My School, MSU, Was the Next Target . . . Who's Next?
Trigger Warning: This mentions a school shooting on a college campus which can be sensitive to readers, especially those who have been affected by it in any way. It's written in the format of a personal experience that happened at Michigan State specifically. Given how recent it was, it's understandable if you are not comfortable reading this, as healing from a tragedy such as this is a life-long process. Everyone grieves differently and at different paces.
Maybe it's too early for me to be writing about this. Maybe I'm supposed to take some time to think about all that has happened and to reflect and do all the healthy things I can't seem to get myself to do. But maybe I need writing to get through this.
I don't think I realized it actually happened until I saw it all over TikTok and saw all the photos and videos. I didn't realize it until I looked it up on Google and saw my own school in the results. For a second, my sober self had to blink twice, thinking I saw Miami or a different school that sounded similar. Because in my mind there was no possible way that it happened here.
I was out with my mentee and I didn't even realize what was going on. I was luckily in a car and got back to my apartment. I was right next to all the police and helicopters and stuff. It was pretty scary. I scared my roommates to death and had to text everyone I was okay. How sad is it that Facebook currently has a safe roll call to see who is okay and who isn't??
We've had gun threats on campus before, but never fatalities. When my mom first told me there was an active shooter, I didn't realize this would be a mass shooting. I think I'm still in shock, so sorry if my writing reflects that.
Today I've been trying to accomplish things. I'm going to try to run and I've done a lot of writing. But I feel tired for no reason and I can't concentrate. I can't fathom that people are dead in this community. And I can't get over the guilt I feel that I wasn't one of the people barricaded in a targeted classroom or one of the people who heard the shots. Or one of the people who got shot. I feel guilty because, all day, I was in that area that got hit. In other words, I was in the right place at the wrong time.
The biggest guilt of all that I feel isn't survival guilt. It's the guilt that we're here again. It's the guilt that I felt so bad after the other shootings. I felt bad and I forgot them just like everyone else. When I criticize the world, I'm criticizing myself too. While I love to try to help change things, I'm worried things will never change. That's the worst part about this is there's no closure. What's to stop someone from doing this again? The students who died last night, they can't say it was their time to go. This is the kind of death you can't say happens for a reason. My faith does not work in this scenario. They were killed. If the guy hadn't been there, they would still be alive. It could be any one of us.
I do really feel numb to it.
Most of all, I feel stupid that I never thought my community would become a statistic. We all wear this pretend invincibility, pretending like we're cats with nine lives. And I think we have to do that in order to press on in this world.
I'm having trouble even writing this blog post, to be completely honest. It's like my brain is having a massive brain fart. I had therapy today and I was talking about something and completely lost my train of thought.
It's Valentine's Day for crying out loud. It's Valentine's and I have a date tomorrow, and thinking about it now makes me want to puke.
I guess I just have one question.
How many more times?
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