WordSisters

Category: Reflection

  • National Day of Mourning

    Is it time for America to create a National Day of Mourning for gun violence victims?

    Think about that.

    Memorial Day I wrote a piece about how children’s funerals create memories that cannot be forgotten and my difficulty in finding peace in my relationship with God. Sitting in a neighborhood church the evening of September 11, 2001, feels like the last time the ritual of praying and singing in community brought calm. The day the world changed, and innocent people became the hunted of those with evil in their plans.

     My final paragraph of the original work was my main message: If there is a way to create calm or comfort for those mourning in Uvalde, please let that happen. For the near future, lets put guns in the safes and do gun related political theater in backrooms. These are days to stand with the grieving and honor the children and their teachers. 

    Tuesday stats about gun violence across the country over Memorial Weekend were published. Wednesday a lone gunman took lives in Tulsa. And local schools cancelled their last days of school because of shooter threats. Babies being buried in one state and grieving beginning in others. The circle doesn’t close. Violent gun carriers, particularly those with assault guns, don’t give us a day off.

    Perhaps it is time for America to create a National Day of Mourning for gun victims. Place the day somewhere in a quiet month like March where it won’t morph into a cookout festival. And make it a Wednesday so the travel industry won’t advertise three-day weekends in happy places. Mark the day as special by pairing it with a mandatory national service initiative. Support those who grieve and remember the potential our nation lost in each of those unnatural deaths. If there is no way to control the killing, let us at least honor our dead and remember their names.

  • Sometimes

    Sometimes

    “She’s staring again,” Juan Jose’ remarked to Crystel on Tuesday. The three of us were dining at Pizza Luce. The 19-year-olds sat across from me. I was looking past them, merely looking, not staring at all, at the people coming in the door, the servers rushing into the kitchen, dodging for silverware, the water pitcher, the food that was ordered.

    Crystel shook her head back and forth, “She always does that, you know that.”

    It could be a girl Crystel’s age that will pull me back to the horror of being raped. A toddler sitting on my lap, dozing, her limbs a rag doll. Trusting. Safe. No worries. What would she have to worry about? She’s 2 years old. At 4, adorned in colorful scarves, beads, and unmatched socks. A Jasmine Princess at 5. Loving Johnny Depp at 8. Being the first to jump in the pool, the first to ride her bike, the first…

    “I’m writing stories,” I say in my defense.

    I’m studying people. Their familial relationships. Body language. Emotional state. Piercings. Tattoos. Eye contact.

    That morning I studied a photo of a 10-year-old Wisconsin girl. She had long brown hair, parted in the middle, smiling eyes, smooth face. She looked happy.

    I pictured the 14-year-old who raped and killed her. How much bigger he would have been than her. His height, weight, and strength. My stomach tightened.

    I was her.

    8 years old
    8 years old.

    The young girl with a smooth face. Smiling.

    I was no match for a 14-year-old.

    My four older siblings just kept getting older. And I would always be the younger.

    The running track already set. An oval that I would run round and round.

    Never getting away.

    I asked for help when I was 9. I was afraid. They were bigger. I needed help.

    None was forthcoming. I became that 10-year-old. Only I didn’t die.

    It lives within me. The assaults. The rapes.

    The watching of others.

  • Renewal

    On days when sun warms my shoulders and tiny green leaves push aside matted brown ones, the idea of spring’s renewal buoys me. 

    I was raised Catholic and the celebration of Easter and spring have always been linked. But I’ve drifted away from the Catholic Church. The Easter rituals of my youth—the stations of the cross, Easter vigil, joyfully meeting the day in a new dress, hat, gloves and shiny shoes—are no longer relevant to me. 

    Easter is meant to be about immortality. Rebirth. But what does Easter mean to me now? I have more years behind me than ahead of me. The idea of rebirth in an afterlife should be coming into sharper focus, but isn’t.

    Without the religious underpinnings, Easter feels odd. But Easter is still about gathering my family, enjoying a good meal, hope, and renewal.

    The midwestern world is coming alive again after a long harsh winter. That’s reason to celebrate. My life and nature go on with their seasons.