I just re-read my last two blogs and think I should clarify that I truly believe life should be an adventure, not a journey--and that at the end of our life, we should look back and not regret a single minute of it. Even when the exciting adventure becomes an arduous journey, we experience a new facet of life and that moment should be appreciated. Unless you understand this, you will not understand the blogs. I hope that Lewis looked at life as an adventure, and I hope he used the journey to travel in the realization that life is to be explored and every moment should be appreciated.

All day today, I thought about what I had written yesterday, and it bothered me that maybe a family member would read it and take offense in this time of sorrow and grief. And, if they have, I am so very, very sorry that things were worded the way they were.

I know at least one person took offense, and I am very concerned and saddened that my words were so hurtful. The comment I received, correctly, was:

"I am absolutely disgusted with your speculations to this matter. Why would you even think prominent business men would be into drugs? So far there have been no talk of drugs int eh investigation and you even writing this makes me ill.

'I hope that the next time you take guesses at this you keep it to yourself or do some research. So far Lewis is coming up clean...just a guy looking to get back money that was stolen by a theif with a long record of fraud may I add. He got his money through hard work adn goals( having his own shop and two jobs). Granted he is a young man I think this speaks for itself.

'So please before you make matters worst or the family sees this you should take down your speculations!"

I don't know that Lewis or his family, and I certainly don't know that he (or his family members) was doing anything illegal--as I had repeated in my writing. I don't know that an illegal act was commmitted by anyone other than the horrible person who took Lewis' life. There are rumors that I repeated, and I want to clarify that I never repeated them to be a source of researched and investigated facts. That I wrote them without thinking that a family member would see these and take more pain was terrible of me, and I sincerely apologize for any pain or further grief I had not intended.

Without thinking of this family and their deserved time of grief and right to only honest sympathy, I was instead using this situation to expound on my thoughts that the police often mess up and we all need to think at least twice before we blithely comply with the police's demands for information. I appreciate that the police are investigating this incident, and I hope they determine the truth in the end. And I hope the person or people responsible for this crime are dealt a hand of justice that truly drives home how senseless this act truly was. I also hope the police don't make assumptions that prevent them from gaining a kind of justice that can never bring back a young man and make him whole again. As an aside, I wonder whether there can ever be justice in this matter--how can there be justice for the deliberate murder of this young man? I don't believe in capital punishment, but even if another person lost his life to pay for this murder, it still would not provide a true sense of justice. In my opinion, there can be no justice when a young man is killed and all his future years are terminated--the death of the murderer could not even begin to provide such justice that could truly atone for this senseless loss of life.

I also wrote my words with the thought that no matter what happened to end this life, there was no good reason for it. It wasn't in my writing yesterday, but this young man worked hard for another company, and he worked hard for himself. The commenter didn't say, but I do know this man was a physically strong young man that used his quickness and his strength and his intelligence to build the foundation for a strong future. The young people in this world have many challenges, and I believe this young man also met these challenges head on and was conquering the challenges he faced. Again, no matter the situation, there is simply no reason that justifies anybody for any reason taking his life. I DO NOT, REPEAT DO NOT, know that drugs were involved, but my point was supposed to make people realize that even had they been involved, that was no excuse for this horrible death. There can be no excuse or even a reasonable explanation. It was senseless, and a good, strong young man died for no good reason.

This young man was supposed to be getting money from someone who owed him money. We don't know why he was owed money, and it makes no difference in the end--debt is not any reason for taking a person's life. I hurt for this young man, though he is in heaven and having no problems now, and I hurt for his family--and it makes me cringe to think that a life so precious was taken with what must have been great ignorance, no compassion and absolutely no good reason.

As I wrote, I believed there are two worlds out there--one that the rule of law tries to regulate, and one that is real and in our faces and that we deal with every day. And that other world is hard, no matter what the circumstances, but the challenges should never be so great that a person takes a young man's life and ends it. I can't imagine the thoughts of a person who deliberately takes another's life, and there can be no justification.

All I wrote yesterday was "true", but it wasn't "right." The fact that gossip is abounding shouldn't be cause for further pain to be inflicted upon a family. I truly hurt for this young man and his family, and I pray to God that he blesses this family with a peace that only God can provide. I suspect the family will suffer great loss, and my total sympathy is with them.

I apologize for any hurt I caused, and I hope this man's family and friends forgive me. I do not deserve their forgiveness, but I can do no less than to sincerely apologize and offer my prayers.

It's been a long weekend. I did respite all weekend, and while there, the news reported that a 21-year-old young man from Little Falls, Lewis Wilczek, disappeared after going to St. Cloud last Sunday. His family said he was going to St. Cloud to get some money that a friend owed him. This morning, a week later, it's all over the news that they found him in a gravel pit somewhere between Foley and Milaca--burnt. It's assumed he was murdered in a drug deal that went bad. My son says the kid was a year younger than him...and a couple years older than my younger son. My son also said the kid's dad is well-known for being a dealer. It's so sad! And scary. Drugs and their sale become an every day part of people's lives--they almost seem to forget that the law is something to be feared; it's more like it's something to be ignored and treated like a disease--something that's there and real and dreaded, but if you contract it, then you'll deal with it. Until you get caught in it's grip, though, you do your best to prevent it and keep doing the best you can with what you have.

I'm not saying that's the right attitude. The law should be respected. And when a police officer is above board and doing legitimate research in a matter, then he law is a boon. But it seems to me that most people recognize the police as using theories that too often find a suspect and then turn the facts to fit that suspect's most guilty history--or they use interrogation manners and techniques that fail to respect the subject. It seems that too often police forget that people are presumed innocent until proven guilty. I understand why they do so, but that doesn't mean it's right.

I know that if the police ever investigate anything to do with me or my family, I will encourage people to tell the truth only as long as they feel the police are respecting them. The minute the police start to appear even a little bit biased, that's when to stop and re-evaluate the answers you voluntarily provide. We need to cooperate with police only as long as they cooperate with us. That's my jaded opinion lately.

I do hope this young man did not die for nothing. I want him to have died with pride, even if it were an illegal act. I want him to have taken pride in his life and in his task, and I hope that he felt his adventure was worth the journey. I hope the fact that human law was violated does not detract from the pride he and his family take in a young life filled with promise. And I hope that his death marks an important event in other young people's lives, to signal to them that each of us need to live each day in a manner that gives us pride and hope. And, most of all, I hope this young man was loved.

I am stressed. If I wasn't stressed before, now I have another worry. Last week, I and my co-workers learned that our company's parent company has been purchased by a larger company. We were assured that there were no plans to make any changes (of course, there were no plans for change at a time when the buyer hadn't even stepped foot in the place yet), and I wasn't really too worried because we've had similar purchases in the past. Today, however, I'm told that next week the buyers will be visiting our location--and they are bringing with them one of our new "sister companies." Why would this stress me? Because at the same time my boss told me this, he gave me the name of that sister company...and it just happens to be a very large competitor of ours, one that we've been challenging in the sense of a David vs. Goliath--with us being David. I don't think we're going to bring the giant down, though. Instead, I received the impression that we may be absorbed by that company and my boss remarked that in such a case, his job was expendable. I just smiled and said that I think everyone's job is expendable. We just have to hope for the best, I told him. But it's a hope that's hard to sustain.

At the same time, I think about some of my friends and families. I don't know of any one of them who can say with better than 50% certainty that their jobs will be there a year from now. And some have been in jobs for twenty or more years. This is a scary time....

And I didn't do too well on my eating today. I started bad by leaving the house without breakfast, and ended up grabbing some fast food. And at lunch time, I tried to eat the bratwurst the caterer had...and I thought I was going to be sick--because somehow my swallowing mechanism has gotten out of sync, and anytime I try to swallow, I have to take my time. Even taking my time, the food lodges just above my collarbone....because I can't seem to get the swallowing action coordinated from my mouth to my stomach. It's very scary when it happens, and that sure doesn't help my throat relax.....but maybe food will be better tomorrow....

Maybe everything will be better tomorrow....

This will be short. Just enough to document that I'm continuing to try to improve my diet. I wanted to order a big pizza so badly! Instead, I bought chicken breasts that were on sale and baked them...and made a fruit salad to go with it. I also tried to make broccoli with cheese sauce, except that the sauce turned very thin! I think I'll take the leftover to work tomorrow for lunch...as soup. At least now I've learned how to make broccoli cheese soup from scratch!