Sosanna's Log - Supplemental...

So this has been an amazingly crazy weekend.  Friday around late morning the first reports were coming out about the shooting in Connecticut.  The message was, possible shooting as an elementary school.  One teacher, one child injured.

Sad.  Then as the day progressed the enormity of the event began to unfold.  First, three then four.  Next we learn that the gunman was dead on the scene.  Finally by the end of the day I watched with complete and utter dismay at the final count. Twenty-seven people.  Twenty of those where children under the age of six at Sandy Hook Elementary School. (Washington Post)

We struggle to make sense of this kind of thing.  We sit here and wonder, why did this happen.  The fury that followed over the social media networks was startling to say the least.  I sat and watched friends, neighbors and family members say things at I really believed at someone point they would end with "LOL".

Reading the news reports this morning I found out several interesting things.  First, Adam Lanza, 20, first killed his mother, who was not a teacher at the school as previously reported.  Second, he busted into the school by force because the school had a newly installed security system.  The semiautomatic weapons he had he had taken from his mother's collection.  She was a legal gun owner who enjoyed target practice.  She was killed in her own home, with her own gun.

Adam then went to the school and sprayed the classroom with hundreds and hundreds of rounds of ammunition from semi automatic weapons that were legal in this country.  He then turned the gun on himself.

This morning I sit looking at the posts on Facebook about how, we need stronger gun laws or we need to allow prayer in school.  One page "One Nation Under God" actually has a graphic of our founding fathers kneeling before a picture of white Jesus.  The post things like "Liberals blame the Guns" or "Allow Prayer in Schools".

Here are a few facts:

Adam was not a gun owner.  So his mental state, age, or religion would not be a factor in gun ownership.  Adam did not attend that school.  His mother was not a teacher at the school and in fact according to current reports that school was chosen at random.  Prayer or lack thereof played no role at all in the events that took place at Sandy Hook Elementary.  Only one had control of the events of that day.  And that my friends, was Adam.

I understand we area all struggling with how to understand, process and recover from this.  It I'm sure will go on record as one of the worse school shootings in US history to date.  However, we have to watch that we don't become completely reactionary here.  Laws are created out of debate and examination.  Not knee jerk reactions.

I'm sure you may be wondering, Sosanna I saw you post on Facebook about this yesterday, what prompted this supplemental.  This morning my hubby kissed me goodbye as he left our house for his job at a gas station.  A place where people come and go daily.  There's a hundred dollars or so in the drawer and some cigarettes.  A few months ago several of these stores were robbed and the cashier killed in the process.  As he returned for his forgotten keys on the nightstand I woke briefly and the words that automatically escaped my lips were ....  "be safe".

You see, he's my world.  Without him I'd be lost.  He keeps me sane when the manias start.  He brings me up when the lows hit.  He keeps me on an even keel.  He brings home litters of worm infested sick puppies for us to nurse back to health.

 He gives shirt off his back so that some one else will not be cold.  He is indeed one of the kindest, gentlest people I have ever known.  He has never raised his hand in anger or intentionally hurt me in any way.  You know what else he is.... He's an atheist.

On that very page I mentioned above, the "Christian" people preceded to say how atheists are nothing and should be put on a island somewhere. As I sit and read the comments on these pages, I'm so glad he' not Christian.  These are some really vile people.  Saying that these lives were a sacrifice for allowing marriage equality in Connecticut.  Saying that it's because they're not praying in school.  I am completely sickened by the responses here.

As I sit here trying to cope with this, my phone lights up with text messages from him.  He's saying just filter them out honey.  Here someone is blaming a national tragedy on him and his first thought is for my well being. He is indeed an amazing individual.  Without religion.

The Facebook page Being Liberal posted an awesome graphic today.

We really should remember, things happen sometimes.  No matter what you do, no matter what you say.  At this time we should be embracing each other.  Encouraging each other to use whatever method we use, be it Jesus or Hecate or WHATEVER to find some comfort.  We need to continue to remember those lost lives.  We need to celebrate their passage on to their next realm and take solace in the fact that according to the news reports they passed quickly.  (For those interested there's a website called "Findagrave.com" that has online memorials to those lost.)



With that I leave you with the following thought.  No matter who you are, where you are or what you believe:

"I honor the place within you where the entire Universe resides; I honor the place within you of love, of light, of truth, of peace; I honor the place within you, where, when you are in that place in you, and I am in that place in me, there is only one of us." ~ Gandhi


Namaste & Blessed Be
Sosanna
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