Something's Gotta Give

            A few weeks ago, parents took their 10-year-old son to the hospital because he had a bad pain in the back of his knee and he was bleeding a lot. After an x-ray, they found out he had been shot. SHOT. The kid was standing on the field in a baseball stadium. Someone from approximately 2 miles away fired a gun into the air and the bullet struck him in the back of the knee on its way down to earth. The story terrifies me. No one aimed at the kid. No one even fired in the stadium where he was participating in pregame festivities. He was just standing there and a bullet, fired from 2 miles away, struck him in the back of the knee.

            How does that even happen?

            It terrifies me because this is the reality in which we live. It’s the reality in which I live, and it’s the reality into which I want to bring a child. It’s in the news all the time. Someone opened fire and killed a 12-year-old at a garlic festival in California. People on dirt bikes opened fire in a local Puerto Rican festival near me. Most recently, there were mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton.

But this isn’t new. Someone opened fire in a night club. Someone aimed a gun at a school board member in the middle of a school board meeting. Someone went into a church. Someone went into a movie theater. Someone went into a newspaper office.

            It scares me. It scares me because I don’t know what the answers are. I have friends on both sides of the aisle: friends who believe all guns should be banned and friends who believe more good people with guns are the answers to getting rid of bad people with guns. On my drive to the Midwest, I see the signs that line cornfields: “He broke into my house to commit a crime. I had the gun, he did the time.” I don’t understand it.

            I have shot a gun. A few years ago, my husband and I went to a gun range and I shot a handgun for the first time. It felt exhilarating. Hitting the target felt empowering. I don’t feel the need to do it again and I do not want a gun in my house. But I wanted to see what it felt like. It was educational. Sort of. We went into the range and the first thing I noticed were the target papers you buy. One was a zombie. One was a generic concentric circle target. One was a deer. One was Hillary Clinton.

            The man at the counter asked what kind of gun we wanted to shoot. My husband explained that I had never shot a gun before. He gave us the lowest caliber in a small basket with ear and eye protection and the ammo we purchased. He told me not to point the gun at anyone and that was that. No lecture. No lesson on how to even hold a gun. As we were getting ready to leave, people came into shoot bigger guns and we left wondering how many safety regulations this range violates a year.

            On the other hand, I love going to an ax throwing range. I love throwing axes, and I hate missing. Is it the same thing? Some would say yes. Some would say no. I say with my aim, no one is danger except the people who are standing next to the target.

            And BTW: When we first threw axes, we were in Canada. I asked if they had a zombie target and they said it was against the law to have any likeness of anyone on a target. Including zombies.

            Guns scares me. They scare me because a lot of people thrive on that exhilarating feeling. And a lot of people decide that pulling a trigger is the only way to solve their problems. It scares me.

            Churches. Malls. Movie theaters. Schools. Most recently a Walmart in El Paso. Hate crimes and accidents. How many people have to die before we say enough?

            Because it scares me, I need to get educated about it. We fear things we don’t understand, and fear can be paralyzing. I don’t want to be paralyzed about this. I want to learn more about it. I don’t want to be afraid. I would rather be angry. I would rather use that anger to push for better gun control laws. Maybe one person can’t make a difference. But I sure as hell want to try. The educational aspect is my phase one.

            Because churches. Malls. Movie theaters. Schools.

            I was in eighth grade when the shooting at Columbine school in Colorado happened. Within a week, one of my best friends had been escorted out of the school by police after he was accused of having a “hit list” in his backpack. We came to find out later that he had no weapons and it wasn’t a hit list; it was a “hit on” list, a list of the girls he liked (better, but only by a few degrees). There was no real threat, but the damage was done. It ruined the rest of his middle school life. He made a clean break of that life in high school with friends who had no idea what he’d been through, and he is doing very well today. I don’t know if that incident stays with him. That incident has always stayed with me, though. We have to be careful with our language.

            I notice more often now how often “gun language” seeps into our everyday speech. I’m going to shoot you an email. I’m gunning for this promotion. You killed that! Great job! Just give me the bullet points. Being aware of language is part of phase one for me: and changing my language is the action. I will send you an email. I’m hoping for this promotion. Great job. Just give me the highlights.

             How many have to die? How many letters do we have to send? How long before the people we voted for actually remember to work for us and not for the lobbyist corporations? How long before the people of this country can band together to say enough? We sure make a stink when the barista gets our coffee order wrong. Why can’t we raise the same Hell over gun violence? I’ll out myself as someone who believes that guns should be nigh impossible to acquire. There should be extensive background checks and restrictions. The amount of hoops you have to jump through to get a gun should be way more complicated than the hoops I had to jump through to change my driver’s license when I moved to a new state.

            I just finished reading Guns Down: How to Defeat the NRA and Build a Safer Future With Few Guns by Igor Volsky. It packs a powerful read in 165 pages. It was a hopeful glimpse into how things are already changing and what more we can do. What more we need to do. Which is a lot. But baby steps! Even Volsky says we won’t solve the problem today, tomorrow, or even a month from now. But we can start trying now.

            Even Trevor Noah on the Daily Show reminds us that Americans try. People die in car crashes; we try to make cars safer. Terrorists hijacked a plane. We try to make planes safer and build up the TSA. There are more guns in America than people. We need to try something else.

            Maybe if we learn more and demand better and demand laws designed to keep people safe instead of laws designed to keep people armed, maybe things can change. Sure, spend time looking at mental health issues. I am all for toning down violence and first-person-shooter video games. And I support hunting if you want to hunt for sport. I also believe (it's fine, I'm fine outing myself) that we have a very divisive, racist, extremist president who is not really in favor of making anything better for anyone but himself (there. I said it. Also, I don't believe he's the only politician like that, not by any stretch of the imagination.). 

            We need to change this. We have to change this. I’m hopeful that things can change. Who knows? Maybe it starts with you.