lightning.jpegBy this time, I'm sure everyone knows by now that John Roberts is in the hospital for what was originally just stated to be a simple fall but is now reported to be a seizure similar to one he suffered in 1993.  He's in the hospital for overnight observation; they think he's going to be OK, but.

But.

Up near my parents' home in the boonies, there was, until last Saturday, a 20-room mansion.  It had seven bedrooms, eight bathrooms, and a grand piano, as well as several precious works of art.  It burned to the ground this weekend, and nobody knows why just yet, but it doesn't look like arson.  There was a boom like a lightning stroke as the propane tank blew up.  It was a sizable tank, so the boom could be heard all the way into town.

Things that seem so stable can, for good or ill, turn to dust at the blink of an eye or a stroke of lightning.  John Roberts, who was picked by Bush in part because of his relative youth and health, was supposed to ensure archconservative dominance of the Supreme Court for decades to come.   Things and situations we think of as unchanging and permanent can be irreversibly altered faster than we can describe the process.

Something for us all to contemplate.