I'll tell you why in a bit but let me start off with we live in a Bizarro World.
Reading the news and watching the television, it's all full of dazed, crying kids and you know why. Yep, another mass shooting, another in a school, another where lives are changed forever.
I have twins, they're fourteen and they are so deep in my heart... I've been upset, I've been shaken and I've been crying. What if it were them?
I'd be devastated.
Back up.
It happened at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. 17 dead and what's so weird is Parkland was named, in 2017, the safest city in Florida. You read that right- the safest.
Some kid, whose name I won't print, had been expelled, came back with an assault rifle, pulled the fire alarm, and as they say, it was on.
Remember Columbine?
I was on the air at CBS when that happened. I remember all of us trying to wrap our heads around it and getting nowhere. I also remember the shock, the sadness. It was the first time I'd ever seen that now all too familiar single file line of students, kids, being led out of the school. It was the first time we had seen that.
Now? We're used to seeing something we should never get used to.
Cut ahead to today.
Same single file lines. Same crying faces. Same moms and dads whose faces register that they can't believe their sons and daughters are gone.
If I were to say, "Thoughts and prayers," would you have heard it before? How about, "Now is not the time to discuss this?" Lips move, we've heard those two phrases so many times. Tell that to those kids, tell it to people whose lives will never be the same.
Gun control, people.
It's harder to get a Drivers License than it is to get a gun. Think about the insanity of what I just wrote. In this case it was an AR-15. There was a time we had no idea what that was.
We do now.
Okay, why wasn't I going to write this? We are in the age of opinion news. I wasn't taught that back in the day. I was taught to keep your cards close to the vest and to keep your opinions to yourself.
Sounds quaint, doesn't it?
But.
I'm a parent now of two of the sweetest boys you could imagine. They need to be protected. We need to protect them.
Now before you get your back up, I'm not advocating taking guns away but we have to do something. You know that old saying that every journey begins with the first step? Well, I'm old enough to remember before there were seat belts in cars. That changed and last I checked the streets are full of automobiles. Heck, there are three at my house and I bet you have one, too.
We still lose too many people in auto accidents but not as many as we used to. And there are folks who will tell you that their seatbelt saved their life.
Watching the students of Stoneman Douglas High School on the news will make you cry. Hearing them say things like, "We're kids, you adults are supposed to protect us," will make you cry.
They are angry, they are scared. They don't want this to happen ever again.
Something has to change.
Parents know exactly what I'm talking about.
God, I love my boys.
#MarkMcEwen
Subscribe to my blog: Mark McEwen's World
Follow me on twitter: @mcewenmark
Like my page on facebook: www.facebook.com/markmcewensworld
And also visit my website: www.markmcewen.com
Reading the news and watching the television, it's all full of dazed, crying kids and you know why. Yep, another mass shooting, another in a school, another where lives are changed forever.
I have twins, they're fourteen and they are so deep in my heart... I've been upset, I've been shaken and I've been crying. What if it were them?
I'd be devastated.
Back up.
It happened at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. 17 dead and what's so weird is Parkland was named, in 2017, the safest city in Florida. You read that right- the safest.
Some kid, whose name I won't print, had been expelled, came back with an assault rifle, pulled the fire alarm, and as they say, it was on.
Remember Columbine?
I was on the air at CBS when that happened. I remember all of us trying to wrap our heads around it and getting nowhere. I also remember the shock, the sadness. It was the first time I'd ever seen that now all too familiar single file line of students, kids, being led out of the school. It was the first time we had seen that.
Now? We're used to seeing something we should never get used to.
Cut ahead to today.
Same single file lines. Same crying faces. Same moms and dads whose faces register that they can't believe their sons and daughters are gone.
If I were to say, "Thoughts and prayers," would you have heard it before? How about, "Now is not the time to discuss this?" Lips move, we've heard those two phrases so many times. Tell that to those kids, tell it to people whose lives will never be the same.
Gun control, people.
It's harder to get a Drivers License than it is to get a gun. Think about the insanity of what I just wrote. In this case it was an AR-15. There was a time we had no idea what that was.
We do now.
Okay, why wasn't I going to write this? We are in the age of opinion news. I wasn't taught that back in the day. I was taught to keep your cards close to the vest and to keep your opinions to yourself.
Sounds quaint, doesn't it?
But.
I'm a parent now of two of the sweetest boys you could imagine. They need to be protected. We need to protect them.
Now before you get your back up, I'm not advocating taking guns away but we have to do something. You know that old saying that every journey begins with the first step? Well, I'm old enough to remember before there were seat belts in cars. That changed and last I checked the streets are full of automobiles. Heck, there are three at my house and I bet you have one, too.
We still lose too many people in auto accidents but not as many as we used to. And there are folks who will tell you that their seatbelt saved their life.
Watching the students of Stoneman Douglas High School on the news will make you cry. Hearing them say things like, "We're kids, you adults are supposed to protect us," will make you cry.
They are angry, they are scared. They don't want this to happen ever again.
Something has to change.
Parents know exactly what I'm talking about.
God, I love my boys.
#MarkMcEwen
Subscribe to my blog: Mark McEwen's World
Follow me on twitter: @mcewenmark
Like my page on facebook: www.facebook.com/markmcewensworld
And also visit my website: www.markmcewen.com
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