Unsilent

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

-Edmund Burke

Going on with my frivolous little blog without acknowledging that the world is different today than it was Friday morning feels weird. My mom is an elementary school librarian, and I know exactly what she would have done for her kids if a man with a gun had walked through the door.

Typing that makes me cry.

Still, I am no more personally involved in this than anyone else whose parents are teachers or whose siblings or children are in grade school. Compared to those families in Newtown, I lost nothing on Friday. To halt my life or talk about my own grief, to refuse to move forward, feels wrong to me when they still have to wake up every morning and go on. I am so, so lucky.

I have so much respect for what other bloggers have done to cope with this - just do what feels right to you. Be silent, light candles, donate, pray, cry. But when you're ready, we have to talk. We have got to talk, and soon, and differently.

Be passionate and informed, and remember that those you disagree with would give just as much as you would to make this stop. Having different ideas about what will make that happen doesn't make a person ignorant or closed-minded or cold. An opinion that is different from yours is not the evil we're fighting against. Eye rolling and name calling have no place in this battle -- and yes, it will be a battle.

Don't shy away from the discussion because there is no simple answer. Write your congressman. Tell him or her what you think is right, and then point to the arguments from the other side that you could live with. Remind them that compromise is not defeat.

From spending law school (and the rest of my life) working in the criminal justice system, I know in my heart that guns are the (very important) side issue; that they are the tools of evil and not the source of evil, that even if we could throw every gun in the world into the ocean, evil would adapt. Don't forget to talk about the people who are pulling the trigger. Demand reform of our mental health system. Insist on options for parents that don't include criminal convictions for their children. Take ownership of the deeper cultural problem that has manifest itself on our watch, and don't stop for a second until we've taken it back.

Our schools, our children, are too sacred not to try. Honor the victims this way.