Still reeling

I'm not a parent.

Apparently that is important if you wish to discuss the Newtown tragedy.

Believe it or not, but I've talked to a few people since Friday, and apparently the defining factor in how your point of view will be considered is whether you are a parent or not.

If you are a parent, I am so incredibly sorry.  I know that ever since you first heard the news images of what life would be like right now had you happened to live in Newtown and send your little boy or girl to Sandy Brook have been playing through your head night and day.  You probably can't keep the nightmares at bay, and you're probably freaking your kid out just a little bit with how much you just want to hold them.

Please go hold them!  Tell them how much you love them.  Make them the center of the world.  They deserve it everyday, and you deserve the liberty to make it so right now.

We, as rational adults, owe it to them to make the world a better place for them to inherit.  It's too soon to call the parents out of their cocoon, so let's non-parents do our best here.  Note that here I'm assuming I'm not talking to residents of Newtown but the people of say Boston, Los Angeles, Oklahoma City, Providence, Houston, etc...  If you live in Newtown, you have your own private hell to go through, and having been through a private hell once that was made public in a small town (because let's face it, no tragedy is private in a small town), I know the best thing I can do is open my arms, take several steps back, and just let you know you are loved and they are remembered.

Let's take a few steps back.  The people of Newtown, especially the parents of the little babies who were murdered, deserve the privacy to mourn without us watching them.  Mourning means different things to different people, and no one should have their mourning broadcast on public TV.  People act pretty crazy when in mourning, and the mundane ones will be seen running out into the front yard with their pajamas on screaming his name and tearing out their hair or quietly drowning in a half-bottle of whiskey in the back yard.

Give them privacy, folks.  Look away.  When CNN offers you footage of their mourning just a click away, refuse to click the link.  Don't go there.  Try to think how you would feel if it were your baby, your brother, your sister, your niece, your nephew, and the reporters were hounding you, your parents, your family, for a good soundbyte.  I heard that a church in Newtown had to have volunteers escort grieving families to their cars after a vigil to help protect them from the press, and that there were 20 members of the press for every resident in that town right now.  That's probably not true, but it's probably not all that far from the truth.

We can't do that much from where we sit.  We can send money, but that won't bring back the babies.  We can empathize and change policy and hope that we prevent something.  The best thing we can do right now is just open our arms, take several steps back, and let them know they are loved and they are remembered.