To grandchildren Brittany and Brandon Keys, 21, and Jesee Weese, 5, happy birthday.
It came out of nowhere. Thunder rumbled faintly, seemingly many miles away. Three-year-old Max knew that meant rain and he loves the wet stuff. Loves to play in a gentle drizzle and walk with his tiny umbrella raised high.

So Max stared through the storm door and before we could get him away it came. A terrific bolt of lightning so close that the light, sound and thunder were simultaneous.
And just as instantly Max was across the room and in my arms. Terrified. Crying. And clinging to me as if his life depended on it.

I think the kid can be a world class sprinter if we can get thunder and lightning to coincide with the starter's pistol!

Seriously, Max was truly scared; that's bad. But to the good he gained a respect for nature that might serve him well in the future. Next year, or thirty or forty years from now it could save his life.
Now Max's lesson did no harm. But many of the lessons we learn in life are hard, and harmful. They sometimes cause pain that never goes away.

Though this story hurts me, there are others who suffer more. They don't talk about it but I know their hurt never stops. And I know too that if there is a minuscule chance to save someone else that kind of hurt they would want this story told.

Yes, it hurts, though it happened 51 years ago. Now there were three close families created when two of my mother's sisters married two brothers, my dad's cousins. Those three couples, and their nine children got together nearly every week. The adults played canasta and we kids roamed the yard and the woods.

Those were good times, but they came to a tragic end. It was the last day of January 1958. Sister Brenda and I came home on the bus after another day at school. But something was different; Mother met us at the door with sadness in her eyes. There had been a terrible accident. Two were dead; two more would die before morning. A mother from one family, a father from another and a precious child from each. That tragic accident brought a terrible loss. And a pain that never stops - all caused by a drunk.

Such is just part of the incalculable costs of alcohol. From AOL News; an American Association of Cancer Research study of 180,000 women shows three drinks per day increases the risk of breast cancer by 30 to 50 percent. Just one drink a day can raise it by 10 percent. Wine, beer or liquor, the rise is the same.

"Any alcohol consumption will raise your breast cancer risk," says Tim Key, cancer researcher at Oxford.
There can be no value put on unnecessary suffering and death. But alcohol hits us in the pocketbook too. Just last week, three helicopters were called to an accident in Monroe County allegedly caused by alcohol.

Publicradio.org says the national average for a medical helicopter in the USA is more than $10,000 per flight.

Who do you thinks gonna pay? You will, Monroe County, if you pay taxes.
We could continue forever, for there is no end to the deleterious outcomes of alcohol use.
Again, how many dollars of tax revenue, jobs or nice places to eat does it take to pay for a human life?

taylormadetalk@yahoo.com