Ella texted my wife on Tuesday.
For at least the fourth in the past few months, and having lost track of how many this calendar school year, law enforcement was on site to answer a school shooting threat against the campus. The police were on site checking bags, searching some lockers, following up on leads, and generally doing their best to get to the bottom of what is becoming a regular occurrence. This time, she was done.
She was no longer going to endure any more lockdowns, feckless leadership that does not even so much as enforce their own mask rules, much less pat students down. She was not going to tolerate a principal that rarely suspends children far out of line, because of his reputation concerns and the idea it could cost funding. She was not going to deal with the weed scented hallways, the disgusting bathrooms, the lack of emotional IQ from staff, the constant fighting that can be readily seen online.
In fact, this one wretched school could single handedly provide enough fodder for an entire YouTube channel. She decided to go home.
She decided to take advantage of the district’s online system set up in the wake of Covid, to no longer have to try to concentrate on algebra while checking her window for approaching terror. She decided to write her term papers at home, in relative peace, rather than being forced to endure the constant interruptions that go unpunished.
She opted to take her studies away from an environment where she constantly had to avoid fights, endure lockdowns, and be subjected to constant sexual harrassment. She decided to no longer rely on a counselor who says that “this is just a part of modern childhood” so she could go home and learn safely. Ella is not alone.
But when your blood relative reaches out to you, in desperate fear for her life, it affects you deeply. When she texts, “please pick me up Todd, I can’t do this anymore,” you want to cry. Your mind flashes to Sandy Hook, to Marjorie Stoneman, and all the way back to Columbine.
Some of the murdered there would be 40 today. That means since the beginning of the school shooting era teenagers have progressed to middle age.
The situation? It is far more unsafe now than that Spring Colorado day.
This has been the kind of day, where as a lifelong Democrat like me, just wants to see the sun set and pour a margarita. And I know vices often create more problems than they solve. But I just want this pressure in my head to go away. I want to not think about, for one moment, how my much needed healthcare could be gone because my own Senator politically stabbed me in the back. I want to not think, for one moment, about how nine-unelected judges are the most powerful people in politics.
And I want to not think, for one moment, how profoundly wrong that is, because judges are not supposed to be in politics.
But mostly I just want to not think, for one moment, how any day Ella is in school I could get a call telling me, “There is an active shooter at her school.” I want to not think, for one moment, about what would happen to my heart if I texted her and she did not answer, as I would see the reports of the incident, the flash of breaking news on my phone, the causalty count climb.
I want to not think, for one moment, about what would happen to my heart, and my soul, and my faith in this world, if someone called me back from that number and it was not her. If the voice of the first responder on the other line led, as they are known to do, with, “Are you Ella’s next of kin?”
And then I don’t want to think, for one moment, about the heartbreak tens of thousands of Americans face every year as the white sheets from gun violence get pulled over their loved ones faces. I just need one moment.
And then, I will think about what to do about it. I will dedicate my life, my career, to stopping these scenes, to ending this evil, to stop the most commonly associated word with the United States being, “gun.”
But first I just need a moment.
Just one.
But in this country, in this wretched festering rotted corpse of a political system, I know in that one moment, in that one lick of salt, in that one swallow, in that one second it takes for the tequila to tickle my throat, somewhere a bullet is probably going to be fired. It might be a toddler accidentally shooting a parent and sibling. It might be a 14 year-old boy allegedly killing children at a taqueria.
And taking that one moment to absorb the nectar of our friends to the south makes me feel guilty.
But I resent the fact I had to give triage and evasion instructions to a child. I resent the fact that every time I go to a store I scan for lunatics with weapons. I truly resent the fact that I now do so, reflexively. I live a life of risk mitigation. Not joy. I have not gone to a movie without being distracted by the back entrance since 2012. I may never set foot in a movie theater again.
I can’t go to a grocer without wondering what the best escape route is. And in my mind, I had convinced myself this was irrational, a product of my training, my background, maybe even mental state. Until Tuesday. Until this child texted me, “Are there any tricks you know to protect myself?”
She texted this from a classroom, as a fight was popping off, as an overworked undersupported teacher yet again called for security, helpless to stop it. And then I realized, “I am not paranoid. I am mainstream.”
And then, in that moment, realizing how this is everyday life, that this is the thought process our children go through day after day, it occurred to me that it is no wonder people hate each other. It is no wonder we view each other as threats. It is no wonder our nation is crumbling at the altar of lobbyists and greed.
When going to school becomes an act of physical courage..
It is time to wrest the political control from the cowards.
My thoughts, and fears, and tactics are mainstream.
That could only have happened, because this nation has failed its people in
the extreme.
-ROC
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