Seventy-five minutes and everything changes

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Over an hour ago I snapped the photo above. I was going to write a post about completing the binding on this quilt, all to remain being the rest of the hand-stitching, both for the binding and quilting. I tacked on that binding, then did some laundry, made a cup of lemon tea, then sat down to write this post.

But first I felt compelled to check Wikipedia, which never happens when I'm ready to write an entry. I merely sit, type, clean up.... I had already read my Wiki for the morning, hours ago. Hours ago Wikipedia had yet to put on their In the news column the latest mass shooting, this time in Lewiston, Maine. But now I know what happened there last night, and writing about quilt bindings seems rather useless, pointless, irrelevant. Once again many people are dead because someone had an assault rifle and employed it not only as a wide-scale murder device, but as a weapon of terrorism. Some of the dead weren't shot, but killed in the stampede that followed the shooting. I have no words for this, although my prayers are sent to the injured, those mourning their beloveds, and those traumatized by this experience.

This post isn't going to rail against lackadaisical American gun laws. I do wish to say how terrifying is the result of someone using any kind of gun to harm another or themselves. Two within my family used handguns to take their lives, so I'm not speaking as a loudmouth on a soap box. The pain that resulted was immense and immutable. I cannot fathom what those attached to this incident or any other mass killing must be experiencing, because it's not only the needless deaths that occur, but the terror afterward. That horror is real, and even years later may surface at any given time.

Life is beautiful. Life can also be brutal. Life is most definitely precarious and precious and in some people's minds rather cheap. Possessing a weapon of mass destruction matters more than one's liberty to bowl on a Thursday evening without fearing for one's life. Life. Life matters. Guns should not.


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