The Visit

 My friends, Curt and Allen, came to visit last weekend. It had been over seven years since I had last seen Curt. He had left the memorial gathering held for my husband after we shared a tearful hug, and had flown home to Orlando, Florida.

We met Curt when he came to work for us while he was completing his undergraduate degree at Pepperdine University. And through Curt, we met Todd, and through Todd we met Christopher. Friends at first and now family.

Joel made enchiladas for our reunion, and I made shrimp ceviche and baked a cake. We served Mexican beer, but Curt brought his beloved Bud Light. Go figure. There was also tequila, mezcal, and a newly discovered jet fuel, Sotol. Food was good, company was stellar, and Curt regaled us all with tales told in his characteristically great storytelling style.

We also talked about Pulse and Borderline. Curt and Allen had been to the Pulse nightclub in Orlando. They had gone there in the past before the shooting that took the lives of 49 people. It was a gay bar and nightclub, and on June 12, 2016 was at that time, the scene of the second worst mass shooting by a single gunman in U.S. history. Is it odd to know someone connected to something so unimaginable? Read on.

My friend, Max, lives in Hamden, Connecticut. In December of 2012, as a supportive friend of the parents, he attended the funeral of a five year-old child who was murdered in the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre. He wrote to me about the size of the casket, and that it was the hardest thing he had ever experienced.

A few years ago, my friend, Joyce, invited me to join her and her daughter, Sarah, for a season of theater in Hollywood. Sarah had been in attendance at the Route 91 Harvest music festival in Las Vegas, Nevada, where on October 1, 2017, a gunman opened fire from a hotel adjacent to the festival site, killing sixty people and making it the deadliest mass shooting committed by an individual in U.S. history.

Joel and I met at Borderline, a country-Western bar which for many years was utilized every Tuesday night as a salsa dance club. We hadn't been there for awhile as salsa nights had ended a few years before 2018 when, on November 7th, a gunman opened fire killing twelve people around and on the dance floor we knew so well. The motive was said to be that the shooter, a Marine Corps veteran, hated "entitled, liberal civilians and especially college students" whom it was said he considered disrespectful of the military. Thousand Oaks, California, where this mass shooting occurred, is considered to be one of the safest communities in the U.S.

My father passed away in 1998, less than a year before the Columbine High School shooting, where twelve students and a teacher were murdered in what was, at the time, the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history. Twenty-three years later nearly 300,000 students have been on campus during a school shooting. According to The New England Journal of Medicine, firearms-related injuries are now the number one cause of death of children, adolescents, and young adults between the ages of 1 and 24 years in the U.S. I often think back to my father when pondering changes in our lives since he passed away. What would he have thought about 9/11? What would he have said about the four years of Trump? How horrified would he be of the gun violence epidemic in this country? The United States leads in mass shootings when compared to peer countries whose governments have been quick to pass gun reform in the wake of tragedies. After the Port Arthur massacre in Australia, the Prime Minister stated "We do not want the American disease imported into Australia." Australia established a national gun registry, requires permits for gun purchases and banned all semiautomatic rifles and shotguns. Gun violence decreased, and Australia has had only one mass shooting in the twenty-two years since these reforms.

In the United States, the firearm death rate in 2016 was nearly four times that of Switzerland, five times that of Canada, ten times that of Australia and thirty-five times that of the United Kingdom. This according to a 2018 study published in the Journal of the American Medicine Association. And, guess what, mental illness in the U.K. is not proportionally different than in the U.S.

I am attending a rally today which is sponsored by Moms Demand Action Caucus which is the nation's largest grassroots volunteer network working to end gun violence. MDAC is a part of Everytown for Gun Safety. Everytown and Giffords advocate gun control. There is no question that the founding fathers did not intend the second amendment to be interpreted in such a way to allow eighteen-year olds to purchase AK-15 rifles without background checks, and use them to slaughter children. Nor did it intend that our lives would be disrupted by mass shootings at Pulse, Borderline, music festivals, churches, theaters, markets, malls, and more. My husband's family insisted that he take his father's guns which were "historic and collectible." My mother-in-law admonished me "Those guns will never be fired. You don't have to worry about that." And everyone who knows me, knows how that turned out.

Through May 31st, Mike Bloomberg will triple match your gift to Everytown For Gun Safety. You can contribute by using this link: Everytown For Gun Safety . The other organization I support is Giffords . Gabby Giffords is the former congresswoman who was shot in the head in Arizona in January, 2012 during an assassination attempt. She is married to former Space Shuttle Commander and current senator, Mark Kelly. These people are working hard to stop the madness. Please join in this fight. Do it for Curt. And for me. And for those 300,000 school kids. And for the future victims who will tragically end up in the firing line of these people with their guns. Join us in saying that enough is enough.