The Texas Solution to Mass Shootings – More Guns
Forgive me for going political, but occasionally I have to let off steam.
I was raised with guns. My husband fought in Vietnam; we have great respect for weapons of all kinds, and when they are needed, and the damage they can inflict. We believe in protecting ourselves.
We don’t need an assault rifle.
When the governor of Texas pulled a sad face and talked about the need to protect Texans, without getting specific, the hair on the back of my neck started going up. Another politician hiding what he is really saying, I thought. When pushed, he referred to the eight new laws going into effect that very day, the same day another angry white American-born male had shot and killed seven people and wounded many more.
He carried an assault rifle. First killed was a policeman making a traffic stop.
The gun laws that the governor referred to as going into effect, each and every law, protect gun ownership and allow guns legally to be carried in more places.
Churches, synagogues and mosques.
Schools.
God forbid.
More guns, in my experience, do NOT make us more safe.
While we were with the military, guns which were not being used for training purposes (or war) were locked up. Every base, every unit has it’s own weapons storage center, kept under lock and key, and those are the rules for professionals with a huge familiarity with guns, and their proper handling, and their capabilities.
Any person can become temporarily insane. I myself have had moments when I knew I was capable of killing, especially to protect my child, or another innocent. None of us know what we are capable of under extreme stress or circumstances.
I can imagine NO circumstance under which it would be appropriate for me to carry an assault weapon.
Here, courtesy of CNN, are the eight new gun laws the governor cited in his lily-livered bow to the NRA:
A series of new firearm laws go into effect in Texas on Sunday, just hours after a shooting left seven people dead in the western part of the state.
Weapons on school grounds
Marshals at schools
Guns in foster homes
Weapons in apartments
Handguns during a disaster
Firearms in places of worship
An Unexpected Day
When I printed out my boarding pass, I got a bad surprise. I had only forty-one minutes from my landing time to the departure of my next flight, and no idea how close the gates would be. I had already committed to trying this trip with one carry on bag – not an easy decision for a person who plans for all contingencies, and packs to meet them.
AdventureMan got me to the airport early, and as no one was waiting at the baggage counter, I asked if there were any seats on the flight leaving earlier. “Check at the gate” she told me.
I got on the flight. Problem solved. Plenty of bin space, my other perennial concern. Even got an aisle seat. All is well.
In Atlanta, I am so glad I made this decision, both the carry-on and the earlier flight. I have to change areas, from A to T, and it would not have been possible. As I walked to the T gate, my mind was fully blown.
The Atlanta airport often has wonderful art exhibits in the underground walkways between different wings of the airport. This time – oh WOW, it is a Zimbabwean exhibit of stone sculptors.
If you have the capability, go in close to these sculptures and look at the fine texture incised in the stone. This twenty minutes made my day.
This one above is called The Conversation 🙂
Look at her hair! It is frothy, and there are holes you can see through. Stone made liquid and light!
Who Will Care for the Child? A comment on the AIDS epidemic and the loss of family and care-taking.
Take a minute to look at the textures!
These masks and motifs may be African, but they also remind me very much of the Alaskan First Nation art and costumes.
LOL, I couldn’t help but laugh. The artist truly captured the eccentric quality of the Secretary Bird.
Air travel can be so dehumanizing, herded from arrivals to departures, herded on the plane, cramped into tinier and tinier seats, using tinier restrooms. And then, all of a sudden, a gift of beauty to make you stop and catch your breath and divert your thoughts from the negative to the positive. Woo HOOO on you, Atlanta Airport.
“You Can’t Send Money to the Sudan”
I totally get it. My bank is trying to protect me. I am “elderly” and I am sitting in the bank officer’s office asking to wire money to my friend in South Sudan.
“I need to talk with somebody,” she says and comes back with a man. I manage, barely, to keep from rolling my eyes.
“You know,” he tells me sternly, “We are forbidden to send money to the Sudan. It’s on the prohibited list.”
“Yes,” I say brightly, “The Sudan is on the prohibited list. The South Sudan, and entirely different country, is not.”
They want to make sure I know what I am doing. They tell me true stories of people here in Pensacola sending money to scam artists. Thousands of dollars. How do I know this person?
I explain he was a State Department International Visitor on their IVLP program, that he has attended church with me, is a renowned journalist, that he has dined in my home. They are looking at me with pity.
“This isn’t thousands of dollars,” I tell them. “This is school tuition, he only asks for help this one time to keep his daughters in school. The South Sudan is going through tumultuous times.”
“I know this person,” I re-assure them. “I believe I am sending money to my friend,” I tell them. “I can afford this risk; I can afford to lose this money,” I tell them.
I have to also tell this to the international wire-banking account manager who they get on the line. We go over it all again. I sign all the papers.
A couple hours later, I get a call asking if I am really sure. What are the names of the daughters? I look up our correspondence and provide the names. The bank information is in Juba, where my friend lives, not Nigeria, not anywhere other than where my friend lives.
In only two days, my friend notifies me that the funds have arrived, and he is profoundly grateful.
A week later, my bank calls me again, concerned as to whether the funds made it to my friend, and how I felt about the experience. They are still concerned. I assure them the funds have reached my friend, he has contacted me, thanked me. I do not tell them my friend continues to raise his voice at a time when the government is transitioning, and he is trying to be a voice of reason and civility.
There is a part of me that totally understands the banks need to protect their customers, and how gullible I might appear to them. And there is a part of me that despairs at our fear of the stranger, at our fear of being taken, and at our ignorance, not even knowing that there is a Sudan, and that there is a new country called the South Sudan.
Four times in my life I have been asked to help with school expenses, in tough times, to people we know in four different countries. Four times my husband and I have wired money to people who only want to give their children a chance at a better life. We have always been thanked, We have never been asked again.
I met a woman whose theory was that none of the money that came her way was hers, that it was God’s money and she was merely the steward; it passed through her hands on the way to where God wants it to go. It helps me with requests like this, from people I know. It helps me with the homeless on the streets of Pensacola, knowing I am to freely, freely give, and God will see that it gets where it needs to go.
“Do You Have a Heartbeat?”
This morning in Pensacola the temperature was a cool 71 degrees F. and the humidity was low. It makes all the difference in the world.
“How’s your day?” I asked my friend in the pool at the YMCA, and she grimaced. “I’m off to a bad start,” she said, “I hung my suit and towel and shoes on the line outside, and after the rain last night, everything was soaked this morning.
(We really needed the rain, and we got a soaker of a storm. Today, everything is blossoming in our yard and happy, moonflowers, African Irises, Ginger, plumbago, roses – they respond to a good soaking by blooming in delight.)
I grinned at her. “Did you wake up this morning? Do you have a heartbeat? Are you breathing? Are you here at the YMCA?” I was heartless, and persistent. She laughed.
I talked about the countries I’ve lived in; how in my first African country, Tunisia, back in the day, people competed for our garbage. My cleaning lady asked permission to take glass jars with lids, to take tuna cans. She asked that I give her any clothes I didn’t want. In the Middle East, there were restaurants where people waited near parked cars to beg for the leftovers we carried. Anything. Anything would do.
Some people didn’t have a towel, much less a swim suit, or shoes to hang on a line.
We live in the midst of plenty. Even Tunisia, when we went back twenty five years later, didn’t have the poverty we saw when we lived there. We didn’t see clubbed feet, we didn’t see hunched backs, we didn’t see crossed eyes. The little villa we had lived in had a second floor. There were signs everywhere of prosperity. We didn’t see any beggars, not one.
When I get all wrapped around the axel about the state of civility in my country, about our abuses at the border, about our increasing bureaucratic hardness-of-heart toward the least of these, I need to stop and take a deep breath and spend time acknowledging how very blessed we are. It gives me strength to go on fighting.
Bozeman Yellowstone Airport
How often does an airport rate a blog entry? From the moment we landed in Bozeman to begin our trip, I was itching to take photos and show you what a beautiful job they have done positioning the Bozeman airport as the entry to Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks.
First, the airport is structured to look like a high-end game lodge. They have high ceilings, a huge stone fireplace, several sculptures and pieces (probably reproductions, but hey) from the Museum of the Rockies. I LOVE this airport.
I love the bobcat jumping off the ledge of the fireplace 🙂
And a last view of the mountains, from the airport.
Glacier National Park: Traveler’s Rest
So we are having this perfect day, this glorious day. Mountains, sun, lakes, Spring, bear, isn’t this a grand life?
Well, like every life, it has its moments. We find a perfectly average place to eat; it really looks promising and then everything we order is like pulled out of the freezer kind of stuff, not awful, just not what we would ever choose if we had known. In East Glacier, however, the season has not really started yet and a lot of places just haven’t opened yet.
Then, we are ready to get settled. I know where we will be staying is near Saint Mary, and I have directions. We keep following the directions, but it isn’t working. I call the B&B and tell her I am at the gas station by the gift shop and she gives me more directions, and we follow them and something is just not right.
AdventureMan is getting frustrated, I am feeling stressed and incompetent, so I call again, and somehow, this time, we discover that I am in the wrong place, about 30 minutes from the right place, which is East Glacier Village, or just outside.
Whew. Crisis averted. We get back on the road and shortly we see where we need to be.
These are some of the nicest cabins I have ever seen. They feel spacious on the inside, and are beautifully done. You can see East Glacier Village and the train depot from our porch. And the mountains.
We go into East Glacier Village to pick up some milk for our cereal in the morning, and we see the Two Medicine Grill, which seems to have fresh pie. We can’t resist fresh pie.
As we are leaving, I point out to AdventureMan the Railway Depot across the street. He said no it wasn’t. I was stunned. Sometimes this happens, and he is very adamant, and so sure that I doubt myself, but not this time. And then . . . then he did it. He said “Do you have a minute?” I held my breath so I wouldn’t laugh out loud. “Sure,” I said agreeably. So he turned the car around and zipped up and pulled into the terminal. “THIS is not the Depot!” he crowed. (Looking right at the sign that said Train Depot.) I just looked at him in amazement, and laughing, until he looked again and then he started laughing too. It was one of the best moments of the trip, and we howled with laughter all the way back to the cabin, where we sat on our balcony, looking out at the mountains, and ate our pies.
He had peach. I had cherry.
Glacier National Park: Many Glacier
We have to take the long way around to get up to the Many Glacier entrance, back through East Glacier Village to Browning, then up to Saint Mary, but no problem, because we’ve rented a cabin in the Saint Mary area. Going through Browning, we see tee-pees, just alongside the road:
This ride is just gorgeous, but it is not a great road. It isn’t a terrible road, but it is not paved, and from time to time there are serious potholes. There isn’t a lot of traffic, so we are not inconvenienced, it’s just we haven’t been on a road like this since maybe Africa.
Along the way, we see something we haven’t seen before, a Mama Black Bear but with only one cub. The cub looks older, maybe one year old, and life must be easier for the Mama than if she were trying to feed two cubs.
It was just us and one other couple. This was heaven.
Now I want to show you how the same scene looked in Hayden Valley, in Yellowstone:
It’s horrible. This was the Mama Bear and her two cubs trying to feed while people are scrambling to get their attention and photograph them.
Bear watching on the way to Many Glacier was relaxed – for her and for us.
Many Glacier Lodge
We want to come back and stay here. (Many Glacier Lodge is not open until around Mid-June) What joy, to wake up in the morning to all this beauty.
Glacier National Park: Two Medicine
Those of you who have known me since 2006, when Here There and Everywhere started, know that I am a religious woman, so what I am about to say won’t bother you. If discussions of a spiritual nature distress or annoy you, just skip down to the photos.
This journey, through Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks has been one of the most profoundly spiritual journeys I have ever taken. I can understand why our First Nation people consider these places holy ground. There is a majesty, and a grandeur, and a reminder that I am a very small piece of a very large and complex creation.
The temperatures are in the 80’s, but roads are still closed and you have to go around.
I loved this write-up, and of course we had to take this hike. I didn’t hike to the top of the falls, but I am happy we did the hike to the view point. As an interesting aside, these falls were roaring. I’ve seen other photos of this falls that show it is actually two falls. In the spring, when the melt swells the flow, you can’t see the two, but when the upper fall diminishes, you can see the larger, lower fall.
Running Bear and Running Eagle 🙂
The General Store at Two Medicine Lake
Picnickers at the Lake
From West Glacier National Park to Glacier Park Lodge the Long Way
We have yet to drive the complete Going-to-the-Sun road, and we know it just isn’t in the cards this trip, even with the heat wave (temperatures are in the 80’s F.) it just makes avalanches less predictable. The road is closed.
So we have to go around, and the going around is beautiful. The map below is from Google Maps.
From East Glacier Park Village, we will be able to take Two Medicine Road. In the old days, this WAS the road into the park, and it is beautiful. (Don’t worry, I intend to balance all this navigation with a lot of photos.)
Map into Many Glacier and Road-to-the-Sun from East Entrance at St. Mary:
What is very cool is that these maps are free, online, at My Yellowstone Park.
You know we have a preference for having the road all to ourself, so an early departure – not too early, like 7:00 a.m. – gets us what we want. Google Maps tells us it will only take an hour and 19 minutes, but we are big on the experience, and we stop often, and it takes us a little longer.
The first thing we see coming into East Glacier Park Village is a gorgeous lodge, the Glacier Park Lodge. When I tried to book it, it said it would not be open when we visited and it wasn’t open, but . . . the people working to get it open were very kind, and a ranger showed us through the beautiful old hotel. It has huge timbers holding up the lobby, and a beautiful skylight in the roof so it all feels bright and airy and open. This place is gorgeous.
This hotel is one of the classic lodges, built to bring visitors to see these amazing sights in a time when there were no super highways, but there were trains. Just across from the hotel is the AmTrak stop.
There is a large golf course, many activities, a famous dining room, and best of all, it is located at the entrance to Two Medicine.
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