For Granted

On Saturday morning my husband and I sat on the patio with coffee and Italian cookies, enjoying conversation and the beautiful summer weather. When we finished, I would putter around in my succulent garden for awhile before running a couple of errands. Later we would take the dog for a long walk on the bluffs near our house, and grill burgers for dinner. The day was effortlessly unfurling before us with no serious obligations or places we had to be. At that moment, all we had to do was sip our coffee, eat our cookies, and breathe in this beautiful day.

It wasn't until we got in the car to run our errands that we learned of the shooting outside a Walmart in El Paso, Texas that left twenty people dead and more than two dozen injured. It had been less than a week since two children and one young adult were gunned down at the Gilroy Garlic Festival in California, along with sixteen others injured. We didn't know it yet, but just thirteen hours after the El Paso shooting, nine more people would die and twenty seven people would be injured in a shooting in Dayton, Ohio.

I am no longer shocked when people are gunned down at a school, a church or synagogue, a concert, a Walmart, a movie theater, etc. etc. And that troubles me. Mass shootings no longer feel like a punch to the gut the way the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary school shooting did. And why should they? With no meaningful gun law reforms since Sandy Hook, why would I be shocked when someone starts firing on people in a parking lot? With a president who pours gasoline on the fires of racism in our country, what is surprising about white men taking up arms to "make America 'great' again?" With politicians too afraid of the gun lobby to name these acts violence for what they are - racism and terrorism - I can only be surprised that mass shootings are not happening even more often.

We are a divided people, angry, and fearful of each other and of "the other." We huddle together in our tribes and feel superior to those who disagree with us. But one thing we have in common is that we can no longer take for granted that by next Saturday, or the one after that, we and all of our friends and loved ones will be safe from harm as we go to school and work, enjoy a movie or a festival, find solace in our place of worship, or run an errand at Walmart. As I enjoyed my Saturday morning coffee, I felt so grateful for the simple joy of sharing that quiet moment with my husband on a beautiful day. Now, more than ever, I am aware of how precious and fragile those moments are becoming.