Today as I sat in my office, the Health Room of an elementary school, I learned of yet another incomprehensible tragedy at another elementary school. I watched the live feed on my computer, saw the sound bites with a little girl who was in the school when the shooting took place and the gut wrenching pictures of families trying to get information about their children, their babies, and I fought back both tears and the urge to vomit. I turned the live feed off and did the only thing I could think of, I prayed. This is a season filled with childhood wonder and joy as children everywhere anticipate Christmas and Santa and even Christmas vacation and this day, today, will forever change their thoughts and memories surrounding this very special time of year. Their childhood innocence has been forever altered.
I spoke to both my children via live chat and realized I just needed to know they were OK and to tell them that I love them. I called my husband to see if he had been watching the events unfold on the television but I really just wanted to hear his voice, to see if he understood, if he could explain, all the time knowing there is no explanation that begins to make sense. I prayed some more.
I talked to my friends, the teachers that I work with, looking into their eyes as they struggled to understand, knowing they were probably having some of the same thoughts I was having; we work in an elementary school, this is crazy, could this happen here, what do we say to the children next week when they return to school. We had no answers. It was unusually quiet in the front office as we left school. What do we say...
So I sit at my computer and try to make sense of something that will never make sense. How can a person walk into an elementary school with a gun which looks as if it should only be used by the military or police and take aim at innocent children, innocent adults? How does that ever make sense in their head? What did these babies do to cause them so much pain and anger? In the end the shooter killed himself and saved the taxpayers a lot of money in legal fees but if in the end he was going to kill himself why didn't he just do that in a place where he is the only one who will die?
I will continue my prayers for the families of the children and adults who died today and for all of us who have been affected by this tragedy. I will pray that those who make gun laws will finally realize things need to change and while I support the right to be a gun owner I recognize there are guns we should not be allowed to own, and I will pray for the family of the shooter who now carry the burden of his actions.
Tonight I pray for God's grace, peace and love.
