A couple of days into the Olympics, by step-son pointed out that the US had not won ANY medals in one event: shooting. I was shocked. For the United States the gun is the holiest of holy! How could we not get any medals? To my relief, in the subsequent days the US did win some medals, including a single gold, but we still placed third overall. What a tragedy!
I came to the conclusion that the structure of the existing Olympic event was not fully compatible with the gun culture in the United States. We should push to get a new event which would better reflect our true skills as a country. The event should take place in a large room, the targets scattered randomly in the room, some of them partly behind obstacles like desks, chairs, and tables. The targets should be smaller, maybe 4 feet tall. The goal would be to burst through the door and shoot as many targets as possible. There would be several rooms set up like this, and the goal is to go from room to room and shoot as many targets as possible in limited time (the average 911 response time). The firearms used would be limited to ones which can be legally purchased in the shooter’s country, which should further guarantee the US supremacy in the event.
I do hope you will all consider my Modest Proposal carefully; I feel this sort of event would truly showcase one of our greatest skills as a nation. We must not throw away our shot.
Many of us do not think much about school shootings, as we are often far removed from them. In my case, had I lived one mile to the east and had my daughter been one year older, she could have been in one of those classrooms at Sandy Hook. As such, I often paraphrase what Phil Ochs said about the events at the 1968 Democratic National Convention: “It doesn’t really matter if you were in Sandy Hook or not, because Sandy Hook is going to come everywhere in the US, and we will all get to meet Adam Lanza, in person, one way or the other.” (the original quote was in his intro to the song “William Butler Yeats Visits Lincoln Park and Escapes Unscathed” at a performance in Vancouver, 1968, listen here)
Every year, around this time, I read through the Wikipedia article about the Sandy Hook Shooting. It would be good if everyone did this, it seems it has slipped from the memory of so many. But on this sad anniversary I am doubly reminded of the one thing that no parent should ever have to do: bury their own child. No parent should ever have to do this. While there are many tragedies which we will all have to face in our lives, I don’t know if there is any more painful than this one. Thankfully, most of us have never, and will never, face this prospect. But as I read every detail about Sandy Hook, tears streaming down my face, I know that the heartbreak I feel is nothing compared to what those parents went through, and are still going through six years later. No parent should ever have to do this.
And so, on this sad anniversary, a friend of ours will have a funeral for her daughter, Emily. No parent should ever have to do this.
As is often the case with my writing, I am not quite sure how to bring this to a close. Probably for these families, there is never much closure. No parent should ever have to do this.
But to end on a positive note, I would like to point that a fundraiser in memory of Emily has raised over $1500 in less than a week for an organization founded, in part, my parents of Sandy Hook victims. One of many organizations founded in the wake of that tragedy. Some other worth noting are The Catherine Violet Hubbard Animal Sanctuary, The Jessica Rekos Foundation and another one founded due to a different tragedy years earlier, The Scotty Fund. No parent should ever have to do this.