Day 41, Year 8: Sadness Doth Prevail
Date: Friday, December 14, 2012
Weather: Mostly Sunny, Still on the Cool Side
Location: Lightkeeper’s Marina in Coquina Harbor, Little River, SC
Sadness doth prevail in our nation tonight. The senseless murder of young
children in Connecticut leaves me with such a deep sadness that it is truly
hard to focus on anything else. As a mother, a grandmother, and a teacher
of kindergarten and first grade children for over twenty years, just
thinking about what happened in Newtown brings tears to my eyes. And it
makes me reflect on our voyage around the world. If we had arrived in a new
country and gone to shore finding people displaying guns in their vehicles,
I would have been mortified. Yet in this country it is allowed. And there
is no reason that any citizen should be allowed to own a semi-automatic gun
ever-not for any reason. When you look at firearm-related death rates in
the world, among first world countries the United States has the highest
rate. We are right in there with South Africa, the Phillipines, Mexico, and
Panama. And we are the most heavily armed citizens in the world. We have
more guns per capita by a huge margin over any other country in the world.
And I surely do not feel safer for it. Do you? So why do we sit by and let
this happen? Each of us needs to take action to make sure this kind of
tragedy never happens again.
