I can't help but feel that all people should pretty much take responsibility for their own actions. I'm sure the Mother means well, but as a parent, if your kid doesn't know something, it's your fault for not teaching it to them. If your kid doesn't know something, it's your fault for not raising someone who'll learn and listen.

That being said, it's fundamentally the kid's own fault for not making the right decision in the first place, and I'm sure the Mother wants someone to blame. She's trying to cope with loss, and pinning resposibility on a company who is not in charge of babysitting your children and being their guardian angel. She's trying to equate her loss with inflicting pain on the girlfriend, who will probably have her own guilt issues anyway. She's trying to extend her loss to the girlfriend's mother, who provided the girlfriend with the car who gave it the guy who drove off and slammed into a light pole.

As my father would say, the light pole didn't get out of the way, did it?

If he were alive, I'd like to think that the kid would blame himself, but that's the libertarian optimist in me talking. It wasn't the city's fault for placing the light pole there where a drunk underage kid with no license drove a car and killed himself. It wasn't the car manufacturer's fault, for accelerating a drunk underage kid with no license beyond his control. It wasn't the girlfriend's fault that the kid decided to hit speeds of 90 miles per hour since she wasn't in the car with him. It wasn't the girlfriend's mother's fault, who probably never asked if her daughter's boyfriend had a license or not, figuring that such a query wouldn't amount to any fruitful discussion. And it's not Coors' fault, for making a kid with no license to ask his girlfriend to give him the car that her mom gave her, so that he could accelerate to speeds of 90 miles per hour and kill himself on the city's light pole.

If this were a suicide where the kid slit his wrist, would the Mom be suing the company that makes the razor? Or is it God's fault, for having a circulatory system where a brachial artery could have such an immense amount of blood flow? Will she sue causality?

Or is it maybe the kid's own fault for making that decision. I firmly believe that everyone should own up to the repercussions of their failures, just as everyone should enjoy in the fruits of their successes.

With my trial tomorrow, I hold true to the credo that you're either afraid of failure, or unafraid of success. Here's the connection: eventually, many years from now, all of this will be behind me. Right now is the beginning of a long challenge, but I know that ultimately redemption will find me: it always has.

I remember the feeling, in 1992, on a hill in Monterey, I trekked up the half mile to the main campus of the city's high school. It would be a hard lesson in the fickleness of childhood romance and childhood friendship. I would lose trust in both, and in my solitude, self-discovery turned into world-discovery. I remember making lonely walks to Pacific Grove, to Cannery Row, to Alvarado Street, to the courthouse by La Mesa, and by Jennifer's house every day.

Heartbreak is free of charge, but learning something will actually cost you.

I knew, in those days of sitting on the terraced slopes of the Monterey Toreadors (or as I like to call them, Gay Matadors), I knew that I'd eventually have the Resilience to have an armor-plated heart. Not easily am I swayed by pretty smiles, gracious movements, and witty speech. Once my flame and twice my burn? Not anymore.

I remember feeling the same thing, this time in the cool San Diego breeze, overlooking a field of grass where cliques pigeon-hole you for many, many years. It was a weird opportunity, and I'd like to think I had the wherewithal to recognize it as exactly that, an opportunity. I saw the light at the end of the tunnel, and I knew not where the tunnel led, but I knew that after graduation, it would all be over. In those days, I really doubted myself, I had real self-esteem issues and I began to write as a method of capturing unformed thoughts in the effort to step back and peer at the Pollock'ed canvas. There was Big Picture moment where I realized that I don't have to know where this tunnel leads, and that each day, it's important to be true to yourself.

When you feel a rage, don't deny it.

I knew, in those days of walking home and being pelted by ice, that I'd eventually have the Resilience to rebuild and persevere. At the time, I was afraid of change, because I built my life around You. But time made me bolder, and children stopped being children. Destiny etched in stone? Not anymore.

Right now is the beginning of a long challenge, but I know that ultimately redemption will find me: it always has. Resilience, to me, means that I'm not afraid of being knocked down or have my heart broken. Resilience is the ability to get back up after a setback. Resilience means hunkering down your life, suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, and by enduring, end them. Redemption will find me because of my ability to roll with the punches. In the end, I will pay and receive my proper due for my actions and merits.

If all is right, everyone does. I think the 19-year-old boy's mom should drop the lawsuit against Coors and the girlfriend and the girlfriend's mother. Your son is dead by his own actions. His resilience was tested; his debts were absolved.