tuluum's Diaryland Diary
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Would You, Could You, Kiss These Tears Away?
(Subconscious: Knight Of Wands (reversed))
I woke up so late this morning. After 10 a.m. And what's more I didn't even care.
I haven't exercised all week.
Forgot to buy yeast. Again.
Forgot to buy tampies, BCP.
I'm just overcome with a leth-ar-gy.
Thankfully Rosh Chodesh break is coming up so I'll have an opportunity to mentally recharge. Focus on mindless Passover cleaning. And getting rid of these ants in my room.
Evil ants.
I have a lot of work to finish today and I don't want to think about it...
I think my elance check is never arriving. I will report it as lost...
The reversed Chariot tells me that I really need to slow down... I'm reaching a breaking point.
Hopefully Rosh Chodesh will help. Just let me get these jobs out of the way today.
Knight of Wands reversed just emphasizes how much I need to be alone and to recharge.
Last night I had the most amazing dream. I think that's why I didn't want to wake up.
I would love to return to it.
It would be so easy. My bed is only 2 footsteps away.
I was loved and kissed and held by the most -amazing- man and the feeling was just indescribable. I felt.. safe, protected. The overall vibe was just sacred (if you can believe). It was just a really holy and mystical experience and I get teary even remembering it. It brought back to my consciousness the first hand feeling of emotions and sensations I have long forgotten/suppressed. I want to hold on to it for as long as I can...
Will I ever feel anything like that? For real?
There have been 2 times when I thought I had. And maybe I had. Who's to say? All I know is that the first time is now nothing more than a memory and the second just feels like an ugly cruel joke now.
To hold and be held... to love and to be loved... it would be lovely, wouldn't it?
P.S. I am the founder of The Wealth Squad. If you are ready to form an alliance that could transform your life, join me.
Could Police Have Stopped Mass Killing?
Posted:�March 17, 2004 at 1:58 p.m.
FRESNO, Calif. (AP) -- As Marcus Wesson was being arraigned Wednesday on charges of gunning down nine of his own children in the city's worst killing, witnesses and even some police were wondering whether they could have done more at the scene to prevent the deaths.
Officers at the scene said they heard no gunshots, but Police Chief Jerry Dyer acknowledged Wednesday that the department is looking into whether the victims were shot while officers waited outside Wesson's house for more than two hours.
Police haven't said exactly when the victims died or what kind of gun was used, and the coroner's office was still preparing its report Wednesday.
But witnesses said gunshots could clearly be heard, and that officers failed to intervene in time to stop the slayings despite frantic pleas from some of the victims' relatives.
Police have defended their response to what began as a call for help with a custody dispute Friday in the working class neighborhood where Wesson lived with his extended clan of children that he fathered through six women, including two of his own daughters.
"The officers made what I believe to be an appropriate decision to summon negotiators and a SWAT team to negotiate the situation peacefully without entering the residence and escalating the situation," Dyer told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
But a relative of the victims, sobbing repeatedly during an interview with the AP, said officers missed an opportunity to defuse the situation.
"All the kids were alive" when police arrived, said the man, who spoke on condition he not be named. "The guy was just standing there, at the door, with no weapons."
The relative said that after police arrived, the mother of one of the victims managed to get inside Wesson's house and briefly hold her 7-year-old son's hand as police talked with Wesson outside.
"She feared for her life and the kids' lives," he said. "That was the last time she saw him."
The relatives, who had come to the house to try to get their children, told police that Wesson had a gun and that the children were in danger.
The women among them appeared quite distraught. Wesson, meanwhile, appeared quite calm.
Dyer said his officers had no immediate reason to take the women's' word that Wesson posed a danger to the children.
"We did not have information provided to us that Wesson would harm his children -- and they are his children," Dyer said.
Officers allowed him to disappear into a back room and evacuated the other adults from the front of the house.
The women then pleaded in vain for officers to intervene, one pounding on the hood of a police cruiser, according to the relative and neighbors at the scene.
Hours passed as police tried to make contact with Wesson. A SWAT team finally arrived. Moments later, Wesson emerged, covered in blood, and surrendered.
Lt. Herman Silva has said police didn't initially have authority to enter the house, even after being told he might have a gun. He also said that officers would have responded rapidly had they heard gunshots, but they never did.
But neighbors dispute that account, saying that officers were present when shots rang out.
Michael Caskey, 14, who lives across the street, said he heard two shots, and he thinks officers heard them as well because he saw one take cover behind Wesson's school bus and another officer duck behind a cluster of pines in the front yard.
At about 3:30 p.m., an hour after officers arrived, Maria Elena Leyva, a 34-year-old housewife who lives across the street and has a clear view of Wesson's house, said she heard at least four shots. She said she pulled her children away from the window as more officers arrived by car and motorcycle.
"I heard the women shouting and crying," she said in Spanish. "One of the women was crying 'My baby. My baby."'
Wesson, 57, was being arraigned Wednesday afternoon on nine counts of murder, which include allegations that could bring the death penalty. The victims include children ages 1 to 17, as well as his 25-year-old daughter, who was the mother of one of the infants killed.
Police briefly thought all was well when Wesson surrendered at 4:45 p.m.
"When we heard he was coming out, we all breathed a sigh of relief, thinking it would be over soon," Silva said at a news conference Monday.
Inside the back room of the house, they found a knot of bodies so tangled that it took hours to accurately count the dead. The chief said at least 17 employees were either on leave with pay or receiving help from grief counselors, some wondering whether they could have done more.
"Perhaps it's the second-guessing that goes on in the mind of an officer," Dyer said. "Also, they were exposed to an incident that most officers will never be exposed to in a lifetime."
(Copyright 2004 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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11:53 a.m. - Thursday, Mar. 18, 2004
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