I don't want to talk about the guns.

Nicolas Kristoff, a columnist for the New York Times, wrote this, and you should read it, but you probably already have. You can copy and paste the link, or if you go to nyt.com and click on Columnists at the very top bar, then on Kristoff, you can find it. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/02/opinion/mass-shooting-vegas.html?rref=collection%2Fcolumn%2Fnicholas-kristof&action=click&contentCollection=opinion&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=3&pgtype=collection&_r=0

One thing he says, and I followed up on it to see if it was true, it was fact checked by an independent source, is this:  Since 1970, more Americans have died from guns (including suicides, murders and accidents) than the sum total of all the Americans who died in all the ward in American history, back to the American Revolution. 

That includes the Civil War.

That is astonishing. And that is horrific. Talking to my brother Jeff today, we both agreed that there are no words to  convey what we feel right now about the situation in the US relative to the atrocious deaths in Las Vegas.  Jeff said, to sum up, that he just does not feel safe anymore.  I agree.  I go to a concert, a baseball game, a gathering on a town square, I ride BART or am stuck in traffic on the Golden Gate Bridge and I know I am an easy target for ANYONE with a gun or a bomb or a loaded car.  I never thought about this before, even in the fifteen years after 9/11.  I think about it a lot now, when I am in a vulnerable place. And unless you live in the country, unless you live in a bubble and don't venture out into the real world, every place is a vulnerable place.  When you add in the threat from North Korea, which our POTUS seems to encourage, the entire West Coast is vulnerable.

No answers here.  No safe words from me. No shelter from worrying, from feeling on edge.  I am afraid for my friends who have children, what legacy will be left for them. I am glad my Mom is gone.... society was getting pretty nasty for her because she watched the news and read the paper, and it would only make her sadder and sadder, as it does me. 

Guns, the regulation of them and their control, it will not change easily.  We must all stand up, do something about it. I just don't know, yet, what that is.

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