Twenty-three years ago a boy in a neighboring town shot up his high school. I was just in college, but it affected my friends, coworkers and roommates. There were prayer vigils and hospital visits and lawsuits. Just when the community started to move on, the next spring, the shooting at Columbine happened. All the freshly healed wounds got ripped open again. Then it happened again, and again and again. I don’t get sad anymore, just mad. Furious.

I am now a teacher and parent. Both my daughters and I are subjected to active shooter drills. I know what fear, pain and losses these shootings create in a community, as do many, many others. Yet, we are timid to make real changes when it comes to stopping the flow of guns into the hands of young men. Instead, we lock up teachers and children behind automatically bolted doors, cowering underneath desks. Why should we have to run and hide when it’s the gun manufacturers and weapons enthusiasts who have all the power? This is not the kind of world we want to live in.