Things I Do Not Understand

I was up until 3 a.m.

I attempted to hide my emotions in a geeky run of Puzzle Pirates. I thought bilging and pillaging could push my thoughts away from the evening’s events and more to sleep. I tried to focus on my husband, who was snoring a bit next to me.

Watching him sleep has always been a comfort to me, even though he’s a big snorer. All I could focus on was what I deemed to be the ending of common sense in this country.

As a lover of criminal justice and married to a man whose background is in criminal justice, I have a great respect for the field. I completely understand from what I have read about the Zimmerman trial that the prosecution failed to persuade the jury there wasn’t reasonable doubt.

There just wasn’t enough evidence to convict. I do understand that. But here are a few things I don’t understand:

• Why didn’t Zimmerman call the police and go home?

• When questioned by Martin (“Why are you following me?”), why didn’t he answer, “I’m with the neighborhood watch team, and I am just making sure you are supposed to be in this neighborhood.” Why did he answer with another question – “What are you doing here?”

• Why didn’t Martin just keep running? Why didn’t he call the police?

• Why was Martin walking alone in the first place? Where was his father?

• Why must suspicious activity be construed as simply walking around in a hoodie?

• Why did Zimmerman say he did not regret what happened? Why wasn’t the first person on his lips when he offered an apology was Martin’s parents? Isn’t taking another human life the most regrettable thing one could ever do?

These questions keep swirling around in my mind, because the answers seem so simple.

Here is what I posed to parents today on Facebook:

“This trial reinforces a few things: parents, never let your child walk anywhere alone at night for any period of time. Ever. Teach your children to only stop for police who have identified themselves. Run, shout for help or notify authorities for anyone else. Tell your children to not underestimate a stranger.”

I added that as a parent, I will also teach my children to keep driving if they are suspicious of someone.

And there’s the rub: in this incident, Zimmerman was the adult. He had the responsibility to make all of the right decisions. Every decision he made was a poor one.

We could suspect Martin made poor decisions, but we still do not know if Martin made the first blow. Isn’t it possible Martin was defending himself from a stranger?

I am so tired of asking these questions, because I know we will never get the answers we want.

Today I am going to try really hard to focus on the positive. Perhaps Zimmerman will think twice before pulling the trigger. Maybe parents will keep their children closer and teach them what to do when these situations happen.

Maybe, just maybe this won’t happen again.

But who knows?

That is another question I don’t have the answer to.