met that smarmy serpent and his shiny apple. The way Grandpa always explained it: "Folks usually do dumb things, because they're always so much more fun. Until you get the bill for the fun!"

* Probably Grandpa's favorite lesson was that's-just-the-tip-of-the-iceberg lesson. He had seen his share of icebergs. "Life ain't never what you see!" was his spin. Which at age 10 didn't make much sense, because all I could understand about life was what I could see about life. Which is why I believed everything I heard in school, read in papers, and most of all saw at the Saturday movie matinees. Grandpa is long dead, but my how I could now swap him story for story on that subject.

Now I'm Grandpa, and now I can better understand what he was telling me so long ago. However, here's my problem. Just like my Grandpa, I may not live long enough to see my grand-kids see what I've been telling them was really worth telling...