Let me put all this in a more personal light: How am I to protect my son from a world that lives inside of me? I have plenty of fancy ideas about how this might happen, about what it means to be a good man, and I’ve spent many years trying to publicize my own glowing empathy. But the truth is I remain a prisoner of terror and rage, one minute puffing out my chest, the next cowering, dreaming of a power that resides in valor, in the ability to inflict physical harm. It’s horrible who I am.
—Steve Almond, “Here’s the Bad News, Son”
