Why Are There Evil People?

And what makes them that way?
I’m not familiar enough with the teachings of other religions, but at least as far as the Christian religion is concerned, this question is as old as, well, as old as Christianity. If the One God is omnipotent, why does he allow evil, when he could wipe it out singlehandedly?
It made a lot more sense to me to have a variety of gods (a la the Greeks, Romans, and Scandinavians) who had virtually equal powers. Some days the good guys won, some days they lost. It seems to me you get into a lot of philosophical trouble with the whole monotheism thing. I can’t figure out how it ever caught on.
In our lifetimes, I suggest that Adolf Hitler is what we consider the personification of Evil, although there are many other evil people in the past who were at least as bad as he was.
The explanation I most often hear is, God gave people free will so they could choose good or evil. But wait. Why is there evil at all? It seems like the choice might have been between good and less good.
The other answer, which is a little easier to swallow, is “I don’t know”. God is inscrutable and beyond our understanding, so we can’t begin to question the whole thing. Well why not? Why didn’t God make it easier for us dumb critters to understand?
Evil, I think, is a little like U.S. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart described pornography: “I know it when I see it”.
I think of it as trying to hurt animals or people who are weaker than you and can’t fight back, or trying to hurt someone for personal gain.
This is the exact scenario I’m going through at work, with a person who literally began a campaign to get me fired, hoping she would replace me. I’m not imagining that; she said it outright. She has read my email, gone through my desk, taken pictures of me secretly with her cell phone, accused me of being a thief, and had numerous conversations with other employees to try to win them over to her “side”. In some cases it’s worked; in others, it hasn’t.
I am mystified as to why she still works for my company. And I am hurt, and shocked. All I ever did was try to help her succeed. And I feel like a complete idiot for trusting her. I will never understand it ever, but I do know this: she’s evil. I know it when I see it.

Spring

Whenever that is.  Technically, Spring begins on the day of the Spring equinox, usually March 21st.  But around here, it’s already Spring…but not Spring enough.  Like Spring everywhere, the temperature is very variable, and can’t make up its mind about whether it wants to be warm or cold.

When I lived in Iowa, I once went to…Home Depot?  In March.  I said to the guy at the counter, You don’t have any tomato plants for sale.   He said, You aren’t from around here, are you?  We don’t sell those until May.  Of course, his first clue was probably the Southern accent.

Then, as in now, I want Spring to hurry up and get here. I’ve started to seriously long for the late afternoons and early evenings after work, when I can sit at my beloved little picnic table in the back yard until it’s dark, and read.  I at least try to stay out until dusk, when I might see bats.  I love watching the forest behind my house, seeing it turn from lime green to dark green;  seeing and hearing the birds; watching the sun set.  Sometimes I stay out so late that it’s hard to find my way back to the house.  Sure, I know the right direction to go…it’s that the ground is very uneven because the Doberman (RIP) dug so many holes in it.

This year I’ll have to be even more careful since I broke my leg.  I expect my left ankle to be very weak, and I can’t afford to step in a hole.  I’m going to have to invest in a good flashlight, and not stay out so late.

The downside of being at the picnic table in spring is that I have to share it with a lot of insects.  Spiders, ants, caterpillars, carpenter bees, mosquitos, and some sort of nameless thing that bites, to name a few.  As for mosquitos–I have that covered.  Me and Cutter are BFF’s.  None of the other critters seem to be impressed by my friend Cutter.

I really can’t overemphasize how important it is to me to be able to come home and sit at my picnic table. For one thing, it’s decompression.  My whole work life is in the public eye, which has both its good and bad points.  Many times it’s very fun…I get to see and meet funny and amazing people.  Then there are the bad points, where I have to do bad things like…threaten to call the police (and sometimes actually do it), or correct an employee.  Shockingly, employees rarely respond with “You’re entirely right”.  But even the good times are stressful to an extent, because you never know which kind of encounter you’re going to have.  Ergo, decompression.  Me, by myself, recovering peace and equilibrium.

But a bigger part, I think, is that I need sun and warmth.  In other words, I’m pretty sure I have Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD).  And what a great acronym is that?  I can tell you that the day Daylight Saving Time ends in November is the worst day of my life, every year.  I am instantly depressed and look at December and January as an ordeal that must be endured.  February is fine…because if it isn’t already Spring, then you can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasonal_affective_disorder