Good morning, all. I am having a hard time focusing this morning after reading about yet another school shooting. Each time I hear of this type of news I have feelings of fear, anger, shock, relief, and pretty much the same reactions as pretty much every other mom out there.
But this one hit a little closer to home. Remember how in the last post I said that one family was not in the group picture because they drove from northern Illinois? Well, Carolinda, the mom of that family, is a faculty member at Northern Illinois University - where the shootings occurred.
Carolinda and I have a shared history; we went to the same junior and senior high schools and while we were never close friends, we did know one another. Then later, in college, we lived in the same student cooperative, where again, we weren't close, but we share a lot of memories and have friends in common. We really enjoyed meeting up this week at the Dells, sharing what our lives are like now and reminiscing about the past.
Until a week ago I had never heard of Northern Illinois University. Now tragedy has struck, and I have a friend who is there.
So I'm having a bit of a rough day.
Thanksgiving Letter to the Family
5 months ago
1 comment:
Ouch. That does hit close to home to have a friend actually at the school. Your post made me go and actually read a few articles about the incident.
I often think of the shooter's family, what they must be going through as well as the victims. I can't imagine what it must be like to get news that your child or sibling was the cause of so much pain and often have to live with accusations and blame.
It's terrible that this is the response that seems to be more common in our country. I know a lot of people point to the availability of guns as a reason, but I wonder about how people get to that point at all. This guy apparently gives no warning--how can you guard against that? The Virgina Tech guy gave off huge warnings but couldn't be contained. How can we be protected against people like that? I think the mental illness that goes undectected and untreated in our society is sometimes more frightening than the ability to own a gun.
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