Is it just me, or are you, too, desperately
trying to find the message, the lesson in the Newtown shooting?
We all are; we all must.
In the few days since news
broke of this tragedy, emotions have swelled, grief has been shared and
disbelief expressed.
What next?
I have shared many thoughts
and feelings with those I personally come in contact with regularly and whose
perspectives and opinions I value. But
no-one has found the answer.
I have spoken to some who said
they did not watch. They didn’t want to
hear the names or see the faces. I understand.
For my husband and me, we
were glued. We felt a type of responsibility
to share the grief of this Rockwell-like community. We wanted to support
them. No-one’s right, no-one’s wrong.
SO, WHAT IS WRONG?
There seems to be two emerging
schools of thought: gun control and
treatment of mental illness.
To those points, we are all
right.
Mental illness has always
brought with it a social stigma. We have
to have learned by now that ignoring a problem doesn’t make it go away.
I think it’s about lack;
lack of understanding, lack of services, lack of the perfection we crave in
every aspect of life, lack of our willingness to say that if one among us is
broken, we are all broken, and that we are all in this – together. It is as elementary as the theory of ‘only
being as strong as the weakest link’.
We can’t cry hard enough
for the families of the victims of Newtown.
To this specific moment of harsh reality in our history there truly are
no words, but, perhaps that is the beginning.
WORDS!
There is nothing more
powerful – and today more necessary – than to begin a dialogue, to begin to
accept that the human condition brings with it moments of inhumanity – even to
our precious children – and that not talking about it – or doing something
about it means we are just waiting for it to happen again…and it will. If it could happen to those amazing women and
bright, beautiful children of Newtown, it could happen anywhere.
When Hilary Clinton’s book,
“It Takes a Village” came out, I was not a fan of her theory. I believed that
every child should find the values, the lessons, and love that life would
require beneath his or her own roof. I
was one of those lucky ones.
I have always believed that
children are loaned to us by God, they do not belong to us personally and that
we are each responsible to and for
every child. I guess Hilary was right.
Newtown, as Columbine,
Aurora, and Virginia Tech will always be remembered on their
anniversaries. Memorials will endure the
seasons. Candles will glow. Somehow, each of us will remember the name of
at least one victim. But that is not enough.
If you know a parent who is,
or you suspect, is struggling with a child the textbooks define as ‘not capable
of properly dealing with the ordinary demands of life’, love that person enough
to let her/him know they are not alone; they are not to blame.
That may be the most
courageous and generous thing any of us could ever do. It is raw. It doesn’t get more personal. It
is a risk worth taking and with greater hope of a better outcome than those who
risked their own lives as they threw themselves into the path of a barrage of
bullets to shield the students of Sandy Hook Elementary School.
You will be every bit as
great a hero.
So, IS it just me, or are you, too, willing to believe that every child in this
world is worth protecting- especially at the cost of our own feelings - because
every child is our hope for a better tomorrow?
The dialogue can begin here and now; please share your thoughts
and feelings…
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