I don’t think there’s a person in our country who hasn’t heard about the Boston Marathon disaster today, but if you haven’t….

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/04/15/17764747-explosions-rock-finish-of-boston-marathon-2-killed-and-scores-injured?lite=

The story has been updating with more and more injured since it happened. It makes me sick.

It makes me mad.

It makes me mad as hell. A friend sent this to me to help calm me down…

Just go watch it. It will make you smile despite all the craziness in the world. And it will comfort you to know that even in the 70s, there were people recognizing the problems in the world.

So what do we do when we’re faced with something so horrific that will affect people on a global scale? I say global because people from countries all over the world come to Boston every year for this race. What can we do? Anything we want. Unfortunately, I have always found myself looking into the epicenter of the destruction, finding evidence of loss and grief. Then I saw something that just…made me look at every video differently.

I then watched the worst video I had seen yet with this quote in mind. I will be telling my kids this EVERY time they see something tragic. No parent can keep grief and horror from their kids. The news is everywhere. People always talk. What we CAN do, is teach them to look for the hope in a hopeless situation.

The only thing I have left to say, is that I truly hope our country will soon stop trying to fix a non issue. We don’t have a gun control issue. We don’t have a bomb issue. I can tell you why:

Not once will you ever hear it reported that Mr. Jones Perfect was of sound mind and body his entire life, never making a mistake and always the life of every event, went and blew up a marathon or shot up a school. It doesn’t happen.

What you will quite often hear is that a tragedy struck and, upon investigation and location of the culprit, it was found that responsible party has had a life long history of mental illness.

We need to stop ignoring mental illness in our country. We need to stop treating it with kid gloves. We need to stop letting mentally ill people who have shown improvement be left to their own devices. If a schizophrenic takes their meds and the voice go away, they logically think they’re cured. The second they stop taking the meds and voices return, they are no longer in enough control of their body to get back on the meds.

I don’t have the solution. Not one that anyone would like, anyway. But I see the problem. It’s a huge problem. Our country needs help. Our world needs help. We all need humanity.

 

Terrible Times and Troubled Minds

I read an article just now…

http://now.msn.com/i-am-adam-lanzas-mother-says-mom-of-mentally-ill-son

This article chilled me to the bone. Why? Because I know this child. Not the exact one mentioned in the article, but I know one just like it. A child who makes daily death threats against the ones trying to provide care. A child who has already injured many and yet remains in the same place. Those of us who have worked with this child have made light-hearted jokes about it to get through the day, but the fact of the matter is that I know I will see that face on a national news story after this person goes on a true killing spree. The worse part is that it would not surprise me if this person was able to evade law enforcement long enough to kill over and over in multiple locations.

Mental health has a stigma on it. Unfortunately, it’s well-earned with the horrific ways in which sanitariums have historically been run. But we need them. We need safe places where mentally ill patients can get the treatment and care they need away from the general public and open access to weapons. I just don’t know that anyone could survive working in a place like that without absorbing a little bit of lunacy themselves. I don’t mean that they would lack self-control, I’m saying that everyone is impressionable, and if you hear something enough, you begin to believe it. If I tell you you’re ugly enough, you’ll begin to believe it even if you’re a model making big bucks with your looks.

It actually scares me to think that the day may come when this kid is all grown up, remembers me and how much s/he hated me, and seeks me out with murder in mind. I would like to think that will never happen, but how can I be sure? This kid remembers EVERYTHING and has threatened my life more times than I can count.

No adult should be afraid of a child. There shouldn’t be a need. And there shouldn’t be a stigma on those who desperately want and need help. Mental diseases are diseases, not choices.

No solutions in sight

In the wake of the recent tragedy in Connecticut (although “tragedy” is sorely lacking to describe the horror many are facing at the moment), we are all seeing post after post of prayer for the victims and their families, not to mention all the new memes coming out displaying sympathy.

I know these people need our support and sympathy. I don’t doubt that for a moment. Though I can’t help feeling as though it does nothing to post these images and heartfelt words. It doesn’t change the fact that it happened and WILL happen again and again and again.

What we need are solutions. Do I have the magical answer? No. I’d be a fool if I thought I did. I have my own utopian ideals of what would help, but they’re unrealistic ideas with constitutional right blocking them every step of the way. Though I can’t help feeling the way I do, so I’ve come here to spill my silly ideals for the faceless few who may happen across my blog to hear.

There is the ever-present debate about how rampant guns are in our country. Personally, I hate guns. They scare me, and all I think of associated with guns is destruction. Once upon a time they served a very real purpose; protection. Today, their main purpose is to maim and destroy. However, there is no possible way to get rid of the guns. And really it wouldn’t be all that great if we did. I truly don’t see any purpose for a civilian to carry a hand gun. Their sole purpose is to kill another person. Rifles and shotguns really are more meant for hunting. I know many people who truly enjoy hunting. They go out every year to get venison for their families. I hear about the new ways they’re using their deer meat to create something new and delicious. And if we took away the ability of the public to go hunting, we could face overpopulation in the deer communities in short fashion.

Even if we DID get rid of legalized guns for civilians, how on earth would the government enforce it? They couldn’t. All that would happen is that the underworld evils in our nation would hoard all firearms, putting it all in the hands of those we need to not have access. There will always be hiding places for the things we want no one to find.

The right to bear arms is in our constitution. Great. That constitution was written more than 230 years ago, when people honestly carried guns for very few reasons. They wanted to hunt so they could live, as grocery stores weren’t around every corner as they are today. They wanted protection. Back then you truly looked out for your own, and whether it be a man trying to steal your horses or a rogue bear trying to eat your crops meant to feed you over the long winter, you needed something powerful to defend what was yours. Today, “protecting” your own includes killing someone over a simple debt (most times one that you never should have consented to in the first place) or over drugs (again, unnecessary) or just because they did something to seriously offend (because we all know the power of our words of even public shame carries zero weight in today’s world). It’s sickening.

My utopian solution would be that the people of our country collectively realize that hand guns serve no positive purpose in our world and they willingly turn them in to our government. They could then be used to arm a larger number of law enforcement officials to help guard public facilities. Had there been an armed officer on duty at that Elementary school, I believe lives could have been sparred because that officer would have found the killer and disposed of him before he’d had a chance to kill as many as he did. There would have obviously been lives lost regardless, but fewer. To me, one life saved is worth it.

I work in a school far from CT, but in the wake of what happened, our local law enforcement ordered all officers completing stationary work (filing any reports for the day that could not be done on active driving patrol) to position themselves outside of the schools. They quickly orchestrated who would be at each of our schools in an effort to ease the nerves of every parent out there thinking “that could have been my child’s school…my child”.

If the country could come to the collective decision that the only thing guns should ever be used to is to hunt for food and to truly protect your own, it would be a much better world. If everyone could collectively agree that keeping the mental instability of a family member a secret is a dangerous and imprudent endeavor, we might actually keep those unstable enough to use firearm for pure malice away from our kids.

Hell, we’ve had real live “zombie” stories in the news this last year. People are going crazy. We WILL destroy ourselves in one way or another, and the world as we know it will eventually end in global tragedy. I do not believe that will happen on Dec 21st. No one can predict something like that, least of all hundreds of years out, but I don’t doubt that a catastrophic tragedy could wipe out large numbers of people on this planet.

Unfortunately I also see that as a potential solution. If we weren’t worried with overpopulation and were instead focused on keeping loved ones close and caring for each other, we would easily be much better off.

Again, I know this is all silly fantasy. The world can never return to a simpler time. You can’t un-ring a bell. I am occasionally teased for my near obsession with books from hundreds of years ago, Laura Ingalls Wilder and Jane Austen being two leading ladies in this. But I can’t help being entranced with the way people lived back then. They cared about and FOR their neighbors when in need. People actually KNEW their neighbors, even though miles often separated them. I live in a building full of people and I’ve only met one of them (and I’ve long since forgotten his name). I long for a simpler time, though I know it will never be. Not in my lifetime. I just wait for the day when the anger will stop consuming us all.