I woke up this morning to my 6 o’clock alarm and laid in bed for the next ten minutes checking Facebook, CNN, and Twitter.
As I checked my Facebook feed, the first post that was from a student that had graduated my high school last year. There had been a shooting at FSU. She was okay; she had been in her dorm, not the library where the shooting took place.
When I read her post, I froze. Even though there have been multiple shootings this past year, this was the first one that actually made me stop. This was the first shooting that someone I knew could have been killed. This was the first shooting that was personal.
I did not learn of this shooting from CNN or from a trending Twitter hashtag. I learned of this shooting from a Facebook post written by a girl with whom I spent two and a half weeks in India with who was scared since there was a shooter on her campus.
It should not have taken this many shootings until I actually froze. Until I actually was scared. Until it became personal.
I’m off to college next year; I got my first college acceptance Tuesday. Will a gunman come into my library when I am studying?
A lot of my friends might be going to FSU next year; a lot of my friends are at FSU this year. No longer are school shootings something that happen across state lines from me. And that scares me.
There was someone trying to cause harm at a place that should be safe. Students should not have to worry about being shot while studying. They should be focusing on the foreshadowing in the novel they are reading or taking the derivative of a function or who they are going to hang out with that night.
I wish I knew how to solve it. And I just don’t.
The only thing that I know for certain is that we must focus on learning and on love.
ad hoc 