There was another school shooting today.
Another.
I took rainbow sprinkled cupcakes into a classroom this afternoon where my sweet boy, wearing a paper crown, passed them out to his classmates as they sang at the top of their lungs, “Happy Birthday to you…”
In another classroom a boy shot an eleven year old, wounded others and then took his own life. I prayed and wept for their mothers as I tucked my children safely into their beds tonight.
As most mothers who pray and weep, I am angry. There was another school shooting, another. It is the word another and the unfathomable amount of times that I have heard it that turns me inside out. How do we make this stop?
I wish that teachers and farmers were the celebrities of our culture. I wish they were paid more and held in a higher regard. I wish that Miss Honey made six figures and had a million Instagram followers. I wish that every school’s budget for food was three times that of the White Houses’. I wish that kids wanted to be someone with dirt or chalk covered hands when they grew up.
In this wishful world of well nurtured children, maybe they wouldn’t feel starved and alone. They would not be seeking fame and attention at any cost. Maybe these kids would go outside. Maybe they would learn to share their secrets so that clouds of shame no longer blocked their sunlight. In this world, these well-fed, developing, brains would learn to look each other in the eye when they insulted one another, so that they could learn what it feels like to cause hurt. Teachers would have the time and resources to teach their students about how to be in the world– how to work, how to try, how to forgive and how to be violent so that it does no harm.
There has never been an easier time to be self-educated if you understand how to think critically, problem solve, practice, listen and collaborate. So, what if that is what you learned at school and once you had all that down we took a pass at Algebra? And what if while you were learning invaluable life skills, you were fed healthy protein and vegetables?
It is easy to look at what we should take away from children – video games, guns, tik tok, sugar – but what about what we are giving them instead?
I know the name of the gunman who took a selfie in a bathroom stall before he shot up a 6th grade classroom, the newspaper headlines told it to me. I can’t help but wonder if he thought about the number of likes or views that selfie would get once he carried out his plan. He wanted to be seen. We have to stop making celebrities out of murderers, jocks and actors if we expect our kids to change the direction of their aim.
I held my son for the first time five years ago today and in Perry, Iowa a mother held hers for the last time. I can only carry the love I have for my own because I will break under the grief of another. Another, let there not be another.