I want to shoo...shoo...oo...ooo...ooo...ooot the whole...day...down.

I've been thinking a lot about guns. The most recent shooting of nine innocent people really shook me up and made me incredibly angry. I keep feeling that we're on the verge of such despair here in this country and that's not how I want to feel about the US. We can do better than that.

My heart goes out to the families of the victims. I can't imagine the fear and terror and loss and sorrow they must feel. I am awed by their forgiveness of the shooter. I hope he understands the enormity of that gesture in the face of the hatred he has in his heart. I don't know that, if I was in their shoes, I would have been able to do the same.

I get so frustrated about the endless yammering debates about gun rights and gun laws that always, always, ALWAYS follows these incidents. I cannot understand anymore how anyone can be so shortsighted that they can still cling to their "right to bear arms" in the wake of yet another tragedy like Charleston. Men, women and children are dying and yet they hold onto their rhetoric and cite their "god given" rights to defend what's theirs without so much thinking that they have never, ever had to once even use that right to do so. They are so afraid that someone might take that hand gun away they aren't even willing to consider there might be a better way to own a handgun that might make it safer for everyone. In other countries, handguns not only have to be registered but inspected annually and law enforcement has to approve of where it is kept locked in the owners home. Before it can even be purchased in some countries there are stricter registration rules, not just a waiting period, but an actual mental health assessment to determine if the person is aware and responsible enough to own a gun. In other countries, hunters store their rifles out of their homes and register them with local authorities. There are ways to do this and, yes, I know, criminals will still have guns. But, the people doing these mass shooting are not the "criminals" that everyone is trying to protect themselves against. They are people we work with, go to school with, see on the street, and live next door to. People who, when the deed is done, we hear other say, "I never knew him to be like that" or "He was always so quiet". They don't rob banks or jack cars. They are simply among us. And armed.

The time for yakking is over and too many people have died. I'd prefer it if all non-law enforcement could not own a gun by law. But I'd settle for some sensible compromise that just might make an impact and lessen the death toll.

The Innocents...

I'm stunned, sitting here tonight, in the wake of yet another gun related mass shooting in the US. Oh, and I'm tired too. I cannot feel the shock that the news media wants us to feel about this shooting. I can't tell you how sad that makes me feel. The idea that we have had so many of these horrific incidents that I can no longer feel the mind numbing shock when it happens.

While my heart aches thinking of those families who cannot and never will again tuck their children into bed on this night, what I feel most of all, is anger. An intense, deep, burning anger.

Yes, I am angry at the young disillusioned man who killed his father and then went to the school where his mother worked to kill her and her kindergarten class. I am so angry at his actions. We can look at his actions and those of others who've gone on shooting rampages and soothe ourselves by saying, "Surely, he was mentally ill." One in four people in the US have a mental health diagnosis. So, look around kiddos...that might be the person standing next to you. Now I work with people who have severe and persistent mental illness and, to be honest, none of them illicit fear in me. Not a one. So while the shooter or shooters in these cases may have a mental  health diagnosis, let's be real here...that unto itself is not the reason those innocent children or those movie goers or those high school kids or those shoppers at the mall or those worshippers at the temple are dead now. I would bet good money that the reason those people are dead now is that at some point those who pulled the trigger all were made to feel insignificant, isolated, ridiculed, strange, and unloved.

I am angry tonight at this grand country of ours. The USA - the land of opportunity for so many - has, over the course of several years now, become a land of fear. We fear getting our "stuff" stolen. We fear someone "attacking" us, breaking in, blowing us up, harming us or our loved ones. And we fear this because we are fed an almost constant stream of news about how horrible it is outside our own four walls and how there are very, very bad people out there who will absolutely hurt us. Neighbors do not even bother to get to know neighbors anymore because, after all, you can never be sure who that neighbor might be. We have been told to identify the strangers and to not tolerate them in any way. Our children learn this from us and so, from a young age, those who are not popular, not "in" or who are different in any way are made to feel that difference in no uncertain terms. We like to point them out and keep them at bay just in case they might really be who we think they are. Never mind we never actually take the time to hear their stories or understand what they are all about. How did we allow ourselves to become so marginalized that we now live in a self imposed environment of fear and hared that has stopped us from even looking one another in the eye! And this phenomenon goes beyond our neighborhoods! It's stretches to our complete lack of global understanding. It is easier to hate what's different than to try to understand it.

I'm also really angry that we live in a country that allows anyone to own and carry a gun. The NRA and gun lobbyists will tell us that if guns are regulated in stricter ways the criminals win. BULLSHIT! I'm so sick of their argument that this is a 2nd amendment right. The second amendment - the right to bear arms - was a statement for the creation of a militia in a volatile time when a tyrannical king was seeking to subdue a budding nation. It was not a call for every chucklehead to arm himself and to use those arms whenever he has a bad day. I'm angry that our government allows the NRA to walk all over the rights of innocent, gunless people who simply want to be able to send their 5 year old to school without worrying that this is the day he or she will get his brains blown out. My niece today called her 6 year old daughter's school to inquire about their security and evacuation procedures. You have no idea how sad that makes me. That she had to even ask.

Shame on us for letting this happen. And shame on us for being so scared of one another that we feel the need to kill each other. Shame on us for losing our ability to reach out and embrace each other across the boundaries of race, religion, socio-economic class, gender, sexuality, and ethnicity. We are all each other's parents. We are all each other's children. We are all family. We have to stop fearing each other and start healing each other.  Maybe if someone had reached out a long time ago there would never have been a shooting in Norcross, GA. or Jackson, TN. or Chardon, OH. or Pittsburgh, PA. or North Miami, FL. or Oakland, CA. or Tulsa, OK. or Seattle, WA. or Wilmington, DE. or Boulder, CO. or Milwaukee, WI. or Minneapolis, MN. or Brookfield, WI. or Portland, OR. or Newton, CT.  Maybe tonight parents wouldn't be mourning their children and the world wouldn't be wondering why we cannot get together to realize that love is all you need.