Realizations like this can come in the oddest way. In both cases, I found out when I double-clicked on Netscape and the browser opened up to my sports site homepage. Just like that, two athletes I had been watching for the past decade, the part of my sports-watching life that I will remember best, were gone, one dead and one mangled.

Why does it look like Thomas can never walk again when former NBA player Sedale Threatt, who was driving drunk at over 100 miles an hour when he was ejected out of his car, can?

All I can say is that God has a plan, although it's pretty hard to understand sometimes. We feel invincible, especially here at Harvard. We're young, talented, and appear to have the world at our feet. But Phills and Thomas were young and talented, too.

Should we buckle up and drive closer to the limit? Undoubtedly. But if that's all we take out of this, we're cheating ourselves and cheapening what happened to Phills and Thomas. We're not as in control of our lives as we think. For the most part, we're along for the ride.

So enjoy it, appreciate it, and realize your own limitations. For me, The Ultimate lies in organized religion. For you, hopefully it's something, if not that.

Life is short. Pray hard.