Barn Burning - House Burning "Stop the Madness"

Initally, in just playing around with this whole blogging site I rattled on after an emergency call that had just been made in the county where I live. This structure fire was particulary traumatic in that the house fire killed two innocent children and this fire was intentionally set by a man who was dating the mother of the kids. Realizing that this blog had no direct literary relationship, it was during the 4/27 pronto session that Mrs. S and I had the same literary thought on how that this call could be interwoven with the Faulkner story, Barn Burning. Of all of the stories that I have enjoyed reading in this course, the Barn Burning story struck me and left me wondering how the family (Mother, Colonel Sartoris, two sisters) could have tolerated the misery that Abner inflicted within their lives. I could not imagine having to uproot my life and belongings as a result of a personal act inflicted on others in such a non caring and incompassionate way. During one of the discussion board postings, the question was asked if ever it was justifiable to destroy another persons property. I was honest, yet regretful to post that in my younger years, my brother and I and many of our friends thought it cool to damage and to vandalize personal property. I absolutely acknowledge that this was wrong and I thank the lord that I did not go to jail and that I have been able to grow and mature to now realize how wrong this damage to anothers property is. In the barn burning story, I could not believe that Abner did not get beyond his pettiness and anger and that even when given a new chance to start over that he could not keep from returning to his destructive ways. Ultimately, I was glad to see how Sarty realized that his father was dangerous and that it was wrong for him to continue to lie to protect the family. I was interested to read to see what Sartry did and of all of the stories in this course, this was one of the more enjoyable for me to read. After the tragedy that has recently happened and as we move toward the completion of this course, I can only blog that whether it is Barn Burning or House Burning, the Madness must stop. We must learn to respect one another and we must seek peace for our society as a whole.