I had to wait...because my heart hurt

I could not write anything about the horrible events in Florida.

My heart hurt. 

It hurt because of the deaths, because of the miscues by law enforcement and because I knew the stupid debate would begin once more.

I am tired of the debate.

What tires me is our lack of common sense and the zealous behavior of the left and the right.  I am so tired of the far left calling all members of the NRA 'monsters' and I am sick to death of those on the far right being convinced that this mass shooting didn't happen and that jack-booted police are waiting in black jeeps at the end of their street for the signal from the government to kick down their door and take their weapons.

I am tired of the self-proclaimed REAL Catholics on BOTH sides of the debate declaring the other side as going to hell.

Being the daughter of a WW2 Vet and experienced sportsman, I was raised with weapons in the home.  Those weapons disappeared when my father left us but I knew where those guns were, could have put my hands on them at any time and knew how to operate them.

I have nothing against responsible gun ownership. 

I am a proud citizen of the United States.  I believe in the US Constitution and I believe that law abiding citizens have rights under the 2nd amendment that need to be respected and upheld.

NONE of this means I think we do not have a problem in this country because anyone and everyone seems to be able to get their hands on weapons that can kill 17 people in a matter of minutes.

I do not like the idea of big government.

That does NOT mean I think black helicopters are being dispatched from the UN, flown by Alien Hybrid Lizard People, to take over our country.  I do NOT believe in 'Crisis Actors' and think anyone who believes these mass shootings are fake are the very people who should NOT be allowed to have any weapon more dangerous than a hunting knife - which, as you probably know, can kill someone. Rarely, however, can one person wielding a hunting knife kill a dozen people in 4 minutes, unless they are a character in The Badlands.

I do not pretend, like most people on the internet, to have a solution to the problem however it flies in the face of reason that we cannot come up with some way to curtail the behavior of someone like Nikolas Cruz or Adam Lanzo.  

What bothers me the most is that we fight over the dumbest stuff - Crisis Actors? REALLY, PEOPLE???? - and waste so much precious time looking for someone to blame and feel superior to that we miss opportunity after opportunity to try and figure out a way to protect our kids.

The members of the NRA are not MONSTERS - stop calling them that - and those who are trying to restrict access to guns are NOT NAZIS - stop calling them THAT.

In fact, stop using name calling of all kinds as a way to make your point.  Tell me what you would like to see done...don't tell me what we CANNOT do, give me an idea for a solution. 

If we can begin with that objective, maybe we can come up with some idea that might work.