America is Lost
Guns in America are Ruining Life in America.
There’s a time and a place for everything or so they tell me. But can we control when, how, and where anything happens to us? Sometimes, everything feels out of my control.
Everything.
Sometimes, I feel like a ship lost at sea. The waves are crashing around me, throwing me from side to side, and I can’t choose a course because I’m too busy bailing water, merely trying to stay afloat.
Am I the only one that goes to bed at night hoping to fall asleep just so I can stop thinking for a while?
Ugh!
My son spent an afternoon with us recently. His anger was visible when we stumbled upon the topic of gun violence in America. His frustration level peaking as well as his feeling of utter uselessness.
Why?
Well, he has a daughter. Fortunately, she’s on summer break right now, but eventually a new school year will resume. He’s scared out of his wits to send her to school.
I don’t blame him. I feel the same way.
When you become a parent you soon realize that for the rest of your life, you’re only going to be as happy as your saddest child. That’s the price we pay for bringing children into the world. We will worry about them for the rest of our lives. We want to protect them.
We’d literally take a bullet for them.
But today, in America, our children are entering a potential war zone every time they get off the bus and enter the school building. It’s risky business to go to school in America. Don’t we already have enough to worry about when they get sick, break an arm or leg, ride their bikes down the street, pass a neighbor’s house where a weirdo lives, eat something that might be contaminated, hook up with a shithead boyfriend, or fall off their trampoline?
Noooooooo …..
Now we have to worry that our kids will get killed by an angry person with a gun who decides to run out and buy a weapon of war in order to storm a school building of frightened children.
I tried to console my son.
I really tried. I hated seeing his anguish. I wanted to take on all the worry for him. Give his poor mind a break. I would scoop up all that angst and carry it around for him if possible. But I knew that he felt the same about his little girl as I do about him.
He was terrified for her safety.
Sadly, this is what life has become in the richest country in the world. We celebrate carnage. We procrastinate. We argue amongst ourselves. We pretend to care. But in the end, we do nothing.
If ever there was a sign that America is lost, this is it.
We are the enemy. Forget about the Chinese and the Russians. We’re killing ourselves. We’re the zombies in our own apocalyptic world. We’re barring our doors and living underground to protect ourselves from one another.
All I could do the other afternoon was listen and shake my head.
My son’s frustration was completely understandable. We both knew that. We also both knew that we were helpless. The problem wasn’t going to go away.
That night, I hoped for sleep, even a few hours. My brain was overheating again.
Teresa Robert is a retired educator, author, world traveler, and professional myth buster. You can find her books on Amazon.
