Yet Again, a Nation Mourns

Up until this past thursday, Valentine's Day, at approximately 3:03 pm, some of my fellow IVCC students and I were scheduled to go tomorrow on a campus visit at Northen Illinois University in Dekalb, IL.  At that time, I was arriving at my job, preparing to co-facilitate a children's counceling group at the domestic violence shelter at which I'm employed.  It's a difficult but rewarding job in which I do my best to do what I can to help end the cycle of violence in these children's lives.  

Little did I know, at that very moment, only an hour and twenty minutes north of me Hell's fury was being released on a lecture hall full of innocent and unsuspecting college students.  A kicked in door, a blaze of bullets, and it was over.  Students barely had time to register that the scene that had just played out before thier eyes was real.  The shocking horror of seeing five of thier fellow students senselessly murdered burned into thier memories, destined to haunt them well into old age.

Another campus shooting had occurred, not even a year after the Virginia Tech Massacre. Across the state and the nation these bright, young souls are being mourned. People, young and old, are scratching thier heads and asking themselves how this could have possibly happened again. They are thinking of loved ones, of friends, of themselves...wondering if they will be next. They contemplate ways in which this can be prevented. Stiffer gun control? Metal detectors? Better mental health care? The proposals are endless, the solutions are few.

So what can we do?

We can hold our loves ones a little bit tighter. We can smile at a stranger a little more often. We can make just a little bit more of an effort to reach out, open our hearts and our minds, and embrace those that are troubled. Perhaps that is the key to preventing future massacres.

My heart goes out to all those affected by the NIU school shootings.