Numb.

The tragedy at Virginia Tech has constantly been on my mind since seeing the news reports yesterday. At first my thoughts were “my God, I can not believe that happened, and I really can not believe that it happened on a college campus.” It was not shortly after my initial shock that I realized that I am a full-time college student that spends a considerable amount of time on campus.

Each of my instructors have reminded us at the beginning of class this week that professional counselors are available 24/7 on campus. There was a gathering at the performance hall to remember those that were killed and to host an open forum for a discussion about campus safety. We’ve actually had two tragedies here, in that a city police officer was fatally shot on Thursday after pulling a car over in a routine stop. City of Utica Police Officer Thomas Lindsey was 32 years old and a 2001 graduate of Mohawk Valley Community College. A police officer, shot dead, simply because he was serving his community and had pulled car over.

When does this all stop? What purpose is served by giving the general public free access to any type of weapon including machine guns? I am not talking about the type of guns sportsmen use when they’re out in the woods doing their thing. Most hunters use their guns responsibly (Dick Cheney not withstanding). I’m talking about semi-automatic guns that can be reloaded faster than it takes to open a can of pop and almost always end up in the hands of madmen.

I feel an incredible rant bubbling inside of me. It has not come to a boil yet and there’s no steam coming out of my ears, but it’s there and it’s building.

I guess the world is really disappointing me these days. Actually, it’s not the world that’s disappointing me. It’s a chunk of the human race.