One was the drowning of 4-year-old Brent Bathory of Red Lion at Pinchot State Park. The other was the heat stroke death of 15-month-old Cassandra Starr, also of Red Lion, whose parents inadvertently left her in their van for three hours.

After coordinating coverage of both events all day yesterday, I went home last night, played with my kids, gave them baths, read them stories, kissed them too many times and tucked them into bed.

And then I cried.

I sobbed for almost 45 minutes.

I kept picturing Cassie Starr trapped in her car seat in her family's van, crying for mommy or daddy. I kept picturing Brent Bathory looking up from beneath the water, panicking as he tried to breathe.

I can handle adults shooting each other. I can handle politicians sniping, idiots spraying racial graffiti on signs and a guy impaling himself through the leg with a wrought-iron fence. In this line of work, I see graphic stories and photos of pain and suffering from around the world every day.

I can't handle it when it happens to kids, to babies. To the truly innocent among us. I don't understand how or why things such as these happen. In a way, I don't really know if I ever want to understand that.

But today, my heart hurts. I've been sick to my stomach for almost 24 hours now. And a new day of news is just beginning for me.