OPINION: Shots in the dark

Peering more deeply into some of the strange silences of our usually rowdy Christmas season, we would have to take note of two things: Hurricane Sandy, which washed away homes, cars, and in some cases savings along the east coast; and the impending threat of the country going over the “fiscal cliff,” which made people increasingly reluctant to spend.

Looking closer to home, our clan, like many others, was visited by what Garrison Keillor calls “the dark angel” – a flu that kept two of our family members from traveling here to join us, and hit a third one upon arrival. We all went forward with the holiday festivities as best we could, but we were conscious of those gifts under the tree that never got opened.

And for me those unopened gifts were an eloquent reminder of the families in Newtown, Connecticut whose little children would be missing, and missed, from now on, murdered at school by an emotionally disturbed young man wielding an assault rifle. On the day the last of the slain children were laid to rest in their tiny caskets, the front page of the New York Daily News had just one headline: “If These 20 Children Cannot Change This World, No One Will.”

Wouldn’t it be redemptive if innocents slain could accomplish what no one else has been able to achieve? It does seem that something immeasurably profound has occurred, and that we will be forever changed as a nation, in some way. But the path to a solution will require calm heads, open minds, diplomatic behavior, and emotional detachment, elements not often on view in the wild hurly-burly of the American scene. Changing the world is a tall order.

Ten days after the shooting, I was in what I call the men’s department of Walmart, back where the tires and guns are sold. I was looking for reflectors, hoping to put them out where they would help me find my driveway on a dark and stormy night. The young man ahead of me was looking for “ammo” for his “AR” (assault rifle), and the department manager was commiserating with him about how it had all been bought up by other gun-owners who were afraid it would be banned. I wanted to ask the young man why he needed the equivalent of a submachine gun. Why does anyone need such a thing, unless they’re on military active duty in a war zone? But it was Christmas — at least, for all the lucky people whose children were still alive — and I hated to be unkind. Now I think perhaps I need to change. As the sign says, “Be the Change You Seek.”

Susan Harper is retired, lives in Commerce and volunteers with the Commerce Public Library and the Jackson County Literacy Program.