As I stood there, tossing deflated pool floats and diving sticks to one side or the other, a blood-curdling scream... I mean A BLOOD CURDLING SCREAM... came from the side of the house.
It was our three-year-old daughter, Emma.
As soon as I detected that this was a genuine scream (not born of sibling rivalry), I dropped my scavenger hunt and rushed out of the lanai.
Emma met me half way, stomping her feet like a well-trained soldier and screaming the most awful screams I have ever heard any child produce.
She was overcome with terror. Desperately, I tried to understand her words, but the screaming grew louder and her stomping more fierce. That's when I saw them.
Emma's tiny little feet were completely black... covered in FIRE ANTS!.
She was being eaten alive (if you'll allow me the melodrama)!
Quickly, I grabbed her and ripped the imitation crocs from her piggies. With her tucked tightly underneath my arm, I rushed toward a water spicket and dialed it up to full blast, unscrewing the hose as fast as I was able.
It wasn't fast enough.
Her screams were more than this father could bear. In a moment of desperation, I abandoned the hose and ran straight to the pool, plunging her tiny body into the water.
It was awful.
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This is a hard world for so many; those who seem to deserve it least, often get the brunt of life's ugliest manifestations. Monsters really do exist and they lurk in broad daylight. Some are corporations. Some are political systems. Some are religions. Some are ants. But usually, most monsters are nothing more than ordinary people.
I know people, right now, who are preying on others. I don't mean that I know of them... I mean that I know them. Some of them know what they are doing. Some of them have no idea whatsoever, thinking themselves to be virtuous. The latter are more dangerous than the former.
I encourage us all to check ourselves today. Explore your motivations. Dig deep into your own cause and effect. Are you merely searching for your things to possess? Are you a trusted leader, privately bound by your very own perversions, but publicly adored and trusted? Do you slip silently beneath the radar of exposure but know full-well what horrible beast you are, in your core?
If you are in power and abusing it... may God have mercy on your soul.
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For the rest of you...
Good people are not here to make the world good. Good people are here to keep the world from becoming absolutely consumed by evil.
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I blasted the anthill back to God with the garden hose. I decimated it.
I know, I know... the ant's actions were done in self-defense. My action was done in vengeance.
You see?
We all have a monster inside.
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