Connie and Tweeters:

You are right, there is no way to make sense of such a senseless act. Mary
and her family are dear friends of my family. I have known Mary since I was 5
years old as she was my (and my brother's) librarian at AE2. I just spent the
last 4 months in Costa Rica with Mary's youngest daughter as part of a program
at Evergreen. We spent spring break at a research station started by a former
Evergreen student where we watched wild Scarlet Macaws from dawn until dusk.

Mary and Susanna were two of the nicest people this world could have hoped
for. They were passionate about children and the natural world, many times
combining the two. All of Mary and David's daughters grew up learning to respect
and enjoy the outdoors. I admire their morals and their strength during these
hard times. There really are no words for such a loss.

We should all continue to go hiking, camping, and birding without fear, it's
what Mary and Susanna would have wanted. May they continue to walk the woods
in peace, as it should be.

Simone Lupson-Cook
Seattle, WA
Zingie at aol.com

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"Good and kind people outnumber all others by thousands to one. The tragedy
of human history lies in the enormous potential for destruction in rare acts of
evil, not in the high frequency of evil people. Complex systems can only be
built step by step, whereas destruction requires but an instant. Thus, in what
I like to call the Great Asymmetry, every spectacular incident of evil will be
balanced by 10,000 acts of kindness, too often unnoted and invisible as the
"ordinary" efforts of a vast majority."
- Stephen Jay Gould (1941-2002)