One Mom and Way Too Many Guns

This article originally appeared on 12th & Broad on December 2, 2015. It went viral the following day.

Photo: source unknown

As Thanksgiving approached last week, I did a lot of thinking about what I'm thankful for this year. My dad is undergoing treatment for pancreatic cancer, and his sudden, unexpected brush with mortality has catapulted me into a reflective mood. Like many families, we have a tradition of going around the Thanksgiving table, each of us saying what we're grateful for. Lubricated by wine and warmth, we pay homage to our blessings.

This year, the most obvious thing to be thankful for was time, the time we still have—all together—in relatively good health. So that's what I said. And I meant it.

But underneath that honest appreciation was an ominous, more disconcerting thankfulness. In my heart of hearts, beyond my father's good health, the thing I'm most thankful for this year is the fact that my four-year-old son has never had to face down the barrel of a gun.

It didn't occur to me to be thankful for this until recently, and, frankly, I'm pissed that I have to be thankful for it. I don't want that thought anywhere near my brain.

I'd prefer to live in a place where guns are regulated and rare. But I don't. I live in a place called America where there are guns under mattresses, on top of refrigerators, and being sold legally—without background checks—in parking lots and at yard sales nationwide. I live in a place where there have been more mass shootings than days of the year in 2015; where 88 people die every single day from firearms; and where little kids are often both victims and accidental perpetrators.

I'm not afraid of terrorism. I'm afraid of play dates. I'm afraid of unsecured guns stored in hard to reach places by well-meaning gun owners. I'm afraid of a split-second.

Gun violence is terrifyingly quick. Whether a toddler shooting his brother or a suicidal college kid wandering into a gun shop on a broken-hearted whim, it's too easy. Access is just way too easy, and the damage done is way too fast.

My kid will have to pass a test and get a license before he can drive a car. He'll be required to wear a seatbelt and get insurance in exchange for his freedom on the open road. But if nothing changes, he will also be able to legally buy a gun from a stranger, when and wherever he wants, walking away with ammunition in hand. As things currently stand, he and everyone else on American soil has that "right"—unregulated and unchecked. 

Photo: John Minchillo/AP

I take no issue with the right to bear arms, but I do take issue with the right to bear them without training or accountability.

And most of the country agrees with me. 92% of Americans believe universal background checks should be required to purchase guns under any and all circumstances. Ninety-two percent! Is there anything else that ninety-two percent of Americans agree on? That the earth is round perhaps? Maybe not even that.

We have an election coming up, and something has to change. Legislators on both sides of the aisle, on national and state levels, need todo something to keep guns out of the hands of criminals, psychopaths, and the clinically depressed. If they can't pledge to support universal background checks, they shouldn't get to be in office. They don't deserve our money or our votes. Period.

I'm late to this party. Moms on the south side of Chicago have thanked their lucky stars for decades when their kids came home safe at night, while the rest of us shook our heads, prayed on Sundays, and wrote off their fears as a problem that would never make its way to our doorsteps. Well, it has arrived.

My own assumption that these casualties would never hit home was rooted in a combination of white privilege, ignorance, and willful blindness. But we're all getting shot now… in nightclubs, movie theaters, and classrooms. Geographic location doesn't protect anybody any more. We are all vulnerable to random gun violence by nature of the sheer number of weapons in our midst and the total lack of oversight from politicians in power.

It's hard to mobilize time and energy for a good cause before tragedy hits close to home. It's easier to turn away until it comes knocking, but by staying silent, every one of us grows increasingly more vulnerable.

I went to a survivor panel hosted by Moms Demand Action for Gun Safety the weekend before Thanksgiving. As I lay in bed the night before, acid churned in my stomach. I was overwhelmed by the news, the shootings in Paris and torrents of fear and hatred flooding the airways. I was afraid to hear the stories of people in my own community who lost loved ones to stray bullets or targeted ones. I was terrified it would add to the very real fear that my son—or any of my loved ones—would find themselves in the path of one of those bullets. But denial wasn't working for me anymore. I needed facts and fellowship. I needed to bear witness on my own turf.

I heard terrible stories there: of kids shooting kids, hate crimes, suicides, crossfire, and deluded madmen. One survivor, Katie, was steps away from her father when he was shot dead in a shopping mall at the age of 45. Each story reeked of chaos and meaninglessness, but instead of adding to the noise in my head, I found power and strength in that room. The fear was no longer distant. It was right there, held sacred by human beings who were willing to crack open their own stories, prepared to link arms and hold on tight for a common cause: common sense.

Guns are everywhere. That's just the truth. This isn't about taking anybody's guns away. It's about registering and storing them properly and keeping them far, far away from people who would do harm with them.

So this Thanksgiving I'm thankful that my 67-year-old father is persevering in the face of cancer. He's doing everything in his power to stay here with us as long as he can. Katie's dad wasn't so lucky. He was shot down in a shopping mall, selling coasters that were handmade by his own father for Christmas. He never got a chance to grow old, to fight for his health and wellbeing, and to see his grandkids grow up.

So in my darkest but most hopeful heart of hearts, I am thankful for every public figure who has the guts to stand up for universal background checks, and I'm thankful for every mom who has the guts to ask before a play date, "Are there guns in the house, and, if so, are they locked up?"

The randomness is almost too much to bear, but in every corner of this country, there is a lot that can be done to make us and our kids safer if we stop turning a blind eye and demand what we know is right. Common sense. That's all. Just a little common sense.