So, I clicked the link.
I sat in silence before I turned and looked at Kim and said, "It happened again."
By this point, she'd seen the news as well, and we were reading it together. That being, of course, that Adam Lanza had gone on a shooting spree in Newtown, Connecticut, killing 26 completely innocent people at Sandy Hook Elementary School.
And of the 26, 20 of them were children, ages 5 to 10.
It close to home for two reasons.
First off, I was a teacher for six years. It was the kind of thing that could have happened at my workplace. I was immediately confronted (as I am each time it happens) with scenarios, regarding what I would do if I was a teacher at that school. Would I shield the kids? Would I have been able to intervene and stop it?
Second, I'm a father now. My son is so precious to me that I grow physically sick to my stomach even thinking about losing him. Let alone, losing him due to a violent crime committed by a psychopath.
I sat and just reflected, letting the silence wash over me.
We didn't watch the news that night. We just couldn't. It was too much to bare. When I saw further developments and other links posted on social networking sites, I ignored them. Not because I didn't care. Believe me, I cared immensely. I just couldn't read or hear about it anymore. It hurt my heart too deeply.
To make matters worse, countless bloggers, "Tweeps" and Facebook Friends decided to take the opportunity to get up on their respective soapboxes and deliver their message to the open-eared masses.
"See? This is what happens without strict gun laws!"
"Guns don't kill people. People do!"
Both sides have some validity, but can we let the graves cool? It's not the right time. It's not. Little boys and girls were SHOT TO DEATH!!
And what about the ones who survived? Little 5 to 10 year old boys and girls will now have to carry the emotional burden, for the rest of their lives, of seeing their friends, family, teachers and classmates brutally murdered in front of their poor little eyes.
Can we just respect that for a second and be quiet?
It's not the right time to legislate emotionally. It's not the right time to argue on Facebook or Twitter. THIS ISN'T ABOUT YOU!
What a selfish, disgusting society we've evolved into, when we see the vicious murder of children as little more than an opportunity to grab hold of a microphone and trumpet a cause.
There is a time to mourn. A time to weep.
Instead of getting in an internet argument that results in nothing, hug your kids today. If you don't have kids, hug your parents. If you don't have kids and can't hug your parents, HUG SOMEBODY!
The gun control debate isn't going anywhere. We'll get there. We need to figure out why this is happening and do our best to control it. But the truth of the matter is that things are going to worse before they get better.
It's all rapidly devolving. This world wasn't meant to last. We're not destined to be here forever, but there is another life that calls us, in the hereafter.
In the meantime, live this one to the fullest. Don't squander opportunities. Listen more than you speak. Love. Give. Laugh. Smile.
We may not all agree on gun control or other social debates, but we can at least all agree that this is one of the finest moments in cartoon history:
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